Work management is the methodical organisation of workflow. Without it, you run the risk of missing deadlines, poor collaboration, and burnouts- and this applies to multiple sectors and industries, including creative ones. So, let’s look at the four reasons why work management plays an important role in creative environments.
1. Steer clear of missing deadlines
Why exactly is missing a deadline so serious? The world still turns without you anyway- that much is true. However, therein lies the problem. This mismanagement of time and energy likely leads to the pilling up of work, which in turn postpones future processes, affecting the outcome of a collective’s efforts. By assessing what each project of piece demands of you, and about how much time is needed for each one, meeting deadlines become much less of a daunting task.
While the organisational part of creating art isn’t the most exciting, it isn’t something to be neglected. It is hard to figure out how much time is needed for the completion of a creative task, since you can’t exactly predict when inspiration will run dry. But there are tools to that can help you organise your work and make the entire process easier on you. These applications, e.g. TESSR, provides different features that allows you to create a more conscious workflow. From setting reminders through notifications to ranking tasks by priority, time management can slowly become a daily habit.
2. Avoid burning out
Much like any other job, artists are not exempt from burnouts. While there are reasons both tangible and intangible to demotivation, poor work management can play a part in it. Creatives often have tasks and ideas in abundance, so much so that it’s hard to keep track of. It’s likely for creatives to jump to different projects without completing a previous one. At this rate, you’ll spread yourself thin— and find yourself in a slump. Stress and unnecessary pressure extinguish creativity.
If you find yourself running into similar issues, start by collating all the projects you have in store. Note down the deadlines of each and approach your work chronologically. Project management tools can assist you do so by helping you better understand how your day should be planned out. Features such as completion percentages or customisable project metrics can help you fall into a healthy work rhythm, avoiding burn outs and even motivate you when you find yourself getting closer to the target. You may want to fall into old habits but keep consistent, and your progress will reward you.
3. Strengthen collaboration for optimal output
Collaboration can be challenging. This is especially true when things are done online; we lose context like body language and tone. Without efforts to engage in constructive communication and positive relations among coworkers or teammates, opportunity is lost. The benefits of it are discussed in the research article from Harvard Business Review, ‘How Creative Collaboration Can Strengthen Relationships’, “positive social relationships facilitate creativity...teams that have members who like each other and get along tend to produce more creative and innovative solutions.” When creatives put their heads together, oftentimes the product of it is innovative.
We’ve well established that investing effort in maintaining healthy communication and collaboration among all members is beneficial for the whole team. In an online-based working environment, managers can look out for tools that provides features like expressive text functions with emojis, voice recordings, and annotations. Applications that provide these create the conditions for effective collaboration.
4. Feel heard and understood
Now, this could be more for managers and supervisors. Task allocation is important for an efficient workflow. Without clearly assigning tasks to members of a team— or to the right members of a team— artists may dispute. Take a team of animators as an example. Conflicts about responsibility or accountability over a certain scene may rouse from the lack of concrete task delegation, or tension between teammates could rise from a stagnated workflow. Both of which is avoidable if processes were managed effectively.
Allocating work with data-based approaches can help create a smooth workflow- a function that can be found in project management applications like TESSR. Transparency is the key element of this feature, helping managers gain insight of their team’s workload and performance; from there, nurture the team from the place of understanding.
To conclude, you may not get work management perfect the first time around, but practise makes perfect. Start now and build new habits that can help you create a healthier relationship between idea and execution - with your own strengths and talents, exercising this only means that there'll be more room for you to grow and excel.
Project management applications, like TESSR are optimised to make hiccups in workflow a non-issue. Features like assigning tasks, managing deadlines, tracking progress and effective communication systems are in place.
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Author Bio
From Malaysia, Leia Emeera is a writer at TESSR, and a published author. She has been putting pen to paper ever since she learned how to, and has an anthology to her name, titled 'Ten'. Leia loves music, games and her beloved labrador retriever, George. She aims to further her studies in English Literature and Creative Writing the moment her gap year ends. 'Till then, you will find her sitting behind a desk, writing with TESSR.
Connect with her on LinkedIn: Leia Emeera
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