Time management for business owner managers in creative
industries. Written by Yolanda Kruger and Daniel G Webb
Let me ask you this question? Are you battling to see the fruition of your brilliant mind?
This article was written in the run-up to Christmas 2008, the time of year that scores of
creatively or artisticly inclined people silently perplex internally about what they haven’t
achieved that year while most analytical people are simply closing off a busy year so that
they can go and enjoy Christmas.
What is it about creative thinkers that seem to render them incapable of being as organized
as their more analytical left brain counterparts? After all, hasn’t the global creative
community published dozens of freely available exciting and colorful tools and mechanisms
for people like us to use and be organizationally transformed.

Do you have these symptoms?
Spending your last few days of December doing well overdue travel
•
expenses?
Do you invent new diaries, planners (computer or paper based), only to yet
•
again be looking for that confounded small piece of paper that you wrote
some important details onto?
Are you forever clicking the ‘forgot my password – please send me an email’
•
button in the countless systems and databases you use for work or private
reasons?
Do you have a tendency of over-committing and then under delivering and
•
feeling guilty and marginally escaping being in trouble with bosses or
clients?
Do you procrastinate over your tax returns towards the last few days and
•
then panic when you discover you don’t have the required documentation?

What is it about creative thinkers that seem to render them incapable of being as organized
as their more analytical left brain counterparts? After all, hasn’t the global creative
community published dozens of freely available, exciting and colorful tools and
mechanisms for people like us to use and be organizationally transformed?
What with mind-mapping, De Bono’s six hats, online tools, Microsoft tools, Blackberries and
Iphones….. One would think the creative minded professional could select one of these
tools and use it to organize them into total success in their fields. Yet, for so many of us a
time like the end of the year is so stressful due to all the good intentions and inevitable
undone tasks.
In my own experience as a fellow right brainer, and from my 25 years of experimenting with
tools and system innovations, I offer you some simple answers below. First of all a sobering
one line statement of fact that people like us do not really like to hear:
Whatever the system that you select to organize your
thoughts, actions, contacts and diary, you still need the
discipline and consistency to stick to one system for long
enough for it to work.

Flat file paper notebooks and diaries don’t seem to work for creative and innovative people.
We have a need for colour and illustrations and practicality. We would also prefer a system
that is always close at hand. Chances are, given our nature of being interested
and involved in a dozen projects at any one time, be they business or private or just an
interest that we normally take very seriously, we lose track of our progress.
It is important that you carefully select a tool or a
system that works for you specifically.
prefer a gadget, I suggest that you carefully think about the practicalities of replicating onto
PC’s and about the long term implications should you should change your PDA or phone in
the future. If not, you may be back at square one when your contract expires and you get
your new gadget.
If you are inclined to use colour and mind mapping and other graphically visible systems I
suggest that you choose your stationery and your pens carefully. Further I would suggest
that you devise a way of capturing thoughts, actions and appointments in such a way that it
works the way your mind works… If you are a true right brainer that means your thoughts
are all over the place all of the time!

It is possible to create a planner that
caters for all your information needs.
Furthermore it is actually most productive to be able to
see your whole estate at a glance, because it caters for
your tendency of thinking about and remembering
multiple things simultaneously. Think how productive it
can be if you are able to quickly jot down a few notes
about your car, boat, website, travel expense, that
present for your lover, and your major project…. All in
the time some person took to laboriously make a point in
an otherwise boring conference call or presentation.
Similarly you can make such notes quickly before you go to bed, have breakfast, or while
you watch the news on TV. Why would you want to make such notes at such times? Firstly,
because 10 minutes later you have forgotten. Secondly, simply because you can, and
because it creates the space for you to be your expressive self when you are doing other
important things!
Isn’t such a system pandering to my already undisciplined mind you might ask? And isn’t it
rude to write notes about other things that aren’t relevant to the meeting I am currently in?
Ever heard of the term day dreaming? The truth is that your right brain will kick you into

creative mode in an instant the moment it senses any hint
of boredom, and your brain will go off and re-decorate
your home anyway. All I am suggesting here is that you
accept that your brain is wired in a certain way and that
you create the paper or electronic systems that will
provide maximum means to capitalize on your invaluable
if not ingenious thought processes. I’m not just writing this
to falsely compliment you either.
I can safely write that if you were a left brain analytical you would already have dismissed
this article as the ramblings of a madman. But if you are still engrossed in these words I
can safely deduce that I have hit a nerve and that you know what I am talking about. You
have the ability to create ground breaking world transforming innovations, but alas, you
don’t have the consistency and discipline to pull it off.
Well, I contend that you most certainly can. If you spend some time in creating that elusive
system that will work for you, fight off the temptation to depart from it and only effect
changes with the discipline of a computer systems change manager! In other words, adapt
and change and evolve your system by all means, but keep the consistency at all costs.
The author of this article has many years experience with mind mapping and other creative
thought tools, and has also overspent grossly on every gadget you may be able to think of!
If you have found this article useful and would like to explore some ideas for

further application the author would gladly offer you the personal consulting or coaching to
help you towards those elusive successes.
The Right Brain vs Left Brain test
The following test is said to test if you are right or left brain.. Try it...
Do you see the dancer turning clockwise or anti-clockwise? If clockwise, then you use
more of the right side of the brain and vice versa.
Most of us would see the dancer turning anti-clockwise though you can try to focus and
change the direction; see if you can do it.
Do this free online test at:
www.Chillibizcoach.com
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