Improvement via Repetitive Tasks

Why there's power in doing the same thing over and over

Every morning when my daughter goes to school, I create a "Bus Joke" and slip it in her backpack to read on the bus with her friends. Nothing sophisticated here, just a cute, fun way to put a smile on her face before she faces the day of school ahead.

But yesterday, as I was drawing the pictures that accompany the joke, I noticed that my school bus drawing had improved significantly in the 52 days that I've been doing it (I'm no artist, but pictures below if you're interested).

Which got me thinking about repetitive tasks.

Here's the realization I've come to: We all have repetitive tasks as a part of our work - but the key is that we get to choose how we respond to them.

The choices are:
A. Do the same thing. Over and over. Copy and Paste. Aim for sameness. "It worked before, it'll work again this time."

or

B. Do the same task, but carry forward lessons learned. Improve each time - if only slightly incrementally. Aim for better. "It worked before, but I bet I can do it better this time."

Because the reality is, any time you're faced with a repetitive task, you have the choice of A or B. So the next time you're staring down at a task you've done before, think about the choice you're making.

The task itself doesn't much matter - it could be anything:
-Building slides for a deck
-Sending a marketing email announcing a sale
-Pulling raw data and analyze it
-Writing a creative brief for an agency partner
-[Insert your repetitive task here]

At the very least, acknowledge that you're given the choice between striving for sameness or striving for improvement.

Chances are, Version 2 of your task might not be that much better than Version 1 - but I'm willing to bet Version 52 will be a vast improvement over Version 1.

Thanks for spending time with me in my workshop,

Eric