Lifting the crisp, warm package to his lips, the golden-brown crust cracked softly against the paper, revealing a promise of what was to come. Taking his first bite, the delicate crunch gave way to a tantalising cacophony of deep-fried potato warmth.
Ha! But SRS, Ray Kroc (RIP) would never have known his maniacal lust for order, by way of systems and protocols would crescendo to fulfil the desires of a Dad in chaperone mode after his kid’s Saturday morning football. Expectations, delivered.
Steering wheel in one hand, half-eaten hash brown in the other, I thought about Ray and his McDonald-themed world. Not the food itself but the experience. A well-oiled, repeatable, reliable masterpiece. And yes, Maccas is an evil globo-mega-corp, but if you squint hard enough, there are some good kernels of wisdom to be harnessed.
The book “The E-Myth Revisited” is an homage to Ray's ways and a guide to applying systems thinking to any business. The hook is that you want to be working on your business, not in your business. If you’re a slave to your business, you don’t have a business; you have a job.
It’s calm, say less.
Your business is a multifaceted universe. Your task is to keep it spinning while consciously identifying patterns and documenting processes that make each facet a repeatable component.
Slowly, you amass a fault-proof bible for running your universe. You are now ready to replace yourself (God). You won’t need a based 10x engineer to save the day. You need a go-getting systems-deprived disciple ready to adopt your blueprint.
As you progressively replace yourself, you eventually free yourself of day-to-day operations in favour of finessing the system. ALWAYS BE strategising, prototyping, documenting, and iterating.
Can turn-key thinking work for creative studios? Yes. Do you need to settle a monotony-filled Canva-esque pipeline of mediocrity to do so? No.
In fact, systems thinking will reduce your time on rudimentary tasks and increase your time on meaningful tasks. You can steadily add immense value to your overall customer experience.
I’ve spotted evidence of creative studios attempting RAY's WAYS™. A recent read on working with clients (unrelated) was written by HAWRAF, a studio that generously published a treasure trove of behind-the-scenes processes as their parting gift when they closed (RIP).
when the studio announced it was shutting down after only a few years in business, the four partners decided that their final act would be to live up to that initial idealism: They scrubbed their internal documents of client names and published them in a public Google Drive folder.
Another reference I think of fondly is Tom Sach’s 10 Bullets—a military-esque set of principles for fellow artists to abide by. Finally, I came across Gardener NYC’s Notion Resources. Hardly a comprehensive list, but evidence nonetheless.
Long-lasting studios probably keep their E-Myth bibles close, knowing well that their value often stems from how you work, not necessarily what the work is.
Eyeballs: Nikitava Silevskiy’s workflow makes my graphic design soul happy.
Reads: Social feeds have become dens of short-span, barely viable, ephemeral dopamine hits that leave you feeling numb. Counter to this is The Slow Web. In response to “Fast Web distress”:
What’s missing in these cases is an inherent sense of rhythm.
Reliable rhythms lead to predictable outcomes, and rhythm is an expression of moderation.
This is a tremendously important distinction between Slow Web and Fast Web. Fast Web is destination-based. Slow Web is interaction-based.
Related, The Revenge of the Home Page further validates this movement, a proposed return to visiting web destinations with intent, on your terms.
SM-ism: SLICK MOLEMAN is a slippery citizen hailing from the bustling underground metropolis of Tunnelton. Stealthy and agile, he unmatched skill in slipping through the tightest of spaces.
AH-HA:
You are under no obligation to be the same person you were five minutes ago.
Alan Watts
My attention has come to my attention recently. Do I think good thoughts? Are they runny, solid or mildly scrambled? What’s your scroll <span>?
A man walks into a bar and asks, “Why do I no longer think fully formed thoughts?” but instead of answering, the bartender points a gun to his face. The man says thank you and leaves the bar satisfied. Why did the man leave the bar satisfied even though he didn't get what he asked for? What was his purpose?
How we fulfil our mental stimulation is rapidly shifting. Now, more than ever, we watch the experiences of others rather than feel our own. Like experience proxies. It’s not as rewarding, but that’s made up for by the volume you can absorb in a short amount of time. Why create art or explore the world when you can just scroll the dopamine wheel? And yes, I’m overgeneralising (maybe). However, it’s an omnipresent feeeeeeling. Broken conversations and preoccupied dispositions are generally normal now. Ya really gotta rattle someone to get their attention.
I’ve noticed I can easily slip back into the virtual stream (Twitter is my crux). It feeeeeels like I’m learning and staying across important stuff. But am I? How much have I retained? Very little. In fact, when it’s something important, I often don’t read it; Instead, I knowingly participate in my own save-for-later fallacy loop.
Like an Atomic Habits aficionado, I’ve been recognising when I’m about to mindlessly scroll-it-up and instead use that as a trigger for something more productive. This is more regularly becoming writing, which has the opposite effect of social media. It puts me in active mode as opposed to passive. I’ve been leaning into Sunday Minutes as that outlet. It’s a discipline trade-off.
The Japanese phrase “Hara hachi bu” comes to mind:
A term meaning “Eat until you're 80% full.” It originated in the city of Okinawa, where people use this advice as a way to control their eating habits. Interestingly, they have one of the lowest rates of illness from heart disease, cancer and stroke, and a fairly long life expectancy.
In some ways, it’s related. I could shovel my fat face with endless memes, hacks and links, or I can consciously restrict it (I disagree with the theory of abandoning it altogether).
Free idea: An AI that does all your mindless scrolling across networks and consolidates the highlights that would matter to you once a day. Sad.
TWIL: You can create seamless tiles in Figma quite easily. The Cosmic Egg is a thing, and there are religious myths about its origin, the Finnish version is my fav:
The goddess of the air, Ilmatar, longed to have a son. To achieve this, she and the East Wind make love until she conceives Vainamoinen, the child of the wind. However, she was not able to give birth to her child. A certain eagle swooped down and impregnated her: as a result, six cosmic eggs were birthed or laid, as well as an iron egg. The eagle took these eggs for himself and protected them by sitting on them, but this came with sitting on Ilmatar as well. Upon the movement of the air goddess, they rolled into the sea and the shell broke: the fragments formed heaven, earth, the sun, moon, stars, and (from the iron egg) a thundercloud.
I’ve been trying to sport my marketing cap more and came across The Game podcast. It feels practical. In this episode, he drops the concept of “leading metrics”:
Track leading metrics instead of the lagging metrics. Lagging metrics are what happened? These are the output. The real things to track what you were doing to create the output
This is a novel way of focusing on the right things and ties well with the theme for the week, “creating” rather than “consuming.” Another concept I liked was “whisper, tease, shout.” Don’t start with “shout.” Effective marketing is a long-lead game; start the clues early and with subtlety.
WHISPER, TEASE, SHOUT™
A trail of unencoded stories and thoughts displayed in a web-based void. Moss in motion. A new beginning was necessary. The final form is unknown, but the beginnings are familiar. Will everything connect? Eventually. Is it serious? No. Can you lick it? Maybe.
SRS-MOSS is a WIP concept. It’s momentarily loose and agenda-less. The door’s been kept open (cat width) to allow curious wafts. It’s tempting to “lock things in“ or give it a name. Breaking that urge feels good, human-like. In this early phase, there’s a slant toward raw and uninterpreted “capturing”—log-like bytes of interest, to build a rhythm and find a flow. I feel like I need to write and think. Is anyone thinking thoughts nowadays?
Sunday Minutes is a steady stream of short Tumblr-esque findings and thoughts gathered weekly. This is the beginning:
A profound goon ponders the falsity of permanence:
You’re wrong until they’re right. You’re right until they’re wrong.
You’re either working toward change, climbing the mountain, proving a point, or in the comfort zone; you made it, and everything feels… right. I don’t like the latter. But the thing is, there’s no final point of perfection or satisfaction. No status is ever permanent. Never. It’s not possible. You can fight it, or you can realise that everything now is as it should be, and that’s it. Because what else is there?
Eyeballs: This week, I learned there are people who live with a veil of “visual snow” constantly passing through their visual cortex. This can sometimes include glitch-like effects and distortions. It’s called “hallucinogen persisting perception disorder” (HPPD).
Earholes: I found a strategic sound company. Amazing.
We may present ourselves as musicians, sound makers and producers. But what really defines us as sound artists is how we envision our work, how we weave music and sound design into consistent and descriptive soundscapes established by the sonic strategy.
SOMETIMES, I AM SOFT
Soft shapes in a knoll-like arrangement are a vibe—as is Klas Ernflo. Last week, I caught a glimpse of a familiar image that triggered an hour-long search to remember who the artist was. Digital hoarding done good son.
Also, I have a soft spot for a good sock. If you do, this might be your sock source solved. I haven’t tried them yet. Order pending. But you never know, a good pique crew could put you in the right mood.
Lastly, I wanted to shout out to the regular living legends lurking in the depths of the chat realm. Dank discordans™ fighting the good fight. This week, on a whim, after days of trying to crack a problem, I tossed my query into the discord machine and went to bed. The next day, someone replied with a casual suggestion. I flippin’ worked. I was smitten. One point for human-based netizens. For now.
This turned out to be a random AF adventure lacking any sense of cohesion or purpose. “Soft shapes and soft socks” maybe? Big.
©SM
