Friday Week 2 of the Q2Y14 Master Plan
Accountability works. So does “trying to look good”.
We are who we pretend to be: so pretend be someone better.
Writing Ritual
Got in a total of 8,654 words from Monday till Friday (was updated after I finished writing this of course 
)… The weekly target for the writing ritual is 9,254 words. I am short by about 700 words.
This was because I ended up writing 4,000 words on Monday, and slacked off for Tuesday. The slack didn’t tighten up till Thursday (I didn’t have my laptop with me on Thursday and I wrote on that weird thing called paper. You know ink gets on your hand if you’re not careful? Anyway…)
I will need to brush up on showing up for writing, and not pay attention to my successes. The Resistance loves it that you win the small battles: that will help Resistance win the war. No sir, not me. Not here. God willing.
Cakes.pk
Weekly Reporting Metric: 7 P/D’s worked.
The cook showed up! Yay! He fits the bill. Alhumdulillah. Part time based, knows what he’s doing. Still have to decide on his payscale though. I was clear when interviewing him to leave the technical side of baking: I didn’t want to pretend I knew it. I left that to my lovely wife. We had decided that we will interview the baker by giving him an assignment to cook the kind of cake we want. He did that. And organized the kitchen cupboard while he waited. He did his job to impress us. I like that. Initiative I believe it’s called.
Also, he looks to be hungry for the job. Part time income is a good thing. I believe the cook is also looking to “add venture” to his life. I hope to make his temp job worthwhile for him. The test will be that he, on his own, decides to work full time for us later on. InshAllah.
I am still looking for a good location for a bakery. By-laws, commercial rent agreements blah blah… I cringe at the thought. But a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.
Blogstarta
Weekly Reporting Metric: 9 P/D’s worked.
This was painful! Moving hosting accounts should be considered as a punishment in all judicial systems around the world.
But have made some progress. Only a little. Although I did end up spending about 9 P/Ds (about 4.5 hours) in the last week (Sat – Fri). But this is a the “learning” phase for me. The hosting is very, very upscale (also very expensive for me). But I have good hopes for this.
My clients are happy. Alhumdulillah. Which is the most important aspect of a business like hosting. Customer service needs to be top-of-the-line. The infrastructure is pretty stable these days: a commodity even. Interesting business challenges ahead.
I have found a business to emulate that makes those tiny decisions all the more easy. This, I believe, is a good technique: when you’re doing a business, find a business that you want to become, and then emulate that. This makes it so easy to come up with the “next action to take” in your business.
LifeETC by Momekh
Weekly Reporting Metric: no discernible tracking variables identified. Although there has been progress, it is not as trackable as I want it to be.
Blog posting is on schedule. Once a week. The article for tomorrow (Sat) is scheduled. Alhumdulillah.
Published a some-what research based article titled “The Well Connected Hard Worker“. If you have the time, would love to hear your feedback on that. And while reading it, set the benchmark – and I say this carefully – as high as you can set it. Would you expect this type of writing from a world class writer? Yes, I just pretended to be one. But in all honesty, I won’t improve if you don’t hold me to a higher standard.
Podcast: Spent about 4 P/Ds on podcasting lessons. The Fizzle course (both, the intro course and the one by Dumas) is helping out here. I am letting the courses decide my next action.
Events: nothing done so far.
Products: Have worked a bit on putting up the sales funnel that I am now so worried about. Without a “sales funnel”, the blog would lose out. I know that. I have decided on one main product, that I will now give away for free. This funnel for this main product will serve as my way of interacting with the potential customers. I believe I will be able to serve the community, and offer useful products such as hosting,custom blog designs, blog reviews, wordpress themes and two other courses that I am working on.
Hosting is Blogstarta. Blog Reviews and the two other courses (paid) is part of the LifeETC by Momekh product list. And the wordpress themes and custom blog designs are part of the next-in-line project: DBM (DesignByMomekh).
Design By Momekh
Worked a total of 2 P/D’s for the whole week. Which of course, is pathetic. Why? Because of the same reason: I slacked off once I saw I already had clocked in 10 P/Ds. But those 2 P/Ds were spent in deciding which tasks to track. I have a better idea of going about this. Which is always a good thing. God willing.
I did have another potential client for custom WordPress theme design (the client knew that my starting rate is US$800 – which is not expensive – but in this part of the world, is definitely not cheap). But I refused. I think that was a mistake
I know that taking on a client right now will demand more on my time. Lesson learned: from next week, I will be ready to take at least one client for WordPress custom design. The house will be in order for that to happen. It’s more of a mental readiness (I haven’t done client work for years now!). What do you think?
Key Takeaways
Everything is an experiment. Failure is nothing more than feedback. But so is success. I can’t (and now, won’t) let tiny successes derail me. InshAllah.
And showing up usually means getting the job done. Simple. But the most profoundest of all things*.
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*(deliberate misuse of superlatives for effect. Or affect. Whatever).
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