I’m going to see Metallica this week in Seattle (woo!), and it’s got me on a huge Metallica kick.
YouTube has started to catch on and now recommends me these amazing “behind the scenes” videos Metallica did a few years back. It got me thinking: why don’t we do a little behind the scenes here too?
A bit of a disclaimer before we get started: we work with Agile project management. Essentially, we send out all our deliverables on Fridays, and each Monday acts as the start of this “set” of things to do for the week.
It’s been a game changer for us! Maybe I’ll write an article about that sometime soon.
So here it is – one week at Pink Robot Studios.
Monday
Monday is the day the tsunami of emails comes in 🏄♂️
We’ve learned to not really schedule ourselves anything to get done on Mondays, since we inevitably get inundated by an insane amount of client requests.
So Mondays are the “catch-all” day to get ready for the week ahead. To help out with this, we’ve started a new initiative: we send out weekly update messages to the Slack channel on Mondays, basically going over what we’re each doing for the week ahead and where we’re at on our projects.
On this particular Monday, I realize Lugo’s weekly update message is pretty short, so I shoot him a message asking if he wants some more work this week. (the answer is always yes with him)
In addition to our weekly update messages, we end up sending lots of comments back and forth on Asana (our project management software). I check on Lugo and Ashley’s profiles to see if there’s anything I can help with, any overdue tasks, or if I missed anything.
I tend to miss things a lot, since my left brain isn’t all that great.
Today, my main focus is to sketch out wireframes for a new project’s homepage. I start this off by researching competitors, getting some design inspiration, and brainstorming user flow. It’s one of my favorite parts of the website creation process!
The Workload this Monday
- TONS of emails
- Setting up for the week ahead
- Sketching some homepage wireframes
- Prepping social media posts
- Starting research for a Brand Strategy Guide
Tuesday
Meeting day!
We meet up at different coffee shops every Tuesday and Thursday. We like to mix it up, but today we’re going to our favorite, Caffeina. It’s got the right mix of workability and ambiance. Plus they give out free pastries sometimes.
Bright and early, we start off the day by prepping for our meeting. Here’s what each of us bring in:
- One idea for the company (big or small, serious or fun)
- One piece of inspiration (can be visual, business, or fun)
- Our song of the week (added to our public Spotify playlist)
- Anything we want to talk about
Our meetings usually start off by critiquing the environmental design of the coffee shop we’re in. We’re getting into interior design, and my mentor Jason gave me a great piece of advice: take stock of the spaces you’re in. Learn from what others are doing, and why it does or doesn’t work.
For the next two hours or so, we do lots of the fun creative work together. That stuff always turns out better when all three of our heads are in it.
Today, we’re ideating some brand visuals for a new client. Going through our research, scouring our notes, bouncing ideas off each other for how we can make these strategies come to life visually.
Tuesday is also payday, incidentally 🤑
The Workload this Tuesday
- Setting up a meeting agenda
- Creating a Brand Style Guide for a local client
- Finalizing that homepage from yesterday in Figma
- Doing some monthly SEO work for one of our favorite clients
- Team meeting at a coffee shop
Wednesday
I can’t speak for Lugo and Ashley, but Wednesday is usually the day you can find me at the Coffee Studio, my girlfriend and I’s favorite walking-distance coffee spot. It puts me in turbo mode, so I get a lot done.
Wednesday is the halfway point through the week, so today we’re usually checking in with each other to see if everything is on schedule.
I inevitably realize I gave myself too much to do, and send a message in our “bounties” Slack channel meekly asking if someone else wants to take something on.
Today is usually the first day of the week where some deliverables get finished up. The easier ones, like Website Strategy Guides, page designs, graphics, and research. Remember though: all our deliverables get sent on Fridays, so we’re holding on to these for a few days.
There’s a good reason for that, though: it gives us two days to let the work soak in and decide if any changes are needed. Sometimes if we don’t have that waiting period, we realize a few days later we could have made it just a little better.
We also do our one-on-one video meetings today! We normally talk through workloads in more detail and check in about how the week is going.
The Workload this Wednesday
- Writing up the next edition of The Antenna (our newsletter)
- Continuing SEO work
- Weekly check-in meetings
- Finishing up copy and details on the homepage design
- Applying research to the Brand Strategy Guide
- Doing some quick, smaller projects for some old clients
Thursday
Next meeting day!
Our Thursday meetings are usually a little more honed in on things that still need to get done for Friday. The real goal is to have everything done on Thursday, so Friday can just be a chill day. We’ll see if that happens this week.
This Thursday, we’re meeting to finish up that branding stuff we started on Tuesday. Ashley designed some really amazing moodboards, and we’re going to talk about what we like about each of them.
These moodboards will get assembled, along with some color palettes and typography sets I’m putting together, into a deliverable for tomorrow.
Today is also our monthly check-in day! I’ll be breaking off from the convo with Lugo and Ashley individually for these. We talk about how they’re feeling about work, what things they want to do next month, and if we can do anything to make our stuff better.
These meetings were Lugo’s idea, and they’ve made such a huge difference for us!
Great ideas just POUR out of this man.
The Workload this Thursday
- Creating color palettes and typography sets for branding
- Finalizing Brand Strategy Guide
- Writing this post
- Team meeting
Friday
On Fridays, I do another check through Asana, Slack, and email to see if I missed anything.
The answer is always yes 🤦♀️
On this Friday in particular, it turns out I missed building an About page for one of our other new website clients. Now my whole day is dedicated to getting this done!
Luckily, I pull it off and send it around 2 PM. The problem is, we don’t have any waiting period for this deliverable, and Ashley and Lugo didn’t get a chance to see it.
It still turned out great, because I work well under pressure, but I do wish they had the chance to check off on it. Definitely a learning experience!
Writing this post gave me a great new idea: I’ll add a task in Asana to check through this stuff on THURSDAYS instead of Fridays. That way, I know if I’m missing anything a day early.
Just did that, so we’ll see if that helps.
After that gets sent off, it’s the official start to the weekend! Kelby and I are hanging out with some friends tonight, so it’s time for us to get in our daily Yakuza 0 session while we have the chance.
Yakuza 0 has got me wanting sushi, so I send a message to Ashley and Lugo asking if they want to go out for sushi again soon.
The Workload this Friday
- Checking in on anything I missed
- About page build
- Playing Yakuza 0
- Sending a message about sushi
That’s an average week here at Pink Robot Studios. If that sounds fun to you, consider shooting us a job application. We’d love to meet 😎
