Centralize, Minimize, Standardize.

I strive to evaluate all of my workflows against this standard, and continue to reevaluate as often as possible. This applies to the physical actions I take to the way I organize my digital work and files.

One example, over the past year my team has been implementing the use of Sheet Set in AutoCAD for all of our projects going forward. In the past, we spent many years fighting the losing battle of accurately listing the same materials, hardware and project information across many drawing files for the same project. The result was often disparate and varying spellings or verbage for the same item, or worse, old or wrong specifications listed on many drawings. Now using Sheet Set, we are able to centralize that information into one location, and reference it in fields on all drawings. This minimizes rework as well as mistakes going forward. We also standardized our drawing templates and process for inputting this information, resulting in a cleaner and less stressful process overall.

Another example is my field tablet shown above. When traveling to the field to take field measurements, I was finding myself frustrated with having to handle printed shop drawings or scratch paper, a tape measure or laser, and pens and pencils while navigating a construction site. I sat down and thought about how I could centralize all of those items onto one carry and minimize trips and items to handle. I came up with the above shape which I cut out of 1/4" material, and added the clips and pen holders. In addition I developed a single 8-1/2" x 11" field sheet with graph paper, and standard abbreviations for all conditions I might encounter and need to notate while in the field. This allowed me to give this tablet and field sheet to anyone taking measurements and the result was always decioherable and uniform.

If you are finding yourself stressed or overwhelmed with a particular process or workflow, step back and look for opportunities to centralize information or required items, minimize actions or responsible parties, and standardize the processes and procedures.