Sunday, October 23, 2022

Be more Organized - learning from others


I need to be really organized. This video of the challenges of Cyberpunk red is reminding me of the technical debt we were incurring. 

I guess what happened in cyberpunk red rules is what happening now: When I switch guears to do marketing and the biz planning and having to delegate the editing and the designing. Where it takes a week or two to switch brain mode - marketing analysis and salesman mode to editor and game designer mode (not just a designer for me but with nicco so I have to be very visual and have reference checklists that is convenient for his access). 

This will slow us down by months UNTIL I make a standard process for it. 
Anecdote - we had audits 2-4x a year (2016 to 2020, the directors didn't want to perform audits so to exempt themselves they had to exempt me also because I used my auditing to push them to be be more systematic) - what I did was I detailed and recorded all my audits - talking and taking minutes as I went and then converting a past audit as a standard operating proceedure. Coloring text of my questions and the actions I have to perform, and clarifying deliverables per Phase of the audit. 

Risks of de-prioritizing Marketing and Biz Planning. 

  • Lost Sales
  • Lost Sales Opportunity, being there to Join in the Free Advertising of DTRPG events
  • Slower Growth - less income, DIYing some of the solutions myself instead of commissioning and delegating it. Adding weeks. 

Activities 

Do these Progressively - check the list, and decide. Cross out done and closed, open new items as needed. 
  1. Update the Project spreadsheet, 
    1. Separate Freecad and blender training projects of my day job with Nicco and the GITB. 
    2. fix the weekly schedule to be more structured. Target Dates, Include ME and my responsibilities (because I am Inputs to Nicco, and Nicco cannot start unless I hand over the inputs) Applying  Sequence Activities, Critical Path, and Critical Chain. 
    3. Include Weekly Royalties as this determines if I can afford to delegate it. A simple Pivot table of seeing if I exceed my budget in a GIVEN phase.  
    4. Include the Change Log Actions. 
    5. Have a day where all I do is a plan and remove or add activities, or set the importance of the activities. If I dont there is so much bias and un-formed information that influence what should or should not be in the activities. I should filter things in my head - but have a log of what I decided and why. 
    6. Track Time. When have we been working on this milestone? 
  2. Create Styles and Standards in LibreOffice
    1. Keep a Problem or Issue Log of what the Current Layouts are in the Industry and what GITB is doing to address it (applying my Day job skills). 
    2. Create a Document and Drawings of how the Layout is going to Work. 
      1. System Locations or Locations. 
      2. Hooks and Issues and Problems - the Conflicts that arise. 
      3. NPCs 
    3. Create Libre Office Templates of these. Links and use Update Version to preserve the links. 
    4. Document all the Strategies in one Doc including the costs in advance (how much per Portrait, per Model, - the expected output)
  3. Create Procedures and Schedules- 
    1. like the Folder KANBAN.  Since we are not using Google Doc, and using Libreoffice we have to have a Folder Kanban method to see if we picked up the next account. (hyperlink it in the tasks). 
    2. Use the Change Log to coordinate changes and activities. 
    3. Which time of the week we do Planning (this means me correcting my self and of course there is a risk I made nicco do stuff unnecessary - but that's what the sponsor of the project do - accept the risk), and which day we do handovers and task monitoring. 

Put the weekly profits as an entry, becuase that sets the budget. 
Of course actions, all have costs (as a former artist I pay per activity, I take the risk - you would be surprised by royalty-based or "exposure" offers to freelancers) 

I am hitting that problem now, the sales data from Dtrpg makes me hopeful, but I have to update my critical path - a list of activity sequences that have to happen (typically starting at the end and moving backward in time) and don't limit it to activities, fill in the problems that have to be addressed. 

One problem is addressing the tedium of preparing a game on VTT. 

The designs and diagrams are for Players and GM. We make a system we have the GMs copy and a blank for the players. 

Impact

  • 1 month delay (4 weeks) - if you saw 1 and 2 in Activities than you realize that will take part-timers like us about 4 weeks to set up. Dont worry Nicco will still be making stuff - he will be working on the Planet and System models (I render and Polish it since I have the more powerful computer). 
  • MORE STABLE release date. If you have what we set up above then our release dates should be more predictable and correct - at least the deviation from Estimates should be smaller over time in the course of Year. We are buying Down Technical Debt incurred of having NO SYSTEM - no organization, and a ton of rework - which Causes any project to be Over Budget. 
  • to do what we are good at more often. With the Processes, and problems that will definitely arise - DOCUMENTING the processes and activities allows us to determine - which tasks we want to be good at and makes us happier. Minimizing the waste. 
The cost of being able to for GITB Full time is 2,200usd in royalties (or 3,300) sales in per week (40 weeks instead of 52 weeks). That would mean of the ~2000 views I would get of people seeing my product - about 22usd per year of sales. 

That means 2000 or so people spend 22usd because GITB Mneme saves them a lot in Prep, Inspires them because they can make renders for their game, they liked and contributed to our writing structure (example pertinent NPC information is how they PUSH/PULL the story forward. and various other stuch requirements for information and fluff in Locations and Hooks; as well as What does the GM show players, what should the GM only see?).

Why would 2000 people spend >22usd per year on GITB?

Also, how can a 2-man Filipino team make that much money when larger Companies have such a large staff, brilliant writing, endorsements, etc...  and so many resources? Our only advantage is that 3rd World Cost of living 😅😅😅 - getting someone like me is Nice-to-Have in Publishing (PM, QA and who has devoted his Teens to present in Game and Systems Design). 

I promised myself If I believe I can make the Family Biz the Next Ikea but in South East Asia IF i had the basic support (management making end-users SHOW UP weekly instead of chasing them down and ending up seeing them 1-2x a month) I could set up our ERP modules faster than Industry (which is 14+ months; we are currently 6 months, target 8 months for Inventory Implementation assuming we chase them all down) 

If I really believed that - Make GITB pay Nicco and me  half of the median income of non-family per year in royalties (that's 13.75usd/hour assuming 40 working weeks and 22,000usd/year/man).  






 


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