Alabama coach Nick Saban says that “Process creates performance.” Its true for football and it’s true for writing.

Whether you’re writing a book or blog posts or a newsletter, you’ll do better work more easily if you have a process that works and that you use every time. Here’s how it works for me for blog writing over at Three Star Leadership.

I capture ideas every day, usually on a small digital voice recorder. I put them in a file and review them regularly.

On Sunday, I block out my blog posts for the week. I check my idea file and the calendar. I have some similar posts that I do on the same day every week, such as my “Leadership Reading to Start Your Week.”

I try to complete the basic outline of each post the night before. Sometimes a news event causes me to change my plans. For example, the Penn State scandal prompted me to write a post, “Moral Fog,” that I hadn’t planned.

Over the years I’ve written books, blog posts, newsletters, and even a radio column. In each case it took a little while to settle on the process for an assignment. After that having a good process and following it made my life easier and my writing better.

Bottom Line

No matter what kind of writing you do, you’ll do better if you develop a process that works and use it every time.