In the post about margin I talked about allowing room for circumstantial error. That’s only half the picture. Your project needs room for human error.
You’ve got to have a system that’s idiot proof; not because anyone on your team is an idiot, but because no one is perfect all the time. Expect and respect mistakes.
That’s not to say that you should ignore mistakes. In fact, I make a point to quench them when they arise as part of a pattern of behavior. But when a mistake is an outlier, coming from someone who usually doesn’t make such errors, then it’s best to acknowledge it and let it go. You’ll have this luxury of letting mistakes go just so long as you make sure that everyone is on the same page. It's up to you to set the expectations and, like I said in the article about delegation, your team members will only take their job as seriously as you take them.
This is what workplace newsletters are for. If you’re a filmmaker or any other kind of creative producer, you can use a production newsletter. I use my own format for these newsletters and send them out to my team weekly. They are customized for filmmaking. You can download a template of it for free on my products page.
Ironically, the most important thing about newsletters is not the content. It’s the regularity. The confidence that comes to your team with the knowledge that they’re getting an update in their inbox every week without faith, regardless of fluctuations in the project, is priceless. It forces all members to take the project seriously and, more importantly, to be clear with you about how much they can actually commit.
When you project consistency, the people around you will behave with consistency.
They will feel armed with information. It builds trust.
I could probably make a whole workshop on this concept alone, so it’s worth downloading my production newsletter template. It’s free, so you have nothing to lose. And if you’re not heading a project right now, you can share this post with someone who is.