Execution Is Everywhere, Capture Is Crucial

I’ve been contemplating a lot about how productivity advice might change in the AI-era

One of the key differences, especially for the self-employed / for coaches

Is that whatever ‘system’ you have to be productive

Whether that’s calendar, apps, journals, notebooks, diaries, email etc

It needs to be optimised for capture, not just execution

Most coaches are pretty good at executing - check-ins, calls, content etc

But with the capabilities of AI, capture is crucial.

Every coach has ideas - in sessions, walks, explaining things to clients, quotes that people say to them.

The difference isn’t having them, it’s what happens to them.

And whether wherever you put them, you trust yourself to find them

Capture has the benefit of you not losing things - but that’s a boring benefit.

The bigger benefit is training your brain to see more.

When every ideas has somewhere to go, you start noticing more things.

More connections between conversations, stories, examples - a trusted container changes the quality of attention you bring to everything else.

You’re creating a feedback loop, not a filing cabinet.

I get asked from time to time ‘How do you have so many ideas / how do you talk about so many different things’

The answer is I have trained my brain to look for connections - because I have the safety of knowing I won’t lose them.

Which explains content droughts that coaches feel

Every drought traces back to a lapsed capture habit, not a dried-up brain.

You stop writing ideas down, the noticing muscle switches off, you hear silence and presume that you just don’t have anything to say - it’s not true.

Most coaches have great ideas, and would have more if they had somewhere for them to land.