Working a 9-5 and building a side project can be hard, especially with a family.
A few play dates for the kids or a sick family member and you'll fly thru a week and find that you haven't done any work on your projects.
It's OK that this happens. Yep, you can go a few days, a week without making progress on your side project. Your family, your health, your sanity are just as important (if not more so) as your side project.
So how do we stay on track?
It important to know why you‘re not working on your side projects. If It’s is a good reason, then just adjust your schedule and move on.
Yes it’s important to have a schedule even for your side projects. If you don’t have a schedule, you’ll never stay on track.
Without a schedule, I find that the launch date just keeps slipping for no apparent reason. Something more important to work on always seems to pop up.
When building your schedule, be aggressive, but be realistic too.
You know your calendar and the demands on your time from your day job and family commitments. There is no point setting a schedule that you really you can't hit, because you'll be traveling for work or on a family trip.
Call a Friend
I'm lucky to have a couple of friends that I talk to regularly about what I'm working on. Nothing serious, just a casual catch-up usually once a week to check in, see what they are working on, and share what I'm doing or have done
Not planned but we end up having our chats late in the week, which works out great for my weekend work. The calls give me time to recall what I got done in the last week, but more importantly what I hope to get done over the weekend.
The weekend is when I have the largest blocks of time available, and so when I get the bulk of my work done. Having a good idea of what I'm going to do is important to make progress.
Build Challenges
I recently just completed season 5 of Buildspace Nights and Weekends, where I ended up building and launching this newsletter/website you're reading.
Increasingly, they are virtual and asynchronous, which means you can fit them around your schedule.
They help to impose a schedule/deadline for your project. They also give you access to others doing similar things, which can really help keeping motivated.
If you're building something for the first time, they often provide a solid framework for getting things done, and can guide you getting your idea and turning it into something you can ship!
I'm working to improve my SEO skills this year, so I'm participating in the Build Challenge from the folks behind Build the Keyword.
I'm already learning lots from Kat & Lee, but also the other people participating!
Hackathons
I haven't been to an in-person hackathon since before COVID, but I love hackathons.
In a couple of (jam packed) days you can make the same progress that would normally take weeks (or months!)
They are normally very short, typically run over a weekend, you can schedule your time away from other commitments to make sure you won't be distracted.
I've participated in about 20 hackathons over the years. I believe 5 projects that started in a hackathon are still online or were sold afterward.
Some hackathons have moved online, and similar to build challenges they can be a great alternative to in-person hackathons, but I highly recommend going to an in-person event if you can find one near by.
Building in Public
It can often feel very isolating working on a new project. You can go into a cave for weeks working on your next big idea, before you're ready to share it with the world.
Building in public can help shed light on your project, you can get feedback even earlier than you hoped.
Don't expect to get a lot of customers from your build-in-public efforts, unless the stars have magically aligned and your building-in-public effort manages to grow the exact audience for your product. You will however, make some friends a long the way, and be much more likely to actually ship your project.
I do the majority of my building in public on Twitter, and do some deeper dives here on the blog.
It's easy to get started, and while you may not get big views at the beginning, the momentum can grow quickly. Find others building in public and support their journey too.
Be sure to include the #buildinpublic hashtag with your posts to get a little extra exposure.
If you are running into a deadline for your side project, find ways to get your friends and family involved.
A designer friend, may be excited to give you a little design feedback.
Does your new projects website pass the Mom test? Test it with your mom!
Hope this helps get your projects shipped!