Daily Good Company · October 26, 2026
Some jobs come around just often enough to be familiar and just rarely enough to make you wonder how you did them last time.
Friday’s restart note was for returning to unfinished work. Today, try making a short checklist for a job you will do again from the beginning.
Choose something small, like resetting your own sketching kit. Leave medical, financial, safety-critical, and other consequential procedures out of this experiment. A pencil case is plenty of responsibility for a first attempt.
Capture the job while you do it
Next time the task comes around, jot down what you actually do: when to start, what you need, the order of the steps, and how you know you are finished. Note anything you had to look up or decide.
Use invented details or information you are allowed to share. Leave out passwords, private records, and details about other people.
Then try this prompt:
“Turn my notes into a short reusable checklist. Include When to use it, What I need, Numbered steps, and Done when. Use only the facts I provide. Preserve the order I specify; flag any unclear sequence. Put missing details and unresolved decisions under Questions. Do not invent supplies, frequencies, instructions, or a definition of done. Notes: [your notes].”
A fictional example
Imagine someone whose notes say: “Before a sketching outing, check my kit against the packing card inside its lid: sketchbook, two pencils, eraser. Put anything missing on a separate list. Refill from my supplies if I have it. Otherwise leave it on the missing list. Keep the card in the lid. Finished when each item is packed or recorded as missing.”
A possible checklist:
Find the packing card inside the kit lid.
Check for the sketchbook, two pencils, and eraser.
List anything missing.
Add missing items from supplies you already have, if available. Update the missing list as you go.
Leave the packing card in the lid. Check that every item is either packed or still on the missing list.
This example is fictional and untested. Buying replacements was never part of the instructions. Neither was declaring the kit complete while quietly losing the missing list.
Give it a practice run
Walk through the checklist with the actual kit. Can you follow it without supplying a missing step from memory? Does it preserve your decisions? Correct it, date it, and keep it with the things you use.
On the next round, notice what still needed explaining. Count the time spent making and checking the list as well as using it. If a handwritten version would do, keep that.
AI can organize the procedure you describe. You know whether it matches the job. The test comes when you use it again.
