Goals :: 2013 is going to be a great year

Everyone’s been talking about their hopes for the upcoming year, and what goals they’ve set for themselves. So we’re jumping on that bandwagon and doing the same in today’s blog post. We thought about the things we want to improve, accomplish, and maintain in the new year. Here’s what we came up with…

1. Maintain our standards for customer service. Although we end up becoming close with our couples and building friendships over the course of our time together, this is still a business and they are still paying for a service. So we will make huge efforts to continue to turn emails around in less than 24 hours, continue to make our couple’s needs our top priority, and continue to provide an experience that is stellar from start to finish. This year we want take this area up a level and improve on our turn around time for photos. Even though we always provide final images well within the time frame outlined in our contract (sometimes even just a few days later!) we are perfectionists and want to do even better at getting final images to our couples faster than they anticipate. Who doesn’t love missing all the red lights, and being the first in line at the DMV? Well we do, and we know no one likes to wait, so we’ll work hard to make the wait time for photos even less than it already is.

2. Create and stick to (on most weeks) a workflow schedule. Everything from emails, blogging, editing, shooting, running errands and discussing business matters will be done more efficiently when we have a more organized schedule to our weeks and days. One morning mid week for our post office run, one day for blogging an entire week’s worth of posts, days scheduled for editing, so on and so forth. Also, we’re going to actually take a lunch break. Where we EAT LUNCH.

3. Stick to a strict end of work day time. No more 2am editing marathons because Maggie’s crazy and forgets what time it is (although a few couples were rather thrilled to receive their flash drives the same week as their shoot). We will try very hard this year to be better at turning off the computer, shutting down the laptops, and hiding our iphones after 7pm. This is going to be the most difficult of our resolutions/goals. But we’ll take it one step at a time, and even if we eliminate all work aside from emails after 7, that’s a good start 😉

4. Become better photographers. If we ever stop learning, improving our craft, getting better… we shouldn’t be doing this job. We are artists above all else, and as artists you can never stop. We will seek inspiration whereever we can find it and continue to feed life into our work. Photographing a couple in love requires an openness in one’s creative heart. We’ll work hard this year to expand our hearts.

5. Become less critical of ourselves. Sure! That one’s soooo easy to do. Two type A’s with a security complex does not result in oozing confidence. However, we must get better at finding quality in our work as well as the weaknesses we will always find, so that we can build on those qualities. We’re also going to try to stop comparing our work to the work of others. Honestly… it’s gotta stop. We drive ourselves crazy when we see a brilliant photographer’s work, then smack our foreheads and begin our woes of “they’re soooooo good, which means we suck”. Maybe the key here is to remember that just because another is “sooooo good” doesn’t mean “we suck”. Right? Right.

6. Take a real vacation. Like a real one. With a beach. Yes, a whole week at the beach with our family right in the middle of the summer. We may have to turn down a wedding or two to give ourselves this treasured time with our family… but they’re worth it and we can’t forget what we love most in the world, and what we love more than this job.

So there you have it, some major bullet points we’ll try to keep at the forefront of our minds throughout this year. There are lots of other small things on our list not worth taking up blog space to include becoming a featured vendor with a DC area blog (which by the way we’ve already accomplished!) but for now, we think this is a good start.

 

What are your goals for 2013? We’d love to hear them!