This Week With – Season 5, going on Season 6

Reflection on last 5 years

Why we started This Week With

Keeping a record of what has happened

Transcription and languages

If you get anything from our episodes, let us know

New Highlight Colour – leave a comment with your suggestions

Thank you to Taylor for collaborating

Taylor’s Week

Squash Tournament winner x2

Upgraded from Co-Working to Fixed Desk due to a new cafe being built

Secure room so keyboard, mouse and monitor can be set up and left

Duplicates of every cable needed to work

Signed up to Prep Kitchen

Very tasty once it’s ready to eat

Eating nutritious food, and saving time getting it

Slightly more expensive, higher in calories, and quicker

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

Subscriptions

Meal Prep to eat healthier

Sent to you once a week on a Sunday

Using subscriptions to save you time or do a job you don’t enjoy

Car cleaned once a month

Audit subscriptions every now and then – check you still need or want them

December is quieter this year than it was a few years ago

School bookings have moved to end of school year

Big company parties aren’t really happening as much these days

A show on a weekday is not getting done as the prep, travel, and performance takes up a big part of the day

Check number of shows compared to previous years

Robin Hood Panto in January 2025 – book tickets – https://sdclub.org.uk

I create the artwork for the show – flyers, banner and programme

Drama Kids parents week and taster class

Take a moment to relax this December, don’t get too stressed

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

Winter has definately arrived

Christmas Cards – branded for The Creative Tinker – sending them to clients

Keep the company in the minds of the clients

Quite expensive to do – but a nice thing to do

Cost of postage is huge at the moment

Sending them through a service to make it easier to do

Top clients got lumpy mail a while back

75 Day Challenge update

Sad news – one of my bunny rabbits passed away this week

Decided to get two bunnies a long time ago so I didn’t let anyone down

Remaining rabbit has been trained but not done a show yet

This weekend is the first time for her.

We now have a new bunny rabbit – Blondie born on 13/9/24

Training starts soon

Losing a valued member of my team – and finding a replacement to get back up to speed quickly

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

Back again after a week off

Final Cut Pro update v11

Accounting – a necessary evil

HMRC bringing everyone in line to the tax year

Digital tax due soon – submitting tax every three months?

It is really difficult and not clear – I had two, two hour calls to HMRC to find out where my figures needed to go

Setting aside money to pay my tax bill monthly

Bank statement is my balance sheet

It will affect all self employed people, to different degrees

The 5 Second Rule by Mel Robbins – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Second-Rule-Surprisingly-Simple-Courage/dp/1682612384/

Counting down from 5 – clears your mind from things that might stop you from taking action

Helping to make smaller decisions that get put off

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

FACE The Podcast – for Family and Children’s Entertainers

Round Table works really well

Asked the question “What is the best thing about conventions”

Chatting with like minded people was the biggest answer

Talking to other business owners, who are not your competition is very beneficial

Bounce ideas off them, get inspiration, how to deal with situations

Website Meet Up – https://www.meetup.com/

Find a way to chat with a group on a regular basis

Not Giving Up – sleeping through the alarm

75 Day Challenge would have started over

Planning the exercise during the day requires work

Solution for not going back to sleep

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

Big week for Apple Announcements

Three in total – first was iMac with M4 chip – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaB7nCdId0Y

Next was Mac mini M4 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtFm9n3NVzE

Then last there was the new MacBook Pro with M4 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0cmfY7qdmY

New minimum memory of 16GB on all these new machine

iOS 18.1 and Mac OS 15.1 (along with other updates) released on Monday to give you the first installment of Apple Intelligence (which so far is really good)

New Siri border animation

So… do you upgrade to the new hardware?

I always ask myself “Does the new hardware do something I want to do, or is my existing hardware struggling with day to day work?”

If the answer is yes to either then I investigate the new hardware further

I upgraded my iPhone 14 Pro to the iPhone 16 Pro to get Apple Intelligence and the new cameras and camera button

Taylor upgraded his MacBook Pro to get a bigger screen and more storage

This decision process works well for all hardware upgrades

New Web App for BNI Traffic Lights

Different levels based on a points system

Green is the best – means you are getting the best out of your BNI membership

Points are calculated on a rolling 6 month period

End of each month your points are recalculated and your level may change

These have been done manually, but automation would be better

The web app will show you what your new level and points are, and what you can do to move up

Trial run underway – then it would be good to roll it out to the region and the rest of the UK

75 Day Challenge update

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

Chapters

[00:00:00]: Introduction to the Podcast

[00:00:39]: Apple Announcements and New Products

[00:01:57]: New MacBook Pro Features

[00:04:29]: Apple Intelligence and Software Updates

[00:08:29]: Deciding on Hardware Upgrades

[00:10:33]: Taylor’s Web App for BNI Reports

[00:12:06]: Understanding BNI Traffic Lights

[00:13:38]: Automating BNI Report Analysis

[00:17:28]: Future Plans for the Web App

[00:20:31]: Conclusion and Podcast Details

75 Day Challenge

Slightly modified to suit Taylor

If you miss an activity or a day then you start over

Physical and Mental Discipline

Not about getting fit, but more about making yourself better

We will come back to this and see how Taylor did

Setting yourself a challenge will always improve you

Use things that you have…

Filming in portrait for publicity on certain social media channels

Using filming equipment that I have, to their full potential

Using my Osmo Pocket 3 and DJI Mic 2s

A mic on the performer and another on the spectator to isolate their sound

Re-learning the settings

Sync to video feature – recording audio directly to the mics when you hit record on the camera

Using headphones to monitor the sound using USB C

Always learning

Face the Podcast – making sure to use the website and upload new content

Takes a lot of time to create an episode – but with the interviews recorded it will push me to edit them

Either use the things you have or sell them / shut them down

My recommendation – get out and use them

Schedule things and book them in – accountability

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

Busy week as always – drama teaching, migrating sites to xcloud.host, clearing emails

UPS using difficult to get to shops as a hub if you are not in

Trying something new…

Mango Tango – something new

Food for the dog – cutting the food into quarters from factory

Getting feedback on whether your customers like it

Research and try new things / product variations and see if they work better or not

Iterating Processes

Adding things into the starter site if it is needed more than once

Keeping a log of changes

Managing and processing projects – iterating and updating

Figuring out what a launched website requires

Getting feedback is essential

Measuring is also a good indicator

Tracking how long projects take and if the time estimate was close

Adding tutorials to Snippet Club quickly

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

Making Notes to remember what was spoken about

Write out action points

Legal reasons

Make sure they make sense when going back in a few months time

Making notes when you think of them

Expanding on the notes while you remember the details

Using Apple Watch Voice Memo for this

Record call and transcribe with Apple Intelligence

Trigger reminders to write them up

MacWhisper for transcribing on device – https://goodsnooze.gumroad.com/l/macwhisper

ChatGPT voice chats

ChatGPT Canvas – https://openai.com/index/introducing-canvas/

Editing parts of documents and code instead of re-writing everything

Voice and Canvas are being rolled out to paid accounts over a few weeks

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.

iPhone 16 Pro arrived safely

Protecting Your Investment

Buying a bag for Ecoflow River 2 Pro to prevent damage

Looking after equipment to prolong their usefulness

2 year old iPhone was pretty much spotless

Padded camera bags

Not lending cables to people

Putting things in pouches when travelling

Good quality bags – they are not all made well

Peak Design bags are great – https://uk.peakdesign.com/

Lifetime Product Warranty: If any part of your Peak Design product becomes non-functioning or defective, we will repair it, send out replacement parts or replace it with a fully-functioning item in the same or better condition.

Everything gets put away before the job is complete

Protecting Your Time

Motion Calculator – https://www.usemotion.com/pricing

Projects stalling for more than 3 weeks

Adding to your Terms and Conditions

Ways to contact clients in advance of the 3 weeks

Being aware of what your time is being spent on

Choosing when to give your time for free

Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk

Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com

Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook

* Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved in creating this content for you.