What Kind of Creator are You?

Uncover the five creator types and find your best work system

As creators we come in all shapes and sizes. We’ve wild creators willing to conquer the world and we’ve got cautious creators, leaving no stone un-turned. There’s no one-size-fits-all mold. And plenty of folks in between.

I’ve found there are five general buckets of creators.

No matter where you fall on the creator’s spectrum, we all share a common bond — innovation. Whether you’re a classic woodworker, or you build the latest software — you think in terms of the future. We bring new ideas, new takes on the old, and new ways of living to the world. Without creators life would be gray and square.

We punch rectangles in round holes. We duck when others jump. We persevere when others quit.

Creators are as different as they are similar. We all have different working habits. Some of us do a little daily. Some work in bursts. While others work when the mood strikes.

The names were made in jest. There’s no judgement here. If you’d rather call them Type A, B, C… go for it. There’s no right way to work. I’m a Turtle. I can’t work fast if you held a gun to my face. But I get a ton of work done through daily consistent practice. I wish I had some of the other traits, but I don’t. So I work to my strengths and schedule my work accordingly. You’ll do the same.

We’ve all got our own plumbing.

You can’t rewire who you are, so don’t fight it. Understand your work process and adjust your schedule accordingly. Design your creator’s environment to enhance the way you work — not fight against it.

Which creator are you?

The Turtle —

You practice your craft every day. You work no matter what. You are far from the fastest. You might look down upon the speed demons, but you know your cumulative effort will deliver in the end. Like the post office — neither rain, nor sleet, nor snow will prevent you from practicing your craft every day.

Your work process: Give yourself reasonable deadlines, but don’t push them too far. Your daily work allows you to hit predictable timelines, but it’s not in your nature to rush. Push yourself a little, but not enough that the work suffers due to poor scheduling. Give yourself room during each day away from your work to recharge. Turtles can work all day if left unattended.

The Moonbeam —

You wait for the universe to inspire your work. The muse is your best friend. Once you get the signal it’s like a bolt of lighting through your body, but the work doesn’t start until you feel it. When you do work it’s a frenzy — even pulling all-nighters to ensure the inspiration doesn’t leave your body. Your work-space looks ‘inspired.’ What others make think is a disaster zone, you surround yourself with objects and materials that keep your creativity at peak levels. Once the inspiration is gone, you crash — giving yourself plenty of downtime to recover between creative intervals.

Your work process: Collect data on your work schedule (how often, how long, and how much you produce in a given month). This will give you more-reasonable way to estimate your output, so you can schedule deadlines appropriately. If you make an average of two projects per month, don’t tell your clients you can make seven. The muse won’t show up when you need him.

The Spazz —

When you work you work like a complete maniac — like you’re hopped-up on Mountain Dew and jet fuel. You do a little here. A little over here. You’ve got sixteen project in the fire and five get finished. Your brain runs in overdrive, even while you’re sleeping. Speaking of sleep — you operate on little, but when you do sleep you crash hard. You tame your idea beast by working on everything all the time. If anyone watched you work they’d run screaming, but you operate perfectly at a level ten all the time. Until you pause.

Your work process: You need a loose structure, but if you try to build too much structure for yourself, the process will likely fail. Find big milestones to hit. Don’t worry about crossing the Ts every day. You’re still very much a craftsman and your output is impeccable, but be careful not to let your customers know how you got there — unless you want to make that part of your story, then by all means.

The Accountant —

Everything has a spot. No project is started without a step-by-step, color-coded plan. You’ve got Post-its, planners, and systems backing up your systems — Post-its reminding you to check your Post-its. You make a Swiss watch jealous with your precision. Nuclear physicists want to use a piece of your brain to help make the atomic clock more accurate. You’re a walking checklist.

Your work process: If your work-space or project is out of order you don’t operate well. Ensure you’ve got everything you need before you start, so your environment doesn’t derail your work. Set reasonable deadlines based on past results. Push yourself, but within the bounds of your systems. Give yourself a little unscripted time every day to decompress from your tight schedule.

The Dabbler —

You’re really good at what you do, but you have no interest in doing the work all the time. When you do work you create amazing project that inspire others around you. You hear a constant “hey, you should really do this for a living,” but you’re worried it will take the magic out of the work. You’re happy and content practicing your work on occasion, but you don’t have intentions of doing this work full time. It may take too much out of you when you do perform the work, so you prefer to create on your schedule.

Your work process: Don’t take paid clients, where there will be timelines and expectations involved. Instead, create your work on your time and sell what you’ve made when it’s done. Be very specific with people when the inquire about ‘custom’ projects. You say ‘nope.’

The Grand Champion —

You’ve got the creator’s gene — a rare breed. You can do it all and never run out of energy. You’ve got the daily work ethic of the Turtle, the inpired genius of the Moonbeam, the ability to pump out projects like the Spazz, the attention to detail of the Accountant, and the ideals of the Dabbler. All creators want to be you, deep-down, although most won’t admit it. If you hope, or think you might be a Grand Champion you probably aren’t one. Most Grand Champions won’t spend the time to read this. They’ll be too busy being awesome.

Your work process: Your personal Kryptonite will be pushing yourself to the point of exhaustion — becoming so competitive with yourself the work suffers in the end. Know your limits but push yourself hard. The Grand Champion gets bored easily and needs a constant challenge to keep the torch lit.

Work to your strengths

In an era where we’re supposed to improve ourselves all the time it’s easy to think your broken. You’re not. Sure, we need to improve our work one percent every day — establishing the craftsman’s mindset if we want to grow. But you’re wired to work a certain way and it’s in your best interest if you feed that work habit instead of fight against it.

Did I miss a creator type? Please share if I did.

Whether you’re a Turtle or a Spaz, a Grand Champion or a Moonbeam — your creator’s work is yours. The way you design your workflow should be directly-related to the way you’re wired. Don’t cram two hundred pounds of stuff in your bag if it hold five pounds.

We need you to operate at your best so we can enjoy your best work.

We’re waiting for you.

This story is published in The Startup, Medium’s largest entrepreneurship publication followed by +431,678 people.

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