Unless whatever you do in your line of work is unique every time, there’s probably a process you can implement to help streamline your efforts. Having a routine whose steps you follow means that whatever you’re doing is repeatable and trackable. Even if the output isn’t the same every time, the process to get there can be. Process can help make sense of chaos.

Sometimes, though, people focus so much on the process that it becomes The Process. It becomes the game itself instead of a method for playing it. When that happens, there’s danger in the air. We risk doing things for the sake of The Process, not for the goal that necessitated that process in the first place. When you can’t explain why it makes sense–when all you have to offer is, I’m sorry, that’s our policy–it’s time to reexamine your method.

The goal isn’t for us to serve the process; it’s for the process to serve us.