For a few years, I’ve been making small content updates to my personal site. This morning, like many mornings, I sat down and didn’t like what I saw. I decided to do something. It feels long overdue.

I try to use a disciplined approach to any project, large or small. This one is no exception. For me, that means writing. Writing = thinking. I begin by writing the purpose and vision.

Purpose —
Why am I doing this?

Vision —
What’s the future that I imagine?

This kind of framework and similar ones help structure my thinking. They work at a variety of scales. Examples: How do I think about investing my savings? Should I take this job? What do I need to be ready for winter? Why update my personal website?

About that last one. Yeah, why update my personal website?

One lost file and a lot of copy/paste, questioning myself, writing and rewriting later…

Purpose—
To be proud of my online expression and enjoy engaging with it.

Vision—
An authentic extension of myself, online.

That’s nice and clean. I’ve got clarity, and I’m excited to continue working on the problem. That’s the beauty of this simple exercise: clarity and enthusiasm.

Why does this create enthusiasm and clarity for me? The answer is lies in the authentic extension idea. I want my website to represent more of me: to sound more like me, behave more like me , and extend beyond my professional accomplishments and goings-on. While I love and care about work things , my life experience is more than that. I care about more than that. I have thoughts, interests, and expressions that are different from my occupation as a design executive and leader. What exists today isn’t inauthentic in the sense. It isn’t wrong, but it’s not right enough!

I’m excited to make my site more right.

After defining the purpose and vision of the work, I’m going to write about the goals and how I might track them. I’ll write about that in another post. If you’d like to know when I publish that, subscribe to my brief email about design and life, Just Enough.

My site is still in its current (old?) form at the time of publishing. Check it out. It’ll change.