In my current role, I’m the product marketing manager for AppAssure, one of Dell’s backup and recovery products. I like the role because I’m on the product team, so I’m tied to engineering which keeps me technical. But I also get to plan how we talk about the product and take it to market. It’s an interesting role from a skill set point of view, because you have to be really good at program management. That means lists (yay!!!), time management, spotting gaps (and creatively closing those gaps, sometimes under unbelievable deadlines), motivating team members who don’t report to you, and interfacing directly with sales and customers. I can go from being super tactical to being super creative. Unfortunately, the creative part is always on a deadline, and sometimes it just doesn’t line up with where I am mentally. And I get writer’s block just when I need to be creative.

In fact, I have it right now. I need to give some input to a downstream team, and it needs to be new and fresh. And the words and thought process just aren’t coming to me, I think because last week I wrapped up two big launches during Dell World and I needed to be uber-tactical to get it all done.

I asked my friends on Facebook what they do when they have writer’s block but they had a deadline. Not mentioning names to protect the innocent (let me know if you want credit for your comment!), but here were the suggestions:

• Do household tasks (raking leaves, cleaning)
• Go for a walk
• Do something else but have a notebook on you and write thoughts/ideas as they come to you (x2)
• Music:
  • Listen to funky music
  • Listen to music
  • Listen to different kinds of music
• Do something else creative (paint, photography)
• Look at photography or nature
• Write down a bunch of adjectives
• Pinterest (x2)
• Leave what you need to write alone for  a while then come back to it
• Start a blog post with a few bullets, keep it in draft
• Warmups – you have to warm up with creative stuff first (blackout poetry, write a couple of little poems, look for a warmup online, free write). If you exercise your body you won’t do it without warming up – conversation starts with small talk to warm up…
• Bourbon. To be precise: lots of bourbon.

I did get some of my writing done. What did I do? I turned the Avett Brothers on Spotify. I looked at Facebook, and saw this post about the Native American music that will be on MTV’s Rebel Music on Thursday. In addition to a new video from Frank Waln (which is wicked cool because it shows native people just doing stuff, then doing the same stuff in regalia), I found a link to First Nations artist Steven Paul Judd. He’s native, and he’s a nerd. And he’s pretty hot too, but that is sort of beside the point. Look at his art!

I’m not sure which one is my fav. I love them both so much!! I am just amazed at how creative people are!

So what do you do when you are stuck in a creative funk, but you have a deadline?