Strategic Switch: Mastering the habits that'll help you become a Strategic Brand Designer

There’s one lesson I’ve learned over and over in business:

You don’t hit your goals with ambition or talent. You hit them by “becoming the person” who is capable of hitting those goals.

• Want to land better clients? Become the person who researches industries deeply, asks strategic questions, and presents solutions (not just pretty designs)

• Want to charge more for branding projects? Become the person who leads discovery calls confidently, delivers in-depth strategy, and positions design as business investment

• Want consistent 5-figure revenue months? Become the person who… You get the point.

  
  

Now the question is: How exactly do you “become the person”?

The answer… HABITS.

Right now, you may want to hit a specific revenue number.

But even if your vision grows into working with a specific brand or starting your own new company, the core skill that’ll help you “become the person” at any stage is building strong habits.

In today's newsletter, we're diving deep into the world of habits for Strategic Brand Designers.

We'll cover how generic designers approach their daily routines, what strategic designers understand differently about habits, and the framework to systematically build habits that transform your life (and your business).

Let's dive in!

Most generic designers treat their business like a pinball machine, bouncing from one urgent task to the next, with no real direction or intention behind their daily actions.

Somedays you think you’re headed in the right direction simply because you seem busy, but when you sit back to analyze, you realise you were only running in circles. Still pretty far away from where you wanted to be.

If that sounds like you, here are the 3 reasons it feels impossible to achieve to your goals:

#1. You rely on motivation instead of habits

You wait to “feel like” doing things.

• You only reach out to prospects when you’re feeling confident.

• You only design when you’re “feeling creative”.

The reason you do this, is because you don’t have a plan.

You’re constantly at the mercy of your emotions and energy levels, which means your business growth is completely unpredictable.

Your entire business depends on whether you woke up on the right side of the bed.

#2. You try to change everything at once

You attempt complete life overhauls that last about 3 days.

“Starting Monday, I’m going to wake up at 5 AM, exercise for an hour, journal, meditate, work on my portfolio, do client outreach, AND learn strategy.”

By Wednesday, you’ve burned out completely and given up on all of it.

You treat habit building like a crash diet instead of understanding that sustainable change happens through small, consistent actions. You go from 0 to 100, fail spectacularly, and then tell yourself you’re “just not disciplined enough.”

#3. You have no tracking or awareness of what actually works

You can’t identify patterns in your creative process because you don’t observe what you’re doing.

You don’t know when you do your best strategic thinking, what triggers creative blocks, or which activities actually move your business forward. You’re flying blind, making the same mistakes over and over again because you never step back to analyze what’s working and what isn’t.

When a project goes well, you can’t replicate the success because you don’t know what you did differently. When you have a creative breakthrough, it feels like magic instead of something you can systematically recreate.

I know you’ve heard it a million times that you need systems and habits.

But in this newsletter, I really want to help you understand the WHY behind this, and how to use them to get a competitive advantage:

Reason 1: You (the designer) are your business’s most valuable creative asset

Your business is often a reflection of you.

That’s why building a business is one of the best personal development journeys you can go on, because you are the bottleneck. So, in order to grow, you have to face your faults, limiting beliefs, and bad habits.

Think about it. As a design business owner, how many different modes are you switching between daily? You are the researcher, the strategist, the creative director, and the client manager.

Now, if you aren’t operating at your creative and strategic best, do you think your business will run like you want it to?

I’ve seen this with SO MANY designers:

• When you’re overwhelmed, your research becomes surface-level

• When you’re reactive, you skip strategic thinking and jump to aesthetics

• When you’re not mentally clear, you avoid challenging creative decisions

If you don’t systematically set yourself up for success, your work will reflect that. And more importantly, your client results will reflect that.

Reason 2: Systems >>>> Goals (especially for strategic work!)

James Clear, the author of Atomic Habits, famously wrote: you don’t rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems.

I know you– I know how busy you are.

• You might be married

• You might have kids

• You might have pets

• You might be studying in college or uni

• You might have health challenges

Life is complex.

So if you think that you’re just going to magically remember to do the things that you need to do, you’re not going to. You need habits that MAKE SURE you do the right things… and not leave it up to chance.

Imprint this in your mind: Systems >>>>> Goals!

Reason 3: The one who keeps standing till the end, wins.

If you have the “Creative Entrepreneurial” bug, there’s nothing you can do that’s going to cure you out of it.

You’re ALWAYS going to want the freedom, the entrepreneurial success, and the impact of seeing your clients win. And you’re ALWAYS going to be dissatisfied with surface-level, commoditized design work!

There are only two paths forward: Either you master entrepreneurial habits or you give up before you do.

This means you simply need to persist and stay in the game long enough to achieve real success. It requires taking care of yourself.

Strong habits will help you endure over time. Then success is GUARANTEED.

Now onto my favourite part!

I am not here to simply tell you why you need good habits.

I want to help YOU get there. So here are 4 steps to build habits that change you (and your business)

Step 1: Start observing your actions (and habits)

You can’t optimize what you don’t observe.

And so, the very first step to habits is gathering data. Start observing yourself and start tracking your actions. Don’t judge yourself for it at all.

Awareness is always the first step. Be kind to yourself but also be brutally honest.

Pay attention to:

• What tasks fire you up?

• What’s sapping your energy?

From here, you’ll notice what is working, what isn’t, and you can start modifying and replacing habits you don’t want.

Step 2: First, start integrating daily habits

Now, the first thing is to start daily. You want to have certain non-negotiables every day, so that you make non-zero progress EVERY DAY.

Here’s some habits I recommend:

• Morning Pages: Free flow journaling on paper first thing in the morning.

• Moving your body: Can be a workout, a walk anything that gets you moving. Your brain works better when your body is active.

• End-of-the-day check-in: Bullets: what you did, what you learned, what’s the plan tomorrow.

• Screen downtime: No phone first 2 hours of the day or before bed.

Start the day with clarity, stay active, choose how you spend your time, and decide the priorities for the next day before you sleep.

Just doing this will transform how your day goes. And you won’t believe how few people do this consistently.

Step 3: Then, start integrating weekly reviews

Once a week, sit down and review core metrics of business and life: DMs sent, Responses received, Sales calls, Client meetings, Revenue generated.

This is your CEO thinking time.

Think about the questions: what you’re learning, and what you’ll do next week. In your plan, make sure you’re doing both urgent work and important work. So you are working on the business, as well as in it.

Your weekly review could include:

• Lead generation activities and results

• Client delivery progress

• Financial metrics

• What’s working vs what needs adjustment

Weekly reviews will make you the CEO of your business instead of just another busy freelancer.

Step 4: Monthly vision alignment

Here you zoom out to view your trajectory and check if you’re going where you want to be. Do this monthly to stay aligned with your bigger vision.

This is you, the CEO of your creative life, thinking about:

• Is my business creating the freedom I wanted?

• Am I moving toward my bigger vision?

• What needs to change for me to love this journey even more?

  
  

There’s no right way to do this.

You’ll design your own!

Your habits determine who you become. And who you become determines the business you build.

So, take this as a much needed wake up call.

And start prioritizing yourself. Not for today’s you, but the future you.

They deserve it!

Chat soon,

Abi 😊

Sign Up

How I can help you ⬇️

​The Ultimate Operating System for Brand Designers ➡️

If you're ready to save hours on admin work, start confidently taking on more projects, and deliver consistently professional results, these proven templates and systems are your answer.