Aug 9 • 🏆 Wins
MY FIRST AUTOMATION - JAKES METHOD
I Kept stopping.
I’ve been going back and forth trying to learn Jake's ICM.
I would start.
Feel overwhelmed.
Stop.
Then come back and repeat the same cycle.
I would hear words like harnesses and MCP servers, API, automations etc. It wasn't that I couldn't learn it — it was that the list kept growing faster than I could get through it, and everyone seemed further ahead every week. Honestly, it became too much
So I stopped.
Then I came back to the community one day and started looking through Jake's Weekly comps. briefs, repos, winners etc.
He said something along the lines of:
"Pick a real workflow that belongs to you. Don’t build for a fake client this time"
That made everything click. 💡
I already had a real workflow.
I’m a solo architectural visualisation artist. Every new job requires quotes, invoices, project folders and client emails.
So I built Workstation around that.
THE OLD WAY ❌
A client email would arrive. I would:
1. Open Canva on another screen.
2. Manually enter every detail into a quote.
3. Triple-check everything then Export the PDF.
4. Write the response email.
Repeat the process for two separate invoices. It took hours for the entire set.
Sometimes I would find a mistake and check everything again.
When a client asked for an imagery proposal, I felt a bit anxious if I'm being honest, because I knew this mess was waiting for me.
Yes, I was creating invoices manually in Canva. I know. Insane.
But that was my system.
THE NEW WAY ✅
Now I paste in the client’s email. Workstation handles the rest:
Client email
Extract the job details
↓
Calculate the price
↓
Create the project folder
↓
Build the quote
↓
Build both invoices
↓
Render the PDFs
↓
Prepare the client email
↓
I check and send
What previously took hours now takes minutes.
HOW IT WORKS
The system uses simple folders and Markdown files:
📁 00_intake: Reads and organises the brief
📁 01_quote: Builds the quote
📁 02_invoices: Builds the invoices and PDFs
📁 03_email: Prepares the emails on my dashboard
I can update my services, prices, tax or payment terms in one file.
Every quote, invoice, email and dashboard view follows that change.
I can update a stage’s Markdown rules, and the system follows them on the next job.
No complicated framework.
Just folders, files and one clear workflow.
IT’S FINALLY CLICKING
This is my first proper automation system using Jake’s ICM method.
It is built around my actual solo work and solves a problem I genuinely had.
I think that was the breakthrough.
I stopped trying to understand everything at once and built something that was already mine.
THE COMMUNITY HELPED A LOT
I was also super lucky to see what other people were building in here.
Being able to look through those projects helped me follow along and find pieces of the puzzle I was missing.
So thank you to everyone in the community who has shared their work.
It helped more than you probably realise.
PLEASE GRILL IT
If anyone wants to go through the repo and grill me, please do.
Tell me where I’ve gone wrong, what I’ve messed up, or anything I’ve included that shouldn’t be there.
I’m still learning, so honest criticism is welcome.
Cheers!
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MY FIRST AUTOMATION - JAKES METHOD
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