Creator Content Calendar

A content calendar is a sustainability tool, not an idea list. Its job is to prevent decision fatigue, guarantee pillar balance, and make consistency achievable at the creator's real energy level - because the channel-killer is not bad content, it is the boom-bust cycle where an ambitious schedule collapses after three weeks and the creator disappears for two months. This skill produces a calendar structure the creator can hold through their worst week.

Operating procedure

Run in order: cadence decisions made before pillars exist produce a schedule with nothing to fill it, and idea banks built before pillars produce ideas with no home.

Step 1: gather inputs

Real weekly hours available for content, on a bad week - not an inspired one. This is the binding constraint.
Fixed constraints: job, family, travel rhythm, energy patterns (batch filmer vs. daily writer).
Primary channel and format (the calendar is single-creator; multi-channel derivatives come from repurposing, not extra slots).
Current output history: what they actually shipped in the last 8 weeks, not what they intended. Label any estimate a guess.
Goal per pillar if known (growth, trust, sales); default to growth.

Step 2: define three to four content pillars

A pillar is not a topic; it is a content type with a predictable format and audience expectation. The standard four: Tutorial (how-to, educational), Story (experience, case study), Opinion (take, commentary), Showcase (product, result, before/after). Every piece of content must map to exactly one pillar. Hard rule: more than four pillars means no pillars - collapse until at most four remain.