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billconrad · 5 months

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How Writing Affected My Life

My big life goals were to become an electrical engineer, get a job, and have a family. Writing did not play a part in these plans, yet stories rattled around my bonkers mind from an early age, and I thought that it would be fun to write something after I retired.

Life does not always go as planned, and being unemployed three times certainly deterred me from my goals. The first round lasted only a month, but it frightened me, and I had to do something about it. So, I created a notebook full of ideas to plan my future.

I wanted to organize my thoughts on business ideas and employment goals. Then, analyze everything to determine the best chances for success. This list of ideas included becoming a big-time author, and I wrote a summary (about a paragraph) for each story idea so I could evaluate the opportunity.

With this tool, I planned to get rehired and start a business in my free time. I did not include writing a book because it would take too much time. Everything was going according to plan, but life threw another curve ball. I was working for a company called Sundstrand (a division of United Technologies Corporation). They had three divisions (cheap, average, and high-quality) that made the same product. It made good business sense to eliminate the middle player. In hindsight, this decision was foolish because it led to a billion-dollar Airbus lawsuit. United Technologies Corporation settled out of court for an undisclosed sum.

This second round of unemployment (technically not unemployment because I was working part-time) lasted a year, and I needed a side activity to keep from going crazy. I had recently attempted to start a business and needed a break from that nightmare. So, I wrote a book because I knew it would be easy money. I began without knowing the reality of publishing, marketing, or proper book structure.

Since that chaotic beginning, I have gained many skills and self-publish four books. It has been five years, and I thought it would be interesting to see how this effort affected my life.

Improved writing skills are the most prominent change. The flaws jump off the page like rocketships when I look at my past documents. Now, my sentences are more straightforward and more grammatically correct.

The downside to my new skills is that I spot errors in other people’s work. Before my writing adventure, I found it amusing on the rare occasions I spotted a mistake. (I cannot recall seeing an error in a professionally published book before I started writing.) Now, errors upset me, and I look down on unskilled authors. Is this bad? Yes.

Writing now occupies much of my time due to the many hours of self-editing and self-promoting. That is time I cannot get back, but what if I could time travel? Would I recommend the path to myself? Hmm. It is clear that I will break even with this venture, but I answer yes. While there have been many negatives, the positives have outweighed them.

My speech has also improved because I think more about what I will say. I also focus more on other people’s speech and often think of better/clearer methods. My family and friends have all commented on the improvement.

While watching movies, I couldn’t care less about acting, cinematography, and special effects. Instead, I focus on the plot and critically analyze it. This approach reduces entertainment but provides valuable information. Why? A movie allows me to visually see how a plot unfolds, which is not possible in a book. I also like to think about fixing a lousy plot; recently, there have been so many.

Sometimes, I fantasize about random people I see walking by. It’s fun to mentally describe their appearance (to develop excellent character descriptions) or guess their thoughts. Sometimes, I even put them into a plot I make up on the spot. Is this creepy? Probably.

Writing has made me more liberal. I want people to be happier and am more willing to be part of the solution. This comes from my desire/empathy for my characters to succeed. It might also be out of the passion for a positive plot.

I have a more worldly view because my characters travel. Therefore, I research other cultures, geography, flights, and currencies.

I am more outgoing online, including sharing my views, discussing critical writing topics, asking for advice, and promoting my books.

Last, I met many authors and became pen pals with two. I certainly would not have done this before my writing adventure.

Until writing this, I had not analyzed all the changes. Writing has indeed affected many areas of my life. So, let me ask myself a question. Do I think these changes are common among authors? I would guess that 75% of the changes I experienced are standard. But making up plots with random people? Only a crazy person like myself would go that far.

You’re the best -Bill

December 20, 2023

Hey book lovers, I published four. Please check them out:

Interviewing Immortality. A dramatic first-person psychological thriller that weaves a tale of intrigue, suspense, and self-confrontation.

Pushed to the Edge of Survival. A drama, romance, and science fiction story about two unlikely people surviving a shipwreck and living with the consequences.

Cable Ties. A slow-burn political thriller that reflects the realities of modern intelligence, law enforcement, department cooperation, and international politics.

Saving Immortality. Continuing in the first-person psychological thriller genre, James Kimble searches for his former captor to answer his life’s questions.

These books are available in soft-cover on Amazon and eBook format everywhere.

#writing #life experiences #life lessons

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xurkitips · 6 years

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On Conveying Personality Through Chatroom-style Dialogue

A friend of mine shared screenshots of a roleplay he was having via a Discord server, wherein the style was chatroom/texting based. Each character would have a different style of typing completely unique to their person. Though unfamiliar with all of them, I could see what their personalities were like

Like real human beings, a character very much so has a “voice”. I mean that both in the literal sense, through their manner of speaking and what they say, but also through their self expression, interests, and actions. This carries over into the digital realm in ways we may not even notice. Text messages may not be verbal, no, but there are ways to show inflection.

There are many, many ways to show meaning through text. Here are some that I’ve picked up and utilized with my own characters:

Sentence structure

all lowercase sentences VS Grammatically correct

Lowercase gives off the feeling of someone familiar with others or willing to become familiar. It lacks the tension of formal writing, complete with its capitalization and proper periods ending sentences, and feels very casual and approachable. It may also be a sign of someone who doesn’t care much about perfection, a lazy person, or an easy going individual. Seems like a lot of internet regulars prefer this kind of typing style.

“im dying

‘deafening horrorcore rap’ ok i listen to literal noise and idk what this even is”

Using a properly capitalized and punctuated style is very formal, like one would see in a book, an official email, etc. It’s more serious and stern than lowercase is and may imply an older, more mature person typing...or maybe just someone trapped on their phone at the mercy of autocorrect.

"I am always happy to see you, even if you are not feeling your best.“

“It's nice here.

Quiet.”

There’s a certain respectful steadiness to it as well. It can be calming to read at times.

Punctuation VS Lack of punctuation

End-stopped lines come with both a pause and a bit of a pointed and direct feeling. It strengthens both lowercase and grammatically correct styles, but in different ways. In conjunction with “proper” writing, it’s less noticeable, merely giving the reader a moment’s pause. In conjunction with lowercase, especially if the one typing isn’t keen on using periods, it can come off as stern, serious, passive-aggressive, or angry.

“whatever.

it's less excruciating than it would be without it.”

Removal of punctuation is a different story. Typically just shown with lowercase, it leaves it with that casual feeling intact, or like one’s sentences are more like quick thoughts or questions. Removing them from grammatically correct sentences does ease off some of the tension, implying someone with a more neutral-positive tone while still being more mature.

“I’m not terribly good with conversation”

And then there’s the run-on sentences from those who type small novels per response. Usually complete with multiple and’s. It’s a sign of nervousness, enthusiasm, or oftentimes a younger character...

“actually i don't know much about it i just happened to see something online and it's apparently only manufactured overseas exclusively for this one particular shop and they made the original design and initial product i guess”

Oof.

Proper spelling (or lack thereof)

The better the spelling, the more the likelihood of the person being older, calmer, or neutral. There’s also a sense of being well educated or careful about one’s typing. Perhaps a confident air may exude from what they say, too.

“Can you come help me for a moment?”

Those who make a lot of mistakes will simply confuse words for other words, forget apostrophes, or type too fast to notice things missing or in the wrong location. Some just don’t really care enough or are too tired to deal with it. Too much focus and people know what they mean anyway. Probably.

“i laug hso hard hes come runin

he thougt i aws dyin”

It can also happen in very emotional situations, in bouts of laughter, crying, rage, or when one is drowsy, medicated, or sick. It tends to stand out when one’s style is suddenly very, very different and tips others off to something being wrong.

Younger characters, especially kids, also make spelling mistakes all the time depending on their age, whether due to sounding out words or just in a hurry to reply.

Short sentence fragments, single words, and lengthy paragraphs

Sometimes people with rapid-fire thoughts, who are excited, busy, stressed, or angry, will take to quick and short responses (sometimes of many fragments in a row). These show a similar feeling as do lines of poetry. Stacking small fragments on top of one another adds emphasis. The reader has to read them one by one rather than as a straight sentence. On its own, the word or fragment stands out and becomes more important.

"well

yeah thats

what i was tryina do

but i mean”

I’ve seen it used used for storytelling from one person to another in larger chunks of things, quick responses, for poetic value, and in irritation or passive-aggressiveness.

In full sentence conversations sent in short bursts, it’s also allowing the reader pause to read each comment without it feeling like a novella. Though it can also feel like someone is obnoxious, rambling on and on as the notifications keep coming, or has a lot to talk about and keeps thinking of more.

Then there are those who type rather large responses all at once instead of hitting the enter key with every sentence:

"Whoever did it was quite thorough; either the power in that area of the lab was cut while we were distracted or they tampered with the security cameras, because that footage is missing. But, we have some theories now. It had to have been someone with direct access to the laboratory. I hesitate to place blame on any of my coworkers...they're all my trusted companions and friends! And yet...”

It’s concise and a solid, complete story in one spot. Could be someone who loves to talk, could be someone who didn’t want a response before they were done talking. It’s also commonly seen by middle-aged texters who want to say everything they can all at once.

Exclamation points and Question marks

Simple one here. Question mark for a question or confusion, exclamation point for emphasis or an exclamation. But when a person adds multiple to a sentence it can convey more of the person’s feelings;

“are you okay??”

Here is someone who is very concerned. Multiple question marks can imply things such as worry, stress, disbelief, and shock. There’s a sense of hurry and tension. Perhaps the person on the other end is frightened, easily afraid, or tends to have an overwhelming reaction to things.

“oh!!! it’s nice to see you!!!”

!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Meanwhile, multiple exclamation points convey much more friendlier, happier tones. Often such things as surprise, excitement, happiness, friendliness. Users typing !! as a punctuation (like I tend to do) may do it as an assurance or to show how thrilled they are to talk. Occasionally !!!! is tacked onto an angry statement to be more of a shout, but I see it less and less.

Chatspeak and Internet habits

Shortenings of words have been a regular thing for ages. It’s easy, convenient, and gets the point across quickly. But the internet has taken it to a new extreme, where sentences can be almost entirely compromised of them.

“wtf r u talkin abt?? gdi man idk wuts even happening rn”

A character wanting to be quick to respond, always on the ball, always involved, may be more likely to utilize and understand chatspeak. They’re the social butterfly of the group. It’s also a sign of a long-time internet lurker who’s aware of what the lingo is, and how to use it. A complete lack thereof points toward either an older user or someone who’s unused to social media.

The more memes, the harder someone is trying to fit in. Or maybe they’re easily amused or just absorbed things from their friends without thinking about it. The comedian of the group is going to know the best ways to use them.

Smilies and Emojis

:D D: :DDD // :3 3: >:3 :3c // :o :O O:<

These kinds of smilies have always struck me as the most friendly. Whether used in devious ways or with genuinely heartwarming intentions, the playful, lightheartedness of the user really shines through these.

"not a bad way to spend a lazy day :D”

“it's also my birthday :3″

It’s got just the right vibe to punctuate a sentence that’ll leave the reader feeling that the person likely means no harm or wants to be friendly, positive, or encouraging. I’ve met a lot of people that use these and turn out to be very kind or considerate people.

:), ;), ((((: and related

A long time positive, friendly smiley.

"You said you've known them a long time? I think they would understand. :)”

And yet these days I tend to associate it with passive aggressive statements, plotting, slyness, devious behavior, or anger. Older users may be inclined to use :) as a means to show their emotional state, but newer users seem more inclined to do the opposite. The more parentheses there are, the more upset the person, it seems.

“man don’t u love it when the power’s out in the middle of the night it’s just (((: really great thanks (((((:”

Then the ;) smiley comes off more specifically flirty and a bit playful. Doesn’t seem to change much there.

“if i find a good chance 2 hook u up ill do my best ;)”

The bane of my teenage existence. It’s a more old school sign of laughter, rarely seen in today’s world due to falling out of favor and becoming associated with, “LOL Rawr XD Tacos I’m So Randoom,” culture. But time to time you do see it. Mostly with sarcasm but sometimes with genuine intentions.

“xDddddDDD

It was a good joke. XD”

A character using it genuinely comes off more playful, and to me, personally, as an older person who’s genuinely unaware of the associations with the smiley itself trying to show how they laughed without using LOL.

Letter/Character smilies

Y’know, things like .w. and ._. or owo, where the letters or symbols make a face. These are fairly popular, it seems. I don’t like using them myself, but know a few who do use them.

"I'm sorry that they can be mean qmq”

It’s a different feel from the others. There’s something soft to it, almost a gentleness. When these or Japanese characters are used, there’s more whimsy. It’s cute and almost a bit feminine. It may convey an open person or give the impression that said person is easier to talk to.

Though honestly I can’t see uwu and owo as anything but heavily sarcastic. I’ll be honest with you.

Emojis

The first rule of Xurkitips club is that we don’t talk about Emoji Movie. Just putting that out there riiight now.

Used sparingly by most for fun and for emphasis. Characters may use them to be lighthearted, aesthetically, joke, or to make a conversation more flavorful. The use of emojis may determine a character’s personality; I find that characters who use hand emojis like 👌 are rather laid back, those who use 🙃 do it passive aggressively, and we all know what kind of person uses 🍆.

Then there’s what in common terms known as, “The DudeBro”:

[MFKNSTARBOI]: the thing i never undstood about hair is why people buy shampoo like regular soap not good enough for you LMAO 😂😂😂

[gostones]: .

[BIGDICKTOYOTA69]: what the fuck man

[ahogekun]: do... you not use shampoo

[MFKNSTARBOI]: aaaah you guys got sucked into big shampoo as well 😔

[MFKNSTARBOI]: When it comes to horses 🐎 the stars in the sky ✨ or just man to man no bullshit advice 👬 IM youre guy 😤😂

I think this one speaks for itself.

#writing advice #milo's writing advice #writing tips #CRY THROUGH😭💦💦THE PAIN😢😩😩BUT KEEP GOING👀💯💪THE HUSTLE 😈👌NEVER ENDS🕛🕧🕟🚫STUDENT ATHLE

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dorothydelgadillo · 5 years

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How to Solve for the "Content Editing Takes Too Much Time" Problem

All aboard Liz's time machine! Please keep your hands, legs, and beer bellies inside the vehicle at all times, as we travel back to a late night four years ago. 🚀

It was 9 p.m. Everyone else had gone home, and I was sitting at my desk in an empty office.

At the time, I was Quintain's content manager. In my role, I worked closely with our account managers and our clients, as I managed all of the interviewing of subject matter experts, as well as the editing and publication of all content for our clients.

I also managed our network of freelance writers, and acted as their managing editor to ensure the scope of each piece matched the strategy I had outlined for them.

For each piece, a writer typically received an audio recording of my subject matter expert interview (about 15 to 30 minutes in length, depending on the depth of the topic), a content style guide I had built for the client, an overview of the purpose and persona for each piece, as well as any other notes or outlines I felt they would require to complete the assignment.

As a word nerd, I loved my job... for the most part.

But that night, I hated it.

I Could Have Worked All Night & Still Wouldn't Have Finished

My husband was always understanding about late nights, but I had left him hungry -- "You only have ingredients in the refrigerator; what am I supposed to do with lettuce?"

On top of that, I had 16 different articles I had to work through -- a blend of assignments that had come back from writers, and a client who had finally worked through their own bottleneck of edits.

Given that it took me about 30 minutes to an hour to work through each piece, at the time, I sat there with my head in my hands. I had no idea what I was going to do. At that pace, I could have stayed at work another six hours -- leaving Patrick to starve and my sanity to wither -- and still only gotten through maybe 50 to 75% of my backlog.

I had a reputation of being a great writer and editor at Quintain, but it was the volume that was killing me. Not because it was unfair, but rather it exposed a huge weakness of mine.

A weakness I'm sure a few of you might also be suffering from.

The quality of my work was outstanding, but that didn't change the fact that my editing process was utterly broken and not scalable.

And the situation I was in, at that moment, could have been avoided.

The 2 Most Insidious Editing Process Mistakes You're Making

Years later, with more experience under my belt, I can easily spot the two reasons why I had ended up in that position:

First, I did not push back on my writers nearly enough.

Second, I was trying to edit for everything at once. Which is impossible.

Now, having done high-volume content production management and editing for more than five years in an inbound marketing environment, I can say that these are the two mistakes content managers and inbound marketers make that result in...

Well, stop me if you've heard or said something like this before:

"We can't ramp up content production because editing takes too much time."

"The quality of work I'm getting back from my writers isn't getting better."

"I just want to scream at my bosses who want me to be more efficient, 'You have no idea how bad the quality of work is that I'm dealing with,' but they don't want to hear it."

"I feel like I am never, ever going to get ahead on our content calendar. I'm living in an endless loop of always feeling behind."

"I can never get to the point of being more strategic in my edits, because I just need to get stuff done and up. I'm always in catch-up mode."

If any of these sound familiar, you're probably dealing with at least one of the problems I mentioned above.

Don't Be Too Hard on Yourself

Today, I'm going to explain why each of those problems exist and how to solve for them.

First, however, I want to make something clear to anyone reading this who feels seen, but also feels like a failure.

You're not a failure for not having identified these as problems and for suffering in editing purgatory.

One of the things I've talked about in the past is that the demand for high-quality content has risen, because the inbound marketing space is crowded. So, while it used to be that marketers could pull double-duty as marketers and strategists who moonlight as content strategists and editors, that doesn't quite work anymore.

The skills I'm going to teach you are often not native to the inbound marketing world, unless you've already started hiring people who have some sort of background in professional publishing, journalism, or some other written communication-based field.

But you can learn those skills.

Now, with that bit of emotional housekeeping out of the way, let's roll up our sleeves and dig in...

Problem #1: Not Pushing Subpar Work Back to Writers

Going back to that night in 2015, my biggest problem was that I had seven pieces that had come back from writers. Back then, if I received a piece of writing back from a freelancer that wasn't good, guess what my first inclination was?

I would open up the document and get to work editing as best I could. My goal was to have a finished, client-ready piece by the time I got to the end. Even if it was bad, that just meant I had that much more work to do.

Which is exactly the opposite of what I should have been doing.

This Rule Works for Internal & External Writers

Now, instead of doing this, these are the guidelines I follow and coach others at IMPACT to follow, as well:

Take five minutes to review a first draft from a writer or returned edits on a draft from a client, where revisions have been requested. Skim, do not edit, at this phase.

Deciding to keep or send back content to a writer is often a judgment call that strikes a balance between not driving up costs with unnecessary revision cycles with a paid writer and making the best use of your own time.

The best practices below can help guide you.

When to Return Content to the Writer

The writer did not follow the instructions in the work order, and thus did not meet your expectations.

The focus of the article is correct, but the overall quality is subpar or lacks the polish that is to our standards.

The client has requested revisions that require a restructuring or reworking of significant portions of a blog post that would take more than 10 to 15 minutes worth of work.

When You Should Edit Content Yourself

The writer has done a good job delivering against the work order, and the piece only requires minimal spell checks and tweaks that would take less than 10 to 15 minutes to complete.

The client has provided minimal edits or comments that can easily be implemented or resolved in less than 10 to 15 minutes.

Why These Rules Are So Critically Important

There are two important deviations here from that typical "I'm just going to fix it myself" strategy that solved for a lot of my pain:

The first thing I do is skim; I do not edit. I do not need to deeply edit an article to figure out if we're in the ballpark of what I was looking for. A quick five-minute review will tell me whether or not the quality is where it should be and the strategic scope of an article is in-line with what was asked for. If it's not, back to the writer it goes.

A writer's failure to meet the requirements of an assignment is not my problem. I cannot stress how important it is to not allow your writers -- whether they're freelancers or colleagues who contribute -- to get the "gold star" of completing an assignment if you basically have to do the work yourself to make it useable.

By following these two rules, I drastically reduce the amount of time I spend on fixing terrible work.

Moreover, I do not become a doormat for writers who learn over time -- because I enable them by not holding them accountable -- that I will just fix their bad work for them.

Think about it -- under the "I'll just do it myself" process, there's no incentive for someone to deliver the quality I'm looking for. What's the point, when I'll just do it for them, right?

But I was also hurting myself, too.

By always positioning myself as a reactive editor, I never give myself a chance to develop myself professionally as a content manager or editor who has a voice or a vision. I also never give the writers who genuinely want feedback -- and the ability to learn and improve -- a chance to do so, because I'm just doing it for them.

The best part about this strategy is that, in the cases where the writer failed to meet expectations or needed to do more work, the edits I returned were more global and fewer in number.

Instead of a document with lots of markup, I'd just highlight sections or provide more 80,000-foot view feedback with a note that, once those issues are resolved, we can move into more copy-editing.

(Oh, and if a writer sends me a draft with tons of typos and grammatical errors, I'll send that back, too, with a note to run it through a more careful spelling and grammar check, before it comes to me.)

Problem #2: Editing for Everything All at Once

I'm going to be upfront and say that you are going to think I'm crazy as I explain the solution to this problem.

You're going to think I'm telling you to do more work, which will take more time.

You have to trust me that, with a little practice, this system will create less work for you and make your editing more efficient...

...even though there are seemingly more steps involved.

How We Normally Edit Content

Someone gives us a document.

We immediately start editing it, with an eye for the following:

How's the spelling, grammar, and syntax?

Did they nail the narrative structure -- should anything be moved around?

Have they answered all of the questions or covered the topic deeply enough?

Is the voice and tone -- the "style" -- in-line with brand standards?

How's the visual formatting with bullets, headings, and subheadings?

Considering how important each of those five points are to ensuring a piece of content meets the needs of the audience, while also reflecting positively on the brand that's doing the publishing, this list makes sense, right?

Of course, it does.

But the idea that you can effectively evaluate a piece of writing for each of those items at once is not only asinine, it's incredibly inefficient.

An Example to Show You What I Mean

Let's say you have an 800-word blog article you're editing from an internal subject matter expert. You do all of the copyediting against those five points above, including making a bunch of spelling and grammar edits.

Then, you highlight a section -- let's say three paragraphs -- with a note for the original writer that says:

"I'm not sure this answers the question we're looking for -- can you take another run at this?"

They come back later and the section is rewritten entirely.

If you've made any edits to that section, you can kiss that work goodbye. Now you have a whole new section -- potentially longer than the first -- that needs to be reviewed, from scratch.

The moral of the story here is you need to solve for the big problems in a piece of content first, before you even bother with the window-dressing edits.

But how do you do it?

Here's What You Need to Do Instead

You need to edit for each of those five standards, but in phases. Never all at once.

Otherwise, you'll end up having to redo your work because (a) depending on some of the edits you provide a writer, you may end up in the scenario I outlined above; and (b) it's almost impossible to effectively edit for everything all at once.

You may think you can, but it's likely that you'll find yourself reading and re-reading something over and over again to make sure you got everything.

So, here's how you do it -- assuming they've passed the skim test I discussed earlier:

First, edit for structure and scope. If there is anything that comes up here, ask the writer to resolve those comments before you move onto the next phase, so you don't have to redo your copyediting.

Next, edit for visual presentation and then content style. Once you're sure the ideas are sound and presented in the right order, you can get to work on massaging how the content looks -- maybe a paragraph might do better as a list or you need a few more subheadings -- and then clean up the style of the content.

Finally, edit for spelling and grammar. Even though these edits are the easiest to spot, you're wasting your time editing for this upfront. If there are a lot of them, you should have already instructed the writer to proofread their work again following the skim test. By leaving this step to the end, you're only doing cleanup on a piece of content you know is in-line with the quality and depth of what you were looking for.

(By the way, if you're moving through a high volume of content, there's no shame in using technology to make the spelling and grammar checks a bit easier.)

It sounds simple enough, but it makes a huge difference.

"These Solutions Sound Great, Liz, but That's Going to Require a Lot of Change for My Team"

If it makes you feel any better, this is exactly how I used to feel.

After that night, once I realized why I was struggling with the workload of copyediting at scale, I made every excuse in the book as to why I couldn't make the changes I knew I needed to make.

It'll make our production timeline longer.

I can't go back and ask clients or writers for more work.

We're not far enough ahead.

Finally, once I was done complaining, I realized the "pain" of restructuring how I do my work and communicating that to my team, freelancers, and writers would be far less than the very real pain I was feeling from always being behind.

In fact, it would make that pain go away. And, in a lot of ways, it did.

However, it did require me to finally stand up as an owner of the content process, which meant I had to create a communication strategy that covered the following:

The problems I had identified within our content process, and the pain we were all feeling as a result, so they understood I was solving a problem for all of us, not just for me;

The changes I was going to be making and the why for each, so they could see why each of those changes were important and not arbitrary.

The outcomes I expected to see as a result of these changes, which included our ability to get ahead, to empower others to be the content contributors they needed to be, and, ultimately, to increase the quality of content we were producing -- which help us reach our goals faster.

While I was scared about the communication strategy for it, that ended up being the easy part.

The hardest part for me will probably end up being the biggest challenge for all of you who need to transform your content production and editorial processes.

You have to stick to your guns.

You have to get better at delivering feedback and not wasting your time fixing the substandard work of others -- otherwise, you'll be paying your freelancers money they didn't really earn and/or your internal contributors will rely on you to do your work for them.

But you also have to push back on those who seek to create efficiency in these processes in a way that will erode the quality of what you're producing.

This is much easier to do, however, if you have a process like the one I've outlined. You can say things like:

"This step is non-negotiable and cannot be streamlined. This is where the story comes together, so, if we skip this or 'try to go faster' here, we're going to compromise the final product. However, we can talk about other parts of the process that won't impact the substance of our content."

If your process is a jumble of moving parts, where you can't point to a single step and MC Hammer it by saying, "You can't touch this," you'll never win a process argument. You'll never be able to justify with any authority that you have a process to begin with or steps within it that are worth preserving.

You'll Come Out the Other Side, I Promise!

Of course, you're still a finite resource. You can make your processes more scalable. But there will always be a breaking point where you'll need help in this department, depending on how robust your organizational vision around content production is.

That said, as someone who has been through this pain before -- complete with crying and nights where I questioned if I was good enough at my job -- and solved for it, trust me when I say you've totally got this.

This pain can be temporary, but you have to commit yourself to being the owner of your content and making the changes you need to, so you can get ahead and produce better inbound content.

Not only will you solve for the pain, you'll also create more time for high-value activities that can establish you as a content visionary within your organization.

from Web Developers World https://www.impactbnd.com/blog/content-management-editing-tips

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asegbolu · 7 years

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The Principle of New Beginning

THE PRINCIPLES OF NEW BEGINNINGS (A DOSAGE FOR PARENTS LOOKING FOR NEW SCHOOLS) - Part 1 SOURCE: The Diary of a Man Lost in Education – Mec Collins PHILOSOPHY: Many parents end up in wrong places because they lack basic knowledge and skills in getting new schools. ABSTRACT: Every school has minimal, average and high strengths and weaknesses, only upon your digestive comprehension of this article will you be able to accurately classify a school but unfortunately, a school's status changes with time, ups and downs are parts of every school system and should you beckon a school's downs, you will never achieve a trace of satisfaction hence, the great need to persevere with your child's school's weaknesses and get married to its strengths. INTRODUCTION: Just like in searching for a life partner or a wife or husband material, a lot of far and close assessments must be skillfully, patiently, interrogatively and practically employed beyond the words of mouth. APPRECIATION: I thank everyone who would patiently study-digest this piece and do hope earnestly that it leaves great impacts on every individual who reads it. SECTIONS: This work is categorized into four thus; General Attributes of a Possible More Consistent Good School, Dos in Choosing a New School, Don'ts in Choosing a New School and Common Mistakes Parents make in Choosing New Schools. GENERAL ATTRIBUTES OF A POSSIBLE MORE CONSISTENT GOOD SCHOOLS A good school is a school you can tolerate. So, a school good to you may not be good to me because no school is all good. So, settle for one, be careful in choosing that one because it is an uneasy task to change a school. A good school is not by number, structure, location, owner, staff and so on but by mission, vision, consistency, products and simplicity. DO' S IN CHOOSING A NEW AND DURABLE SCHOOL In choosing a school, be guided by the following and a few others: 1. Patience : You can't be in haste while in search for a new school, ask many questions and watch the consistency of the answers, possibly request to watch teachers teaching and students learning, be relaxed and try to get everyone at relaxed states. Do sampling of opinions and sometimes try to act against the average opinions. 2. Time: Give enough time, one visit will not be enough, go when the learners and teachers are on and request for their yearbooks, bulletins, logbooks and so on to read while waiting at the reception. Take tour of their websites, social media platforms and other sources of their profiles. 3. Familiarity: You need to be familiar with the location of the school, the alternative routes and the mentality of the descendants and inhabitants of its surroundings. Don't go to schools that would psychology draw you aback of your exposures and education. 4. Convenience: Ensure picking or dropping your child or the child going and coming are both finance, health and time healthy, just like renting a house, it is not making initial payments that matters but renewals, go for what you can maintain on the long run at slight upwards or downwards in your income and schedules. 5. Consistent Income: Sizing your financial class is too important here, ensure you proportionate your steady income to overhead expenses in ratio to your continuous footing of the school bills. If you are in business, consider how established the business is and if a salary earner, your alternative investments as you can lose your job at any time unforeseen. 6. Road Network: For sure, some look for schools during dry seasons only to start looking for new schools in rainy seasons, if you are new in a place, ask questions about the roads. Not only rain, in traffic overwork so that your child doesn't get exhausted before getting to school or home every day or getting late home or to school. See to ensure there is an alternative road that is motorable if you are mobile. Some roads to some schools are flooded on small rains or very mouldy and child-unfriendly, be sure to find out. I don't believe that with so many schools out there, you need to go afar to fetch education for your child. 7. Religion: This is vital, be ensure of the religion of the school before you opt for it, is it specific religion based, mixed or undecided? 8. Security: There are some badly located schools amidst smoking ends, drug points, bad meeting places, illegal business places, brothels, clubs and moral forbidden places, could you ensure you do meticulous findings? Not only that, the water sources, waste disposals, and other health security devices must be in place. 9. Child safety compliance: Simple safety measures like fire extinguishers, emergency exits, safety signs, floors, perimeter fencing, etc are unavoidable watch-outs 10. Collective decision: Don't just send your spouse and sit back to beckon on what he or she will say coupled with the bills you can afford, be involved, sample your views and disagree to agree, if not, the other will most likely always put all blames of the school's shortcomings on the infield marshal who sourced and recommended the school. Most times women are involved solely, most women are very ill-behaved, they are after bargaining with any school ready to play along in getting her own share and so on and believe me, women are easily lured to wrong choices. This is though not obtainable in rare women. DON'TS IN CHOOSING A NEW SCHOOL There may be more to the following don'ts but most of them are: 1. The School is big: This is the number one priority of the rich people, the size of the container not necessarily its contents as initial factor. 2. The fees are high: This has always been a misleading factor; everyone believes that the amount a school charges determines its quality. This is a universal erroneous belief; so many tokenism schools out there out-perform most of such schools. 3. The environment is luxurious: Modern schools in modern environments having modern facilities are found to grow within an abnormal short period of time. Why? Education is a luxurious demand. Yet, the children of the poor, attending poor schools, in most cases, go into the labour market only to threaten the people from the other end if at all such people find their ways into the market. 4. The school uniform is fine: Fine, if this is your reason, very soon, you will pull it off your child for another uniform, a school may have good designers in fashion but bad ones in management or standard, that one is creative doesn't make him productive. 5. The children speak well: Speaking is an art, education is more a science. Many are good speakers of English who are only known for grammatical expressions. 6. The teachers dress well: Packaging is a part of it not its whole, if this is what attracts you to a school, welcome to one-chance drive. 7. The front-desk officer is attractive: Some are carried away by these professional customer care ambassadors of the schools. Look, these people are on their jobs, they have been well trained to do the job in such ways. Their appearances are conditioned to suit the job as some schools even go extra miles to spend extra on their appearances, that should not automatically magnet you to a school and in case you think enrolling your child or ward will bring you closer to the beautiful or handsome front-desk person, I just wonder how many hands will be on him or her. Don't allow professional smiles, touches and treats deceive you, you are strictly on your own. Remember that the beautiful ones are not yet born, so, there are probably more beautiful or handsome front-desk officers in other schools, will you keep moving? 8. The School Owner is always on ground: This must be a small school, standard schools have branches, school owners can't be in each branch all the while. In fact, millennium schools are owned by boards, please wake up. Today's School Owners have also learned to involve in other businesses especially training of other schools in areas of their strengths. No School Owner of good quality is stationery today, they are mobile. 9. The School Owner speaks well: Have you wondered if he or she teaches the staff talk less, the learners and if yes, how often and how many classes? His or her great accent or grammatical luggage may most likely not have direct impacts on your child. 10. I was told they teach well: This depends on people who said so to you, are they those working there and looking for how to pull you there or those already there who may be friends to the school or just trying to ensure you are where they are. You can't hold on this to choose a school for your child. 11. The School has a school bus: It is usually painful to prioritize this although I understand you may not be able to combine work with picking and dropping your child but please always go abroad beyond the school bus availability. 12. They go on excursions: Field trips and excursions are teaching methods in education but not absolute. In education, no singular method is recommended the most effective as a good lesson must have the combination of several teaching methods, so why should you just base on excursions to choose on a school? 13. The School does lesson and has longer closing time: You may be looking for people who would keep your child longer but the truth is, it is not how long but how well. 14. My friend, family or neighbour works there: Will he or she be there for as long as your child has to stay for continuity and come to think of that, what productive difference does this make on your child?

15. It is owned by my church or mosque member: This will always disappoint you. Holiness is bound in the building of a religious place, once you are out, the true colour of everyone is clear. These set of people have been found to give room to greater negligence and unprofessional treats to their consumers who are their members in the same religious worship places. 16. It is owned by a church, Pastor or Imam: Is a school a religious place? Does this automatically ensure your child's all-round-success? Please, this is not a point to consider. Some of you have selfish motives for going, believing he or she is a religious leader so would be considerate in charges, in payment grace and so on, you have just lost it, very soon, he or she will be too busy to even remember there is a school under his or her administration. 17. The school is approved: Whether a school has been approved or not, this is not an express guarantee of excellent practices or standard. Lest I forget, most of those schools you see 'GOVERNMENT APPROVED' have really not gotten approval or have only been incorporated not approved by the Ministry of Education who don't even recognize incorporations on schools. Your incorporation is just to be taken as a business unit free to own bank accounts and carry out other business transactions while approval with the ministry is the super and main security on approval that any school could secure. 18. My child was happy going for summer there: Child's psychology is highly important here and I will also back it up with the Law of Diminishing Returns. Children like new places, friends and things in general. Your child must have been enticed by one thing and there you go, carried away by the child singing it at home that he or she likes the place. Mind you, schools tend to go an unsustainable extra mile during summer to impress the kids, this is why some schools will even make their summer fees very ridiculous to just get children to attend then leave other things to them. Please be smart. The little difference that has been made on your child is on sustenance base, in strong doubt and you know what, after your child gets fully registered, the child starts disliking some if not a lot and most times, tells you after a while that the previous school is better if at all you dig deeper. 19. Their handbill is fine: Excuse me, that handbill was designed by a graphics designer who most likely is not even a staff of that school and even if he or she is, how does the beauty of handbills add to your child's success? 20. The School won in a competition: Who did they compete with, did the children they took for the competition start all their education lives with them, are you sure the school is the sole former of such children academically or in the skill they won on or those children have private teachers from other sources doing the bulk of the jobs or acquired their excellent skills from their churches, mosques or other social places? Does taking your child to that school automatically get him or her such a winner and how consistent is even the winning for the school? By the way, who judged the winning, what parameters were used in judgment, are you sure it was not bought? 21. I was given good discount: Can you please never mention this? This is always a trap. This is a no guarantee of excellence. 22. My wife says she likes it: Did I just hear you say your wife or maybe your husband? Wonderful! Choice of school must be a joint one not one person's likeness or otherwise. Look, your spouse must have based on some erroneous reasons to insist to you his or her likeness. Please discuss all.

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