Are You Staying Competitive?

Okay, so you created a business plan and are on your way. But is that really enough? While that may have been fine to get you going, it’s not enough to keep you going, especially if you’re out to make a profit.

Whether you'd just like to sell your work steadily to quality markets without too much hassle or whether you like the idea of making enough money to be invited to visit luxury resorts or  test-drive the latest sport cars, you must look to profits. If you don't concentrate on having a surplus at the end of the year, you’ll fall behind. Profit requires knowing how to compete with the professionals so you may join their ranks.

So how do you stay competitive in this business?

First and foremost, you have to focus on your craft. Your writing has got to be the best it can be. After all, it’s your product and your livelihood. Are your writing skills up to par? But don’t just check the mechanics—spelling, punctuation, sentence structure—check your content. Is what you write compelling? Does it capture your reader’s attention and hold it? In this world of ever-increasing distractions, does your work stand out? Periodically check what’s being written about in your subject area. While you may be a fine writer, you may be behind the times with your content.

And what about your financial reserve? Do you even have one? Too many beginning freelance writers work so close to the wire that one unpaid job can knock them for a loop. Try to build up some sort of reserve so that you don’t fall into this rut. Once you end up there, you’ll find it difficult to get out.

How well do you manage your time and energy? Remember, time is money. If you don’t manage your time efficiently, you won’t make any. Do you work on several projects at once? Do you combine research for more than one project instead of flitting from one to the other? Do you get the most production out of the time you do have?
   
Have you set some priorities? Arrange your work in order of importance—what’s due first, perhaps who’s paying the most. However, while working on high-profile projects all the time can be rewarding, it can wear you out. Mix lighter jobs with more heavy duty ones that require more intense focus and energy.

Problems arise in this business all the time. Sometimes, you may feel as if one problem follows directly on the heals of the previous ones. Are you ever going to get a break? Often, you won’t. Do you have the stamina and patience to put up with the nit-picking of some editors and clients? Are the ones doing the nit-picking the ones who pay the least? Consider if working for them is worth it in the long run. When problems do arise, are you able to solve them quickly or do they linger and eat into the energy you need to complete your work?

Let’s face it, freelancing is a risky business at best. It’s like putting your right foot out and not having a steady ground to walk on. How do you handle risk? Are you an all or nothing person? Or do you balance risk with some conservative judgements? Ask yourself, “What do I have to lose?” You may be surprised with the answer. Freelance writing is a lot like playing the stock market. Some of your stocks may shoot upwards only to come crashing down the next day. Others may plod along steadily and in the long run earn profits for you. While the steady ones may not be as interesting, they don’t come crashing down too often. Taking calculated risks is good for business. Study the markets and know what you’re getting into before you make the leap.

And once you’re a success, how do you plan to stay up there. It’s a long way down and sometimes the rungs of the ladder break, causing you to fall quickly. There are a lot of ups and downs to freelancing, and it’s up to you how you handle them if you want to stay ahead of your competition.

A Step in Time Saves Nine

Busy managers have a lot in common with busy freelancers, so it’s only natural that time-saving tips for managers would also work for you.

During an average workday, a manager’s work load consists of numerous important as well as  unimportant items. Much of a manager’s time involves sending and receiving information, mostly through speaking with workers under his or her charge. During the long hours managers work, they’re busy doing a lot of mostly fragmented things with a variety of people. So important for a manager to manage their time wisely so they don’t go mad. Does this sound like your typical work day. If so, here are some time-saving tips that will increase your productivity and help you to retain your sanity.

    1. Work at as clean a desk as possible. There’s nothing worse than trying to find that one paper that you need to complete a project. Move projects, important correspondence, and such off your desk each week on schedule.

    2. Handle routine paperwork, such as correspondence, only once.  While this is difficult to achieve without help, make an effort.
   
    3. Create a To Do List. Depending on how busy you are, you might create one for the week or perhaps one every few days. Cross off items you complete as soon as you finish them.

    4. Employ the A-B-C priority system. Once you have made your To Do List, place an “A” next to items of top importance, a “B” next to those less important but that still need to be done, and a “C” next to those with the least importance.  You may find that the ones with a “C” next to them may complete themselves automatically or may not need doing at all.

    5. Also ask yourself, “Am I making the best use of my time right now?” If the answer is no, then take immediate steps to remedy the situation.

    6. Give yourself a reward upon completion of a job. Go for a walk or stop at your local coffee shop for a cup of joe and a sweet treat.

    7. Plan five minutes of review time into your daily schedule. Look at what happened yesterday, what will happen today, and what you need to do tomorrow. The more you plan out your day or week, the more you’ll accomplish.

    8. If you’re especially busy, delegate low-priority jobs to others.  Perhaps hire a high school or college student to do preliminary research, set up interviews, order supplies, or filing.

    9. Force yourself to make decisions. Always take some sort of action on an important job to keep it moving forward. Delays result from simply avoiding decisions.

    10. At the end of each day, take 15 minutes to plan tomorrow. Knowing what you need to do helps to keep things organized should an unexpected emergency develop.

Remember, as your freelance business increases, so do the stresses of everyday work and life. Staying organized will help you to better cope with the ups and downs of this business.

Don’t Put Off Until Tomorrow What You Can Do Today

Everyone suffers from occasional bouts of procrastination. The subject is so popular that over 600 books have been written about it. But for many writers, this happens more often than for others. Why? And what can you do about it?

According to its psychological definition, procrastination refers to the act of replacing high-priority tasks with those of lower priority, especially if the lower priority ones provide enjoyment. Writing can be stressful at times. Deadlines can loom overhead like giant alien spaceships. Generally, those lower priority tasks are things that you can do later or perhaps not at all.

Behind most procrastination problems lies abulia, the abnormal lack of the ability to act or make decisions. And there’s no mistake that it’s a force you need to conquer. Knowing when, how, and why you’re procrastinating is the first step toward improvement.

Just because you procrastinate doesn’t mean that you don’t have the motivation or willpower to complete a writing project. Perhaps the project is too big or maybe your skills aren’t developed enough to handle it. While you may be motivated to write a particular book, for example, you may not have the resources or knowledge to do so. This leads to putting it off as long as possible. Simply trying harder won’t do it. You must understand what triggered you to procrastinate in the first place.

One of the biggest triggers for writers is the fear of rejection. Every writer, from novice to experienced professional harbors this fear at some time or another. Too prevent the fear of rejection from overwhelming you, the best thing to do is have several projects going at once. If one fails, you’ve got the others as backup. And who knows, the rejection of one you had hopes for may cause you to put more effort into another which may go on to be a bestseller. Let’s face it. Not all writing projects are meant to be successful.

Other things that may cause you to procrastinate are distractions from your environment. Is your office cluttered with papers that need to be filed? Does your house need cleaning? Does your garden call out to you to be tended? All of these can keep you away from your work. To make sure you don’t spend all your time on them, schedule each for specific times during the week. By doing a little each day of any of your chores, you’ll not only get them done but get your writing done, too.

Procrastination isn’t a harmless little hang-up. Don't reward it. Sure, you need to take breaks once in a while, but don’t take time to drink too many extra cups of coffee.

To conquer procrastination, define the stumbling blocks in your path. Then tackle them one at a time. Pick one specific area where procrastination plagues you and conquer it. By becoming aware of the problem, you’re half way to solving it.

Learn to set priorities, then focus on one problem at a time (See my blog on priorities from two weeks ago.) If you try to tackle all your problems at once, you won’t get anywhere. Set a goal to take care of the most severe one first.

Give yourself deadlines. Many writers work best when on deadline. The added stress of knowing a project is due by a certain date makes them work harder. But when they don’t have a deadline, they find other more enjoyable things to do.

Don't duck the most difficult projects. Work on them but perhaps not as long as some of your others. By doing a particularly hard writing project a little at a time, it tends to make it seem easier. Another way of tackling this problem is to begin with an easier project, then switch to a hard one, followed by an easier one. Giving yourself a break between difficult projects makes doing them less stressful.

Don't let perfectionism paralyze you. Too many writers are perfectionists. Some continue to do edits and rewrites until they lose sight of the project as a whole. Know when to stop. Perhaps give yourself a limit on rewrites. Continually rewriting can sometimes make what would have been a good project a mediocre one.

To paraphrase an old saying, “If you can't beat procrastination, make use of it.” Perhaps the fact that you’re procrastinating about a project means that your subconscious is holding you back from something you’re not yet ready to do. This "something" may be only a segment of an article or short story for which you’ve written a good beginning, or it may be the approach to a better-paying market.

Don’t neglect that little voice inside you that’s saying "not yet." You just may not be ready.

You make good use of procrastination when—and only when—you’re able to find a better way to accomplish what you avoided by procrastinating. It can be a blessing in disguise, but it won't be unless you make it so.

Prioritize

When you decide to quit your day job and write full time, you’ll have to give careful consideration to your priorities. No longer will someone else be deciding what work you have to do and when you have off. Now it will be your responsibility. For some writers, this works great. For others, it doesn’t.

The first thing you’ll need to do is figure out when your peak thinking and writing times occur. Are you a “first-thing-in-the-morning” person, a midday person, or an evening person? Also, do your peak thinking times and peak writing times occur at the same time or at different times during the day? If yours are separate, you’ll want to focus more on the former, giving it top priority in your daily schedule. It’s harder to think out a piece of writing than it is to actually write it.

To help you set your priorities, you must first create a daily work schedule. You don’t have to stick tightly to it, but it should act as a guide. To begin, block out a schedule for the week, indicating when you’ll begin work. You may want to use the same schedule you used in your former job. Working from nine to five is good for a start. Next block out time for lunch, 30-60 minutes should do.

Now that you have your start and end times, plus lunch scheduled, you can lay in blocks of time for your work. If you know when you’re at your peak for thinking, block in time at the appropriate hour. Then lay in some time for writing and research. It helps to mix up your day by working on several projects in different stages. While you’re getting ideas for one, you may be working on the first draft of another, and starting research for a third. Doing this actually helps exercise your brain and prevents getting burned out by writing for hours on end. It pays in the long run to not write for more than two hours at a time.

And don’t forget to allow time to get more work. You’ll need to send out E-mail messages to editors, or perhaps call them on the phone. And when will you study new publications to see if you’re right for them? Many editors schedule staff meetings on Monday and often Fridays are wrap-up times before publication, so you’ll want to limit your editorial contacts to the middle of the week.

What many people who work for themselves forget is allowing time for other obligations. Do you have to take or pick your kids up from school? When do you do grocery shopping? Must you cook meals for your family? What about talking to friends on the phone?

It’s a real temptation to procrastinate when you work at home. You may say to yourself, “I’ll do that later,” but do you? If you have a tendency to procrastinate, you need to attack the problem head-on. Doing so will increase your production and your income immediately.

You should try to schedule time to write every day. Some days you may have more time while on others less, but writing every day will help you keep up the momentum. Be sure to divide your time adequately among important projects. If you know you have deadline coming up, be flexible enough to allow time to finish the project that’s due. This means you must be careful that deadlines don’t pile up on one another. And for some writers, having no deadline takes away the impetus to get things done.

To help you prioritize your work, create three lists—one for Top Priority items, one for Secondary, and one for Do at Leisure Tasks for each week? This will help you stay on track. You might plan on taking care of the items on the first two lists during “working” hours and leave smaller tasks, like filing, correspondence, and organizing notes for evenings or Saturdays.

And while it’s important to get your current work finished, it’s just a important to plan ahead for new work. Do you have days or evenings when you are systematically building your files, increasing your contacts, beginning speculative new ventures, adding to your catalog of possible topics, and promoting yourself?  How about the time it takes to read and answer your E-mail and check on your social media sites?

If you keep your priorities in order as you start out in your writing career, you’ll be in a better position to recognize and take advantage of golden opportunities as they arise. The more you priorities your work, the easier it will be to tackle really complex projects and do them without stress. And as your career progresses, you should have more and more work to do. There are only so many hours in a day, and you can’t squeeze more work out of them than you already are unless you set your priorities.

Plan diversions into your work schedule. Don’t be a workaholic. But do so with care. It's too easy to take time to have that extra cup of coffee.