Anne H. Janzer's Blog, page 33

Are You a One-Size-Fits-All Writer?

Early in my career, I worked in a small startup. As the only writer in the company, I wrote nearly everything for the business, from data sheets and white papers to direct response ad copy, emails, user manuals (back when companies shipped printed manuals), and invitations to the holiday party.

In retrospect, I’m pretty confident that the ad copy stank. But hey, in a start-up, everyone wears a lot of hats.

I was the living expression of the One-Size-Fits-All Writing Myth – the idea that the person who can write well can tackle any writing project with equal success.

The One-Size-Fits-All Writing Myth

At first glance, this doesn’t seem like an unreasonable thought. If you write well, you should be able to undertake a wide variety of projects, right?

Sure, you can write – but can you write something effective?

The One-Size-Fits-All writer often underestimates the challenge of creating effective content for different purposes.

You wouldn’t ask your house painter to paint your portrait, would you?

Alright, you might if you happened to know that she is an accomplished artist. But you get my point: you cannot tell how the portrait will turn out by looking at the brushwork on the window trim.

Writing is at least as complicated and specialized as painting.

How This Myth Can Hurt You

This myth strikes in many places.

On the job: This myth is more pervasive in the workplace than you might imagine. I spoke with one writer who, on completing a LinkedIn ad campaign for a product, was asked to write the documentation for the same product – as if the one followed logically from the other.

Writing effective procedural instructions calls on one set of skills; writing ad copy that converts is an entirely different task.

Your personal writing: The successful poet may not write a passable thriller the first time out. Authors can cross genres, but shouldn’t take success for granted.

The danger lies in overlooking the differences in the audience needs or reader expectations as you change writing areas, or underestimating the learning curve involved in being successful.

The One-Size-Fits-All myth can set you up for failure.

But I don’t want to debunk it completely, because it has an upside.

A Little Myth Can Go a Long Way

We expand our skills by trying new things, with the faith that, with work, we can succeed. Sometimes, the belief that you can do something gives you the necessary impetus to learn and grow.

For example, let’s say you’re a strong writer, but have never written a book. A dash of belief that your writing skills are transferrable may help you get started. You’ll learn as you go.

I’m grateful for my experience writing in the startup; I learned about multiple areas of the business, figuring out where my strengths lay and where I needed work. The environment was supportive.

You can make this myth work for you, if strike the right balance of optimism and realism.

Believe in your ability to grow as a writer.

Balancing Optimism and Learning

Here’s my best advice for protecting yourself from the dangers of unrealistic expectations while expanding your writing skill set.

Start with a growth mindset. Let’s say you’ve decided to write a script. Instead of thinking I’m not a scriptwriter, think I haven’t written a script yet, but I can learn how to do it. 

Commit to learning. Read, watch videos, talk to other writers. You don’t have to become a master – just learn more than you know now, and work on improving with intention.

Set expectations – your own and those of others. In the workplace, if you’re asked to do something unfamiliar, let people know that there’s a learning curve. And if you’re setting out on your own to do something new, cut yourself a little slack while you learn.

How have you handled balancing this dilemma? Are you a “generalist” writer eager to try different things or a specialist? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Related Reading

Writing and the Growth Mindset

Two Books to Build Your Writing Resilience

Look for more on the myths in the book The Workplace Writer’s Process

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Sticking to the Writing Habit on the Road

I intended to have this blog post drafted before leaving town for a short family visit, but didn’t manage it. Then I planned to write it during the visit. Again, didn’t happen.

So here I sit on the plane home, composing a post about the virtues of writing while traveling. The irony is of the situation isn’t lost on me.

Travel really messes with writing productivity.

And yet, some of my best ideas have surfaced when I take the time to write while away from my ordinary life.

Metaphors pop into my head. Insights add color to topics I’m researching. I observe people differently when not distracted by my daily concerns. I decided on a book topic while taxiing to the gate at Midway Airport.

These insights arrived when I made the time to write regularly on the road.

The Muse Shows Up When You Leave Home

You might stop writing altogether when you leave home and office. But if you show up, pen or keyboard at the ready, you may discover that the Muse is along with you on the trip, noticing everything and waiting to tell you what it sees.

Putting aside your normal routines shifts your perspective. Freed from the ordinary list of concerns, the creative, associative parts of your brain are flooded with images and experiences. The Muse perks up with all of this fresh fodder.

Travel expands the mind; writing expands your perception.

How do you find the time and discipline to write on vacation, without compromising the point of the trip?

If you follow a strict writing routine, rising at a special hour or working in a dedicated place, the challenge is greater.

In her wonderful book Process: The Writing Lives of Great Authors, Sarah Stodola recounts how Edith Wharton demanded that the hotel staff rearrange the furniture to accommodate her morning writing routine when traveling. Most of us cannot afford to be that picky.

In contrast, Vladimir Nabokov crawled into the back seat of his car, parked in the lot of a cheap hotel, and worked there.

Neither of those plans suit me. Surely there’s a middle ground.

A “Travel-Sized” Writing Plan

Unless I’m on a tight deadline, I put aside my ordinary writing tasks during trips, to reap the benefits of taking a break. But, I try to maintain the practice of writing by finding slices of time to process down my thoughts or work on anything that strikes my fancy.

This doesn’t happen at same time or place each day. Some days I don’t write at all, and that’s okay.

The output is almost irrelevant. What matters is the process.

Each time I sit down to write, it’s like putting the welcome mat out for my Muse. When I plan to keep a journal, I notice the world around me differently, filter conversations and insights. It’s always time well spent.

How Do You Balance Writing and Travel?

As the summer rolls into August, you might be planning a get-away. If so, how do you plan to fit it in with your writing? Do you try to stick to the same schedule when on the road? Lower the expectations for productivity but keep up the process? Or simply write for enjoyment?

Do you have a “travel-sized” writing plan? I’d love to hear what works for you.

Related Content

Managing the Muse

Leave Room for Curiosity

The Muse and the Scribe are described in detail in the book The Writer’s Process.

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A Field Guide to Writers in the Workplace

On any given workday, you can find countless people typing on laptops. They may be writing emails, reports, papers, advertisements, job postings, or resumes. They all have one thing in common: They are assembling thoughts into a written form, and hope that those efforts will support their careers.

They are workplace writers.

Workplace writers come in many guises. Some are successful, while others struggle. It’s important to know the difference, particularly when approaching one with a writing project.

Distinguishing between the different varieties of workplace writer can challenge even the most astute observer. Use this handy field guide to help you identify each type you encounter.

The Inadvertent Writer

The inadvertent writer may be the most common type of workplace writer. They frequent all kinds of offices, filling roles ranging from the C-suite to the administrative roles. For the inadvertent writer, written content is a byproduct of their role.

The inadvertent writer can often be identified by the look of surprise when something they’ve written doesn’t get the reception they expected, or when it returns to them filled with comments and corrections.

The Aspirational Writer

Aspirational writers want to write, but never get started. They may be waiting for the perfect opportunity, when they have caught up on anything else.

You can spot them reading blog posts entitled “How writing a blog post every day changed my life” with a dreamy look in their eyes. They often have piles of unused Moleskin notebooks on their desks.

The Reluctant Writer

Reluctant writers don’t feel comfortable writing, so avoid it whenever possible.

To identify the reluctant writer, use this simple test: Invite a group of people into a room and announce that you need blog contributions. The reluctant writers will dive under the table or find an excuse to take an important call.

The Unproductive Writer

Unproductive writers readily accept new projects, then don’t get them done. They may have towering piles of untouched projects around them. While other people in the workplace initially interact with the unproductive writer, eventually they move elsewhere and stop asking.

The Frustrated Writer

Frustrated writers struggle to get their writing projects through approval processes. They often feel that no one values or uses their work. They may care deeply, but feel that the environment doesn’t support them.

Identify them by the perpetual frown lines and occasional outbursts.

The Overburdened Writer

Overburdened writers take on all of the writing-related tasks of their teams. They often migrate to this role from a college English department. (Reluctant writers are often found congregating near an overburdened writer.)

You can nearly always locate this type of writer at a desk, working. On weekends, they will be hunched over a laptop at home, still working.

Look for the harried expression in their eyes, and the people lining up to throw writing projects their way.

The Successful, Valued Writer
image from #WOCinTechChat

Successful and valued writers are rarer – and always worth seeking out. You can identify them by the trail of completed projects they leave behind and the crowd of people who want to work with them.

What Kind of Writer Are You?

Your actual title or area of expertise doesn’t really matter. If writing is any part of your job, then you are a workplace writer. Which type are you?

These designations aren’t separate species. You can move between types quite easily. Everyone can learn the practices of successful, valued writers.

That’s the subject of my latest book, The Workplace Writer’s Process.

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It offers easy-to-implement advice to transform your writing on the job. Whether you are aspirational, frustrated, overburdened, unproductive, reluctant, or inadvertent, use the practices in this book to become a successful, valued writer in the workplace.

Check it out and let me know what you think.

 

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Subscription Marketing: Protests and Pricing

This month’s subscription update is all about turning lemons into lemonade: protesting net neutrality changes, changing pricing models, and dealing with new email regulations. Let’s jump in.

Rally for Net Neutrality

Find me a subscription business that doesn’t depend, in some way, on the Internet. Go ahead, I’ll wait. Any luck?

On July 12 businesses large and small staged a protest of the FCC’s plans to end net neutrality regulations, potentially giving ISPs the ability to control which content gets delivered quickly. Yep, this could kill your streaming videos on Netflix and Hulu.

The day of protest is past, but you can still act. Visit this site: https://www.battleforthenet.com/

More subscriptions for your summer

Looking for some entertainment this summer? Here are a few thoughts:

Content for your travels: I love Scribd because it combines ebooks and audiobooks in one subscription service. Sign up for audiobooks for that road trip and ebooks for the plane. Oh, it also includes research papers.

Summer and baseball: Love the game? Subscribe to PlateCrate for a monthly box of baseball-related gear.

Lindsey Lohan’s lifestyle: It was only a matter of time – now you can subscribe to Lindsey Lohan’s her lifestyle site Preemium.  Shout-out to Subscription Insider for unearthing this one! (I’d recommend the subscription to Subscription Insider over Lindsey Lohan.)

What should subscriptions really cost?

Is it time to shake up our ideas about pricing? Richard Reisman proposes a radically new pricing process in his book FairPay. Read my review of it here.

Email marketing and GDPR

The EU’s new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) may have spurred one company to ditch its 700K email database. Find out why in this article by Mark Masters for the IDG Group: Making Email Subscription GDPR Heaven. (Mark kindly gave me the chance to rant about subscription relationships.)

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Disrupting Subscription Pricing: FairPay

Subscriptions are a disruptive force in many industries. When researching and writing Subscription Marketing, I was hard-pressed to find an industry that wasn’t being affected by subscription-based entrants.

Subscriptions fundamentally change the customer relationship from a one-time transactional engagement to an ongoing interaction and relationship. That shift changes nearly everything:

How you deliver goods and services
How you market to customers
How you support customers
What people are looking for from vendors

How about pricing? Is it time to rethink the traditional model of vendors unilaterally setting prices that apply for all customers?

Richard Reisman, president and founder of Teleshuttle, thinks so. He lays out his vision in the book FairPay: Adaptively Win-Win Customer Relationships.

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Value-based Pricing for the Subscription Economy

Reisman proposes an adaptive, interactive pricing process, based on the value the customer experiences. Described in his own words: “FairPay is a new logic for conducting ongoing business relationships that adaptively seek win–win value propositions in which price reflects value.”

Hidden in this definition is a radical shift: price isn’t determined by the vendor alone, but by the vendor in a one-on-one collaboration with each customers.

Here’s how it might work, as described in the book.

To begin, a business might invite a subset of customers to participate in the FairPay pricing process, such as loyal customers or prospects for a new service offering.

The customer is invited to use the service for a fixed period of time, and then set a price based on what they feel the service is worth, after the fact. The vendor must accept the price for the cycle that has completed, but can decide whether to extend the FairPay offer for future cycles based on the pricing logic established by the first iteration.

If the vendor and subscriber agree on the price, then the relationship continues based on these terms. If not, the subscriber could revert to a traditional pricing scheme. The first payment cycle is essentially a trial of the payment process.

By understanding the factors that generate the customer’s perceived value, businesses can make better initial suggestions about price points. (Cognitive science geeks should realize that the framing effect comes into play here.)

If the subscriber’s usage changes, their perception of value (and hence negotiated price) may adapt as well. When businesses add features that increase the value of the solution to customers, their revenues can grow.

Over time, the aggregate effect to business revenues can be powerful: pricing that accurately reflects the value realized by customers. Writes Reisman, “What matters is not any one cycle, but how the cycles motivate and converge on cumulative fairness over the relationship.” The repetition of the pricing process “gives the buyer the incentive to be fair and cooperative enough to satisfy the seller.”

Because the pricing process must repeat over time, it’s a natural fit for the evolving Subscription Economy.

The book describes different scenarios and economic models in more detail. I’m interested in the ongoing, human relationship part of this process.

The Value Nurturing Perspective

FairPay is an intriguing proposal. The cognitive science aspect alone is fascinating. If it catches on, FairPay will spawn many graduate school theses in game theory.

The model brings the business much closer to its customers. Business revenues depend on individual negotiations (albeit automated) with customers. Instead of running “voice of the customer” surveys, you can see how people vote with their actual dollars.

The pricing model itself is based on both trust and value: the two core components of a successful subscription marketing practice. Price reflects the customer’s experience of value, and both vendor and subscriber must trust each other to participate in this interactive price negotiation.

In many ways, the FairPay pricing model is the perfect complement to the practice of value nurturing outlined in Subscription Marketing. Organizations that adopt a FairPay pricing must work hard to nurture the customer’s perception of value, both within the solution and beyond.

What Do You Think?

The entire argument is laid out in the book, but you can get an overview on the FairPayZone website.

What do you think?

As soon as you start picturing this in your head, questions will pop up. What about my high-value customers? How would this affect revenues? What if everyone buys and no one pays? Reisman addresses these issues in his book, so I won’t do it here.

But before you start thinking of the objections, ask yourself this:

How would FairPay change the way you do business?

How would your business operate today if your revenues were directly tied to the customer’s perception of value? What would you do differently in marketing, product development, or support? How would it change the way you think of customers, and of pricing?

Related Posts

SaaS Marketing: Trust and Value

The Magic Moment for Value Nurturing

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The Perils of Worshipping the Big Idea

Raise your hand if you’ve ever worried about someone “stealing your idea” – and let that worry stop you from doing something.

We’ve all done it at one point or another. But except in patent situations and other unusual cases, those worries are usually unfounded.

Worse, they can hurt us as writers.

Be careful not to buy into the Big Idea Myth. 

How the Big Idea Myth hurts writers

The Big Idea Myth is the belief that for any creative endeavor, the idea counts the most. Execution is trivial.

Start-up founders often believe this myth: they come up with a great, no-fail idea for a business.

The start-up landscape is littered with the ghosts of businesses built on great ideas.

In writing, the Big Idea Myth leas you to believe that the concept is the important part of the project, while effective execution is either trivial or something that anyone can do.

Not only is this myth untrue, it’s dangerous.

For authors, the Big Idea Myth New impedes publishing and marketing efforts. New authors are protective of the work they have done – or that they plan to do – and don’t want to share their ideas.

They hesitate to submit a proposal to an agent or publisher, in fear the publisher will “steal” the great idea.
They wait to build their author platform, to keep the idea secret for the “big reveal” of publication day.
They don’t reach out and speak with other people in their field (who could be wonderful advocates for their books) because they want to protect and shield their ideas.

In protecting your cherished idea from prying eyes, you may well condemn it to languish in obscurity.

The Big Idea Myth is dangerous for any type of writing.  If you believe in this myth, you might wait to start writing until you have a “golden” idea. For most of us, the ideas only flow when we’re actually working.

Worshipping the big idea short-changes the other significant part of creating excellent work: execution.

Great writing is much more than a great idea

If execution were so easy, the world would be filled with wonderful movies and books. Ideas are abundant. Most stories can be mapped to a finite set of plots.

Good ideas aren’t scarce; great execution is.

Behind the Big Idea Myth is another fallacy: that ideas are a finite resource, operating by the rules of scarcity. A single idea can be claimed and used up.

When it comes it writing, this is not true. I love this quote from Seth Godin:

Sure, it’s been done before. But not by you. And not for us.”

(See the blog post: It’s been done before. Write anyway.)

Good ideas are a multiplying resources. Share them and they grow.

The Big Idea Myth in the workplace

The tendency to worship a “big idea” is prevalent in our society. If you work as a writer in an organization with this bias, then people will not value the work you do shaping and crafting content. They’ll toss outlines at you and act surprised if the final result isn’t dazzling.

The Big Idea Myth marginalizes the real work of writing.

You can attempt to educate those around you about what is involved by making your process more visible. Or you can accept your fate and hope for acknowledgment or recognition from the people who matter in your job.

But whatever you do, remember that skillful execution is at least as important as the original idea. And sometimes, execution is the path to bigger and better ideas.

Related Resources

This is one of the common writing myths discussed in The Workplace Writer’s Process: A Guide to Getting the Job Done.

See these other posts about writing myths:

Anyone can write, but … (the Universal Writer Myth)

Writing is effort, not destiny (the Destiny Myth) 

For authors, read Tim Grahl’s post Ebook Piracy = Sell More Books

The post The Perils of Worshipping the Big Idea appeared first on Anne Janzer.

Writing in the Zone: Say Hello to Flow

You know when it happens – but only after the fact.

You’re absorbed in the writing, the words are pouring out, and suddenly you realize that an hour or two has passed. It’s as if you wake up from the work. Instead of feeling drained, you are energized.

Performers and athletes talk about being “in the zone.” Psychologists call it flow.

Whether it lasts minutes or hours, writing in a state of flow is wonderful. The main thing most people want to know about flow is this: How can I get more of it?

If we could choose, we would always write this way.

Flow: Not just for “artists”

Even if you don’t find it often when writing, you might experience flow in other parts of your life. Perhaps you get absorbed in the work when gardening, painting, or practicing an instrument.

You might even (wait for it) find flow in the workplace, when editing a paper, writing code, or analyzing data. What if your day job included work that you found absorbing and inherently rewarding?

Flow is the ultimate employee benefit.

Good news: We do have some control over when and how flow happens. It’s not just a matter of chance.

Here are two things you can do today to increase your chances of working in flow, no matter what kind of writing you’re doing.

1. Remove the obvious obstacles

The psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi wrote the definitive book about the subject in Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. The seven key attributes of flow are also its conditions for success, and include lack of self-consciousness, complete focus on the work, and losing track of time.  (See all seven conditions for flow in this post on Finding Flow in the Writing Process.)

Most of us can structure our work and our working environments in such as way that flow is more likely to happen.

Here are a few things to try:

Eliminate distractions: Flow requires focus, so tune out potential distractions when you want to work in flow. Shut down apps, silence the phone, close the door.

Check your mindset: One of the preconditions of flow is a lack of self-consciousness and fear. When writing, one way to silence fear is to break the work into phases. Tell yourself that you will take another pass or do a careful revision before you show the work to anyone. This helps you set aside fear or self-consciousness when drafting.

Externalize time management: When working in flow, you lose track of time. That’s a problem if you have scheduled commitments. If you’re going to have to go somewhere, set an alarm. Then you can work without watching the clock.

2. Practice flow with freewriting

Like anything else, writing in a state of flow gets easier with practice.

If you’ve read The Writer’s Process or my past posts about the Muse and the Scribe, you can imagine that flow is the point at which these two competing parts of our inner selves work together. It’s a delicate balance.

To get improve this real-time collaboration, practice writing in flow with a non-critical project.

Open a file and start writing about any topic. You might sketch a personal story, thoughts on a work-related project, or an email you plan to compose.

Try to write fluidly for a certain period of time or number of words. Get your inner Muse and Scribe accustomed to working together.

Try doing this every day for a month as a writing warm-up. This daily practice is one way of rehearsing writing in flow.

Other resources

Chris Syme and I talked about flow in this Smarty Pants Book Marketing podcast on balancing creativity and productivity when writing.

Other related posts:

The Muse and the Scribe: Writing Fast and Slow

Flow: Finding Flow in the Writing Process

Freewriting: Fast, Fluid, and Fearless

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A New Book on Writing in the Workplace

Want to know the strategies I used to fuel a successful consulting and writing practice? My secret practices for writing content that clients value or getting information from reluctant subject matter experts?

They’re all yours for 99 cents – but only for a couple weeks.

Preorder today, get the book on July 18.

Do you set yourself up for success every time you write something?

The Workplace Writer’s Process: A Guide to Getting the Job Done (Kindle version ) is now available for preorder on Amazon. It will be released July 18th.

The book covers the processes of writing on the job, from initial inception to final publication. It’s filled with actionable advice that you can put into practice immediately.

If you write for an organization, I want to introduce you to your new best friend.” Pamela Wilson, author of Master Content Marketing and founder, Big Brand System.

Act fast to earn fame, fortune, and gratitude

Look at all the great things that can happen if you preorder the book now and read it as soon as it’s published:

Fame: Be the first one on the block (or in the office) to start using the practices in this book, and catapult yourself to writing fame.

Don’t start your next writing project without it!” Linda Popky, author of Marketing Above the Noise

Fortune: Buy the ebook for 99 cents now, instead of $9.99 full price. Take the extra $9, invest it in bitcoin, and earn a fortune. (Disclaimer: Never take investment advice from a writer.)

Gratitude: Leave an early review when the book is up – you’ll help others find the book, earning their gratitude and mine.

Okay, so maybe I’m overselling. But if writing is any part of your job performance, you’ll find something in this book that will help you be more effective.

Here’s the link.

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Anyone Can Write, But …

“If you can write, you can write a book! Anyone can write a book!”

The world of self-publishing has unleashed a torrent of advice like this, which has in turn spawned a flood of frustrated writers and unsold books.

This sales pitch is the perfect expression of the Universal Writer Myth. It’s particularly dangerous and compelling because at one level, it’s true.

The Universal Writer Myth

The Universal Writer Myth is the belief that everyone who can read and write is a writer.

In the last post, I wrote about the Destiny Myth, or the idea that only special people are writers. That’s a limiting belief. The Universal Writer myth is its counterpart: everyone can write, so go for it.

Technically, it’s true. If you write, you are a writer. That’s important advice to remember.

But just as some people need to hear this advice for encouragement, others need to remember that the Universal Writer dogma glosses over an important fact:

Anyone can write. Not everyone writes successfully.

Success doesn’t mean selling thousands of books. Success is writing something that reaches and resonates with a reader.

Writing is not a one-way street: as communication, it must find and affect a reader.

If you write without any concern for the reader or what happens to the words when you are done, then you are really journaling.

I love the practice of keeping a journal. I write for myself all the time, to clarify my thoughts and think deeply, and to work on the craft of writing.

Keeping a journal is part of my practice, not my writing output.

At work, not everyone should be writing

The Universal Writer Myth pops up in the workplace all the time, particularly as businesses look for ways to increase employee-generated content to fuel corporate blogs.

Companies ask executives, engineers, support staff, customer success teams, sales teams, and others to contribute content to the corporate blog or email newsletter. Everyone knows how to write, so what’s the big deal?

Sometimes it works well, other times it does not. Even when the individuals write well, the resulting blog does not always achieve its purposes.

In the workplace, it’s not enough to simply write.

Writing effectively for business requires that you execute several tasks, including:

Finding the right tone and style
Understanding the target audience
Creating content that serves the reader’s needs while fulfilling business objectives

Why this myth can be dangerous

A belief in the Universal Writer Myth can mislead people about the what it takes to be effective as a writer.

It’s not enough to write – you need to write effective content. So, the first question is, what’s the effect you want to have?

If you’re publishing a book, write a book that someone would want to read. Understand your audience and their needs and expectations, and then meet them. That’s how you write effective content.

If you’re writing a blog post, consider its purpose. You could simply write 1000 words and post them online. You’ll be a blogger, but not an effective one. We’ve all read blog posts like that. Consider what you want the blog to achieve and who might visit it, and work from there.

Yes, you can, but should you?

Anyone can write. But you should write only if you are willing to do the work to write something worth reading.

This is true whether you’re writing books or creating content in the workplace. In the workplace, asking everyone to contribute to the blog may not be the best way to create content.

Joe Pulizzi, of Content Marketing Institute, reiterated this advice in his 2017 Mid-Year Content Marketing Checkup blog post:

A few innovative companies that work with CMI have taken away all writing assignments from their employees and given them to outside writers. It saves on employee time, editing time, and, in most cases, produces content that is far superior.”

The Universal Writer Myth can lead to a great deal of ineffective content.

Plan first, then write

The first, most important step of writing something effective is planning. Determine what you are doing and why.

Planning is particularly critical in the business context. Without planning, you may waste time and damage your reputation. With the right goals, you know what to aim for.

Then, work on the craft. Edit and revise your words. Try to continuously improve. Hire an editor. Proofread. Read your words out loud and listen to how they sound.

Whenever you encounter the “anyone can write” advice, remember the essential modification:

Anyone can write – but do the work.

Related resources

This is a part of a series of posts based on content from my upcoming book The Workplace Writer’s Process, which will be available for preorder July 1.

In the mean time, check out these other, related posts:

Writing is Effort, Not Destiny

I’m an Indie Author

What a Brewer Taught Me about Writing

 

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Writing Is Effort, Not Destiny

“I’m not a writer writer,” said my friend.

I was puzzled. She has extensive experience as a technical writer and is paid to write for a living. People value her output. But her training and background is in engineering, so she doesn’t feel like she’s really a writer.

Here’s a clue: if someone is paying you to write, and if your job performance depends on the quality of that effort, then you can genuinely say that you’re a writer.

My friend is not alone. Many people have difficulty considering themselves writers. Somehow, they feel that to be a “real” writer, they need to have a completely different background, and possibly an alternate identity.

We are all susceptible to a common myth that writing is a destiny, rather than an acquired skill set.

The Destiny Myth

The Destiny Myth would have us believe that a specific, unique subset of individuals are natural-born writers. They master grammar, sentence construction and vocabulary, in service of creativity granted from above. The rest of us are merely pretending to be writers.

It’s wrong.

Clearly writing comes more easily to some people than others. Our writing ability is influenced by verbal intelligence – what some might call talent. And it is nurtured through our educational and cultural background.

But here’s the secret: everyone who writes well learned to do so. No one is born with the ability. As Angela Duckworth points out so effectively in the book Grit, talent is just the starting point. Achievement is all about effort, and effort can outrun talent.

Good writers develop through intentional effort.

The Destiny Myth often afflicts people who, like my friend, write as part of their jobs. The content she creates is functional in nature. Few people read a project proposal or technical document for the sheer fun it of. We read it for a reason: to get something done.

Let’s not denigrate workplace writing. That writing may serve a more important function than the novel you read on the beach. Business writing may operate by a different set of rules than fiction, but the people who work on the craft are no less writers.

The Dangers of the Destiny Myth

Believing in the Destiny Myth gives you an excuse not to work on the craft of writing. You can lower your standards; people shouldn’t expect much from someone who isn’t a writer, right?

The Destiny Myth can also damage your career prospects if the people around you believe in it.

If you are not identified as a writer, you may have to actively volunteer for opportunities to write.
If you are the defined writer, you can end up the dumping ground for all writing-related projects. This may limit your ability to take on other projects.

You can use the Destiny Myth to avoid doing writing that could benefit your career. I cannot write a blog post, because I’m not a writer.

How to Defeat the Destiny Myth

The first place to tackle this myth is in your own thoughts. This is what it might sound like:

“I’m not really a writer.”

When you find yourself with that thought, start questioning it. The truth is probably more specific. You might narrow it down to “I’m not a fiction writer,” or “I’m not paid to write.” More often, it’s “I’m not confident in my writing skills.”

Those are all things that can be addressed, if you choose. It’s in your control.

Writing is a destiny you choose yourself.

More Myths and Misconceptions about Writers

People have a lot of crazy ideas about writers. When I say people, I mean everyone  – even people who are by definition writers.

Myths make great fodder for summer movies. But in real life, believing in myths can prevent you from taking the actions that lead to success.

This is a first in a series of posts about writing myths, expanding on content from my upcoming book The Workplace Writer’s Process. Look for more in the coming weeks.

Related Resources

Two Books to Build Your Writing Resilience

Writing and the Imposter Syndrome

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