Being Less Precious
April 22nd 2008 08:37
With this new job I’m having to learn to be less ‘precious’ about the stuff I write. Because I’ve pretty much always written for myself, in the sense that at the end of the day I still own the stuff, it’s a bit difficult making the transition to writing for some ‘entity’ other than myself and thus not being worried about what happens to it.
For instance, I spent a lot of time a couple of weeks ago rewriting material that had previously been used as part of a proposal. What I had to do was make it more user-friendly. It took me two or three days to find a way into doing this, between other things, and I was pretty satisfied with the result. However, it didn’t get used, and the new version of the proposal was sent away without it. In fact, the new version had a rush job done on that part of it, with me culling together bits and pieces that had originally belonged in other places.
Not the way I work at all, I thought! And then, today, a magazine produced nationally for the people I’m working for arrived, and there in a sidebar was one of the paragraphs that had been ‘lost’ from the proposal.
Since yesterday morning I’ve been working on a writing job that entailed finding stats, adding scanned material, answering questions, and making it all very readable. Except that the boss took one look at it and said, Great, but how about doing a lot of those things as bullet points?
Bullet points instead of my fine writing? Well, yes, because I’m paid to do what I’m asked. So bullet points appeared instead of flowing sentences,
and at the end of the day, the thing was pronounced ‘excellent’.
A few years ago I wrote several pieces for the firm my son works for. These were case studies, and there was quite a bit of discussion over how they’d be put together and what they’d include and so on. I worked hard at them, and was paid pretty well too. But I don’t think any of them ever appeared where they’d been planned for, and I have no idea what happened to them.
You could say, Well, you were paid for them; what does it matter what happened to them? It doesn’t matter a jot, really. They were never meant to be masterpieces. It’s just that I hadn’t learnt at that stage that not all writing has the same value to others as it has to me.
For instance, I spent a lot of time a couple of weeks ago rewriting material that had previously been used as part of a proposal. What I had to do was make it more user-friendly. It took me two or three days to find a way into doing this, between other things, and I was pretty satisfied with the result. However, it didn’t get used, and the new version of the proposal was sent away without it. In fact, the new version had a rush job done on that part of it, with me culling together bits and pieces that had originally belonged in other places.
Not the way I work at all, I thought! And then, today, a magazine produced nationally for the people I’m working for arrived, and there in a sidebar was one of the paragraphs that had been ‘lost’ from the proposal.
Since yesterday morning I’ve been working on a writing job that entailed finding stats, adding scanned material, answering questions, and making it all very readable. Except that the boss took one look at it and said, Great, but how about doing a lot of those things as bullet points?
Bullet points instead of my fine writing? Well, yes, because I’m paid to do what I’m asked. So bullet points appeared instead of flowing sentences,
Doug Ward's bullet points
A few years ago I wrote several pieces for the firm my son works for. These were case studies, and there was quite a bit of discussion over how they’d be put together and what they’d include and so on. I worked hard at them, and was paid pretty well too. But I don’t think any of them ever appeared where they’d been planned for, and I have no idea what happened to them.
You could say, Well, you were paid for them; what does it matter what happened to them? It doesn’t matter a jot, really. They were never meant to be masterpieces. It’s just that I hadn’t learnt at that stage that not all writing has the same value to others as it has to me.
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