Scheduling Part 2: Long-Term vs. Short-Term (i.e. What's Getting Me Paid)
Monday, September 20, 2010 Question of the day: I'm interested in how you manage longer term deadlines (novels) vs. short-term deadlines (magazine articles, etc). How do you prioritize what to work on, and do long-term projects ever suffer when the short-term deadlines loom? Or, more specifically, how do you prioritize stuff you're not getting paid to do (ideas for future books, etc) when deadlines loom for things for which you're paid? This is always what traps my time.
Great follow-up to Thursday's post, and thank you for asking because I realized I didn't really address this. I gave a generic look at my day, but obviously, things shift around depending on what I'm working on - that glimpse was sort of an average work-load sort of day, but definitely, setting priorities is a big part of making my schedule work, so here's how I handle that.
For me, most of my fiction deadlines are self-imposed. What I mean by that is that I have a delivery date for my publisher - let's say, September 1st, and I know this delivery date probably six months (if not more) ahead of time. So knowing this, I set deadlines for where I need to be in the book and when. So let's say I got this delivery date on March 1st. I'd want the first 100 pages (or 27k-ish words) cranked out by April 15th. I'd want the next 100 pages by June 1st. And I'd want the last 100 pages by July 15th, which gives me enough of a cushion to step away for a week or so, then go back and do a light revision. That's generally approximately 27k words over six weeks, and six weeks is five working days per week, which means 30 days. Which means if I write 1k words a day, I easily hit my goals.
BUT, some days, yes, I will have a magazine deadline, so maybe I'll cut myself some slack and write less. And some days, I'll absolutely be flying with inspiration, so I'll keep going. The point is that I aim for averages - if I can hit that 27k/100 page goal over six weeks, I give myself a lot of wiggle room, whether it's spending the afternoon drafting a celeb piece or spending the afternoon working on (non-paying) blog posts or spending the afternoon brainstorming new book ideas (I actually don't do this, as I only focus on one book at a time, but I know that some of you do, so I'm just throwing it in there as an example). :)
I think the key, for me, is to have a real long-term strategy in place. If I feel like things are constantly cropping up and being thrown in my direction, it makes me too jittery, unable to be pinned down and really focus on what needs to get done. So with this foundation in place - six weeks to hit a target - even when other hurdles arise, I'm okay. I know what the end target is, and I know how to compensate to get there. Yes, I can accept that last-minute celeb piece because I wrote 10k words last week, and now this week, I can slow down and take a breather. Is that making sense?
So getting back to the original question about priorities, I'd say that by organizing my life with these goal posts, I don't really HAVE to prioritize. I can't neglect the fiction because I'm contracted, but I don't WANT to neglect the other stuff because I enjoy it. But the only way to manage both is to have that foundation pinning me down. I never, ever miss any kind of deadline and with these longer goals in place, the shorter goals are easier to manage as well.
Does that help?
Craft, Life as a writer
Reader Comments (4)
It does help--and makes a lot of sense. Much thanks.
Great post thanks!
Very interesting, thanks! Now, I don't necessarily want to get into financial specifics, but I'm curious... Do you HAVE to write the magazine pieces anymore? And if not, what keeps you doing that instead of "just" novels?
Kristan- No, technically, I earn my living on fiction - the magazine stuff is simply because I enjoy it, and to be honest, I think that's really important. Maybe it's because I'm a gemini (hee), but I like mixing things up, and I also just really enjoy the heck out of doing the celeb profiles, so that's why I do them. That said, I take those deadlines as seriously as any other, regardless of whether or not, I "need" to do them financially.