Given that I have now written five books, in different formats, I thought you might be interested in my reflections about what I learned along the way (this post has been edited since it first appeared in 2019 when I had just written Mentor Coaching: A Practical Guide)
- My years of blogging really helped me to just jump right in. I encourage you to write before you start your book, just to get into the rhythm of it and to test out your voice. The more you write, the more confident you will become in that voice.
- You may be able to repurpose some of your writing into your book, so keep it all, just in case. But don’t be limited to writing for the book. Keep the ideas and the (figurative) ink flowing.
- If you know what you want to say, writing a business book doesn’t actually take all that long. I started my first (traditionally published book) in late July, sent in my draft at the start of September and then sent the updated manuscript at the start of October. That’s a quick turnaround – my second book took close to two years from start to finish, as I started with the kernel of an idea then conducted interviews, and only then really knew what the book would cover.
- You do need downtime from other work to be able to write at the speed I wrote at the first time. August is usually relatively quiet in my world, so I had the space to crack on with it. My husband was also away from home, so I could write in the evenings. For my most recent book, this proved to be trickier, as my husband was at home the whole time, so I didn’t feel I could write in the evenings. Even when we went into lockdowns, I didn’t use the time particularly wisely, and stalled somewhat.
- I wish I had built in some down-time at the end of the first draft – instead I felt as though I was in catch-up and I became totally under-resourced for a few weeks because I wasn’t taking enough time to recover. Oh dear, I didn’t learn my lesson second time around! I should have read back through these lessons learned.
- I wish I had started with a more complete outline! I never wrote outlines for essays either, so I’m following a pattern. I could have saved myself restructuring time had I got that right at the beginning. And yes, I should have known that! I did do more of this the second time around, but I still ended up restructuring the book, after feedback from a reviewer. So perhaps it wasn’t an outline I needed after all, but just to get it all out on (figurative) paper so that I and others could respond to the structure.
- I have often said that business books are too long. They could say what they need to say in a handout. I tried really hard not to over-inflate anything, but it’s tough when you don’t know what people know and don’t know. I had every intention of keeping mine short and sweet, but it turned out that I had more to say than I thought I did! It was still on the short side though, so I hope I haven’t broken my own rule. My second book was twice the length. I did make sure that each chapter was short and sweet though, making them easy to read, one chapter at a time, in short bursts.
- Things that might seem obvious to us are not obvious to others, so it’s important to explain yourself well! I had to fill in quite a few gaps along the way. It makes me re-realise how unique we all are, with a ton of stuff that we know that we assume other people know but they don’t know. That’s what makes us special, the stuff that we know that others do not. I hope that doesn’t sound arrogant – it’s meant to be an encouragement to recognise what you know that other people don’t know and share that where it’s appropriate – perhaps that’s in a book, perhaps a blog, or a vlog or short Linked In posts. Whatever the vehicle, you do have something unique to say, from your intersectionality.
- I learned huge amounts that I was unconsciously competent about. For several chapters, I had to really dig deep – and have some good conversations with others – to figure out what I do and how I do it. For the second book, I interviewed 26 people to check what I thought I knew, and to build on that. In many respects, that made it harder to start writing as I had sooooo many notes and I procrastinated for some time before distilling those into something coherent.
- Conversations really do help me get clarity. So much better than trying to do that inside my head. They also helped when I was stuck with good old writer’s block and procrastination.
- Second time around, I was part of a book buddies group, all of us aspiring to or in the midst of writing a book. This group was invaluable to me to get over my hump of procrastination. I recommend Sue Richardson’s book buddies groups, but there are others too, like the London Writers Salon which is a space to write together (but alone).
- People you wouldn’t expect offer to read the draft, write a testimonial, write a book review. I had some wonderful offers, and I took them all up on it, as I wanted as much feedback as I could get and as much publicity from advocates too.
- I thought my grammar was good – I learned it needed a lot of brushing up! So many rules that I didn’t know and don’t remember ever being taught. Second time around, I had forgotten many of these rules, so still needed a good copy-editor to put my writing straight.
- I hate doing references and citations and permission logs! That was the most painful bit.
- It can be scary to put yourself out there for scrutiny – but as Brene Brown says, you have to get in the arena if you want to learn and grow.
- Pressing send is the biggest weight-lifter ever!
So, if you have been thinking about writing a book for a while, maybe my learning will help get you kick-started.
