Blogger: Rachel Zurakowski
Location: Books & Such Main Office; Santa Rosa, Calif.
The third quality I admire in authors is professionalism. I’m not saying that you need to wear a suit and tie or a dress and nylons whenever you’re near me (and please don’t expect me to dress up very often). Professionalism is much more than looks. Below, I’ve listed the qualities that come to mind for me when I think of professionalism. Some of these are pretty obvious, but I believe that each of us can work at growing these qualities in our lives.
Professionalism includes, but isn’t limited to:
1) Good communication skills–very important when you’re working with an agent. You need to be able to listen to your agent and articulate your dreams/concerns. Communication is so important these days that you can go to school and get a degree in it. 🙂 My roommate in college was a Communications major, and she would often read snippets of Deborah Tannen books to me. Interesting stuff!
2) Ability to show respect to those you work with–this will help in your relationships with your agent and editors. If you are disrespectful, people don’t want to work with you no matter how wonderful your material is.
3) Ability to think before speaking (or blogging, or twittering, or…)–I suffer with the “foot-in-mouth” affliction. I’ve kinda learned my lesson on this one, so I often sound a bit slow because I’m thinking through what I’m going to say before I say it. I’ve learned it’s better to sound a little stupid than to hurt someone unintentionally. This translates into internet “talk,” too. You can really hurt your writing career or your relationships with editors and agents by posting without thinking on twitter, blogs, Facebook, etc. It’s best to slow down and think things through FIRST before there’s a problem. I still make mistakes though! We can definitely work on this aspect of professionalism together.
4) Ability to follow through–when I read a book idea that has merit but isn’t quite ready for publication, I’ll frequently write back to the author and suggest changes be made. So many times I never hear back from that person again. I know this is the case for many agents. When we write suggesting changes, the project really did interest us. When we suggest changes, we’re often testing your ability to follow through because this becomes an important part of the author/agent relationship once you are a client. For example:
a) contracts involve finishing a book on deadline
b) a publisher could request revisions on a project that need to be made quickly
c) your agent might request you work on building your platform to help promote your book
We need to be sure you can complete the tasks that are set before you so that we can easily work together to get your book on the shelves and into the homes of readers around the world.
5) Attitude of cooperation–If you go into each day with a good attitude and a desire to work with people to make amazing things happen, I think you’ll have a better chance of having a blessed and productive day. A willingness to work with and learn from others goes a long way in forming strong relationships.
Do you have any professional qualities to add to this list or thoughts on what I’ve written? Please share them with us!
It’s so true about the slowing down and thinking before you post a blog or on FaceBook. Even writing loops.
Communication is key. I’m not sure what the real stat is anymore (it’s been a few years since I was in grad school), but it was said that most of the arguments/misunderstandings between people were due to non-communication.
When in doubt, check it out!
It kind of goes with what you said to slow down before you talk, write, post, etc. So true.
It’s all about respect. Great post today!
Hi Rachel,
Ok, I’m writing this again. I wanted to make sure I followed number 3 and lost my first draft 🙂
Great list. I was surprised the ability to research was not in the list.
In my current project I have to research characteristics of children of divorce, and characteristics of an abusive relationship.
I’m able to use my Christian background for some of the characters, and my location is based loosely on my area.
Thanks for the great list.
Irene
Brevity.
This is a very helpful list. Each one of these qualities are very important.
I would add a gracious attitude. It is similar to respect and cooperation, but it goes a bit farther and means you are ready to listen and learn and you can acknowledge that someone else’s ideas are as good as yours and maybe even better. A gracious attitude also means you care more about relationships and people involved than being right or having your way.
I disagree completely.
Have you ever see Elizabeth Gilbert before she was famous http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bhVDIe42to verses her TED video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86x-u-tz0MA or any person like Susan Boyle in the beginning and then when they become successful? It isn’t the person, it is their talent and when in America are we going to get that?
Sometimes extreme poverty wreaks havoc with ones life and causes reactions and a presentation the reflects that not too dissimilar to that of the Soloist Nathaniel Ayers http://www.soloistmovie.com who is beloved by the musicians in LA.
Looks and behavior is not the catalyst, but the art and only the art and we are fooling ourselves if we think otherwise.
Try telling a 5 year old not to like someone becuase of how the appear…
Nice one, Bill.
Hi “Redhead”,
Thanks for taking the time to comment! I’m a little confused about the “appearance” part of all of this. I don’t see, even in re-reading what I posted, that I said that looks were important in deciding if an author is someone I would want to represent. I did say that I don’t think dressing up is an important part of professionalism.
In Monday’s post, I explain that these posts are about qualities I admire in authors. These qualities help the author/agent relationship. If I can’t work well with the author because of a lack of professionalism or trust, it’s going to be very hard to work together to sell the project no matter how good it is.
Publishing is a very relationship-based business. You need to work closely with editors, agents, publicists, fans, book cover designers, etc. and if I see that an author doesn’t possess certain people skills, I’m not going to take on the personal training required to get that author ready to work in the publishing world. An author should “train up” first before starting the publishing marathon. Pitching your project to agents and editors is one of the first steps of the publishing journey and through these posts, I was trying to help authors perfect the training.
I hope this explanation clears things up!
Warmly,
Rachel
Irene, I agree that the ability to research is very important. Getting the facts right is so important because it builds trust between the author and the reader.
Thank you for adding this!
Carrie, I 100% agree with you about the gracious attitude. Thanks!
Bill, brevity can be very important. It’s nice to see that you’re practicing getting your point across in as few words as possible. I’d love to hear one of your sermons someday! 🙂 Thank you!
When I was sixteen, I decided to become a writer. I thought my work was so fantastic no publisher would refuse and I would beat the odds. A story was sent to a fantasy magazine. The magazine was interested and suggested changes. I intended to rewrite, but at that age I wasn’t so with it on the follow through. Instead, it was shelved.
This was a really good and encouraging blog. Sometimes, I have put my foot in my mouth on my blog. It’s been a learning process for me. I have to force myself to slow down. I’ve learned if I write it on word and reread before posting on my webpage it seems to help.
These blogs are really helpful! Thank you.