Archive for April, 2007

KL like you’ve never seen it before - from the eyes of base jumpers who leapt of that tall flying saucer tower that I can’t remeber the name of.

Breathtaking! Extreme! Crazy!

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I came across this via http://www.kualalumpurishome.com - so thanks to them for the heads up on it.

This piece of flash fiction was inspired by a browse through the Argos catalogue.

“Can you look at my ticket, dear?” The old lady said, leaning towards me. “I can’t see my number.”

I was sitting on a plastic seat, waiting for my ticket to be called. All I needed was a cheap toaster to replace the one that had smoked out my flat that morning. I had come into Argos just before work and it should have only taken a few minutes. Argos is a hybrid mail order / department store - their shop space is no more than a series of cash registers and a long counter. You choose what you want to buy from thick catalogues, pay and then wait for it to come up from storage. There were crowds of people waiting for their goods that morning and I was going to be late.

I looked at the ticket in the old lady’s claw-like hand. It was trembling. The electronic counter overhead said 45. “You’re number 71.”

“It’s busy today, isn’t it, dear?”

I grunted. “Mine is 79. I’m already late for work.”

I didn’t feel like talking. I hadn’t had any breakfast on account of my broken toaster and I hadn’t bargained for a long wait in this store.

The old lady said happily, “I’m very excited. I’ve been waiting for eight weeks to come here today.”

She folded her ticket neatly and put it into her purse. It was a slow process, her hands shaking all the while. She drew out a folded page, torn from a catalogue, and carefully opened it out. I looked at her for the first time. She was sunken and frail as if her body had given up on her. She might have been a beautiful woman once, or perhaps just a plain one. I could not tell through the mask of her age. Her voice too had that dry, paper-thin quality of the elderly. It is as if age sucks the life and uniqueness out of anyone of us and leaves only a generic husk - an old lady or an old man, no longer Daisy or Gina or Ned or Hassan.

“Look, this is what I’m waiting for.” She pointed at a photograph on the worn page. It was page 523 of the Argos catalogue. From its creases and softness, I sensed that it had been folded and unfolded and gazed upon many times. It was a picture of two porcelain pigs, both upright and chuckling. One played a fiddle and the other danced. They were bright pink with a black patch on their backs. With their round cheeks and laughing eyes, they looked like surreally giggling toddlers.

“I always love looking at the Argos catalogue. It comes through my door once a year and there is so much in it. You could have anything you ever need in your life from it. I like sitting in my chair with a nice cup of tea and reading through it sometimes, you know?” She looked up at me with tired eyes. “My little things used to look so pretty in the house. There was space for them then.

“I’ve got all different kinds of ornaments - china ones, glass ones and some lovely crystal pieces. My favourite are the animals, they all have such character. But after Len died, that house got to big for me, you see. I’m in a flat - it’s small, just right for one person but my little things don’t get the chance to shine, all cramped up like that. My daughter, she says, why do you need all these little knick-knacks, Mum? They only clutter up the place. Do you even know what you’ve got, Mum? she says.

” ‘Course I do, I say to her. I know each one of them and I know where they each sit. I wish you could see them. They’re so pretty. These little pigs here are pretty, aren’t they? I saw them a few months ago. I love their smiling faces and look, this one’s playing music and this one’s dancing a jig. You’re thinking I’m a silly old woman. But just looking at them puts a smile on my face. They’re so cheeky.

“I’ve been saving up, you know. A pound a week, I put aside from my pension. A pound a week. For eight weeks. And now I’m here. Is it my number yet, dear?”

“No.”

“You don’t mind me chatting to you, dear? I don’t see many people. With my arthritis - and my eyes not so good now - I don’t get about as much as I used to. My daugher comes when she can but she’s up in Manchester and she’s got a family and a busy job, I can’t expect to see her all the time, you know? It’s very quiet at home. But I’ve got my litte family, as I call them, my little happy band. And these piglets will fit right in. I’ve got just the spot for them - on that table right by my chair. So I can see them all the time and pick them up and touch them. You can’t touch them on the page, can you? It’s not the same, just having that picture, and holding them in your hands.”

I let her talk on. I didn’t want to. I wanted to close my heart to her. It was easier if she were just another extra in this momentary scene in my life, a one-dimensional part of the general view. But there was the treasure of her heart, on a page torn out of a catalogue, and now I held it in my hands.

When her number was called, I held her seat as she hurried unsteadily up to the counter, fumbling with her stick and her handbag. She shuffled back with the plastic bag, her face beaming. “I want to look at it now. Check that it’s all right, not chipped or anything.”

I helped her with the packaging, her crumpled hands hovering impatiently beside mine. “Careful, now, dear. Yes, there, there we are.”

The porcelain pigs were round and shiny, smooth to the touch. There was little weight to them. The pink was even more luminous in my hands than in the picture. Their perky features were starkly set, from molds that rolled out a hundred thousand others an hour in a factory in China.

The old lady took first one, then the other in her hands, held them as if to warm them, followed their contours with her fingers. She did not speak, just smiled with pleasure at their beauty. She stroked their cheeks, their lips, touched their little ears.

After awhile, she took a breath and handed them back to me. “Thank you, dear.”

She watched me carefully as I wrapped them up and put them back in the box. As she stood up to leave, she took my hand. “Thank you for making an old lady happy.”

I felt embarrassed. “I didn’t do anything.”

“You sat with me and looked at my pigs.”

They called my number then. I scrambled up and headed for the counter. When I looked back, I saw her bowed figure struggling with the door, her woollen hat peaking up above her hunch. A man held the door open for her. She looked up and I could see her smile at him. I imagined she said, “Thank you, dear.”

He did not look at her as he let her pass and walked in through the doors.

Photo: thanks to humblehomestores.com

There’s a great article in the Independent today by Danuta Keane about “Why so many novels never make it to the big screen”.

“Books provide filmmakers with ready-made plots on which to base screenplays
(useful when plagiarism claims start to fly), and a proven audience. But unless
they are global mega-sellers like Dan Brown, J K Rowling or Michael Crichton,
the actual authors are lower on the food chain than the screenwriter, and if you
think they are respected, watch Sunset Boulevard or The Player.”

The Player is one of my favourite movies - showing how a sensitive literary story is turned into a blockbuster starring Julia Roberts and Bruce Willis in an explosively ridiculous ending.

I had my own brush with Hollywood with my first novel The Flame Tree. It was truly a brief encounter but telling none the less. It went something like this:

Hollywood production company: Love the story.  Where is Malaysia? Can we set it in Vietnam?

Me: Uh, no.

The End.

Danuta’s article also has a list of the 5 best film adaptations of books and also the 5 worst. I’d add to the best adaptations “Gone With The Wind”, “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” and “Maurice”. And amongst the worst - Polanski’s “Tess of the D’Urbevilles”.

What are your favourite or least favourite film adaptations of books? Which adaptations do you think are the best or the worst? Add a comment or email me and let’s see if we get a consensus or lots of different views!

Following on from Nicola’s post as Guestblogger last week, when she wrote about Writing Business Books, she explains what Mentoring is in a business context and also talks about Cross-Cultural Mentoring and her own fusion background growing up in Singapore and feeling Singaporean.

Nicola writes:

What Mentoring is All About

Mentoring is the process of exchanging experience and related information. In the past mentoring was traditionally viewed as a ‘elder/protégé’ relationship, but now it is being recognised that experience does not always come with age. This realisation has refined mentoring models to establish reverse mentoring are being encouraged between the leading edge youngsters, as the mentor with the valuable experience, and the elder successful business, as the mentee, to continue the circle of valuable learning and knowledge exchange. Other perspectives of the mentoring process are buddy, peer and themed mentoring.

Mentoring is essentially an activity that is free at the point of delivery. For example, the business person voluntary mentoring in the Princes Trust, the line manager mentoring identified talent potential, or the employee who wants to understand his strategic role in the organisation for promotion. In all these cases the mentee will not be paying for the service.

So, outside my work the question for me is: do I want to mentor, free of charge, using this area of my expertise for the benefit of others? My professional fee charging role, mentoring is the area in which I train people in the mentor and mentee relationship and skills, how to set up and implement a mentoring programme and create a framework to measure the success and increased benefits and profitability to the organisation. These are consultative pieces of work. Sharing my experience as a cost free activity is my choice, which I personally need to assess so as not to blur the boundaries of paid and voluntary work. I do mentor others, but usually making my experience available to the voluntary sector. I am currently President of the City Women’s Network (CWN), which was set up in the 1970’s for the mutual support and positive experience of senior women working within the City of London. We all accept the ethos of the network and are prepared to give other members the benefit of our experience.

Needless to say, at the moment I have a mentor, who is someone recently retired from academia and is an expert futurist, which is an area I find fascinating and definitely broadened – or is lengthened a better word? – my view of the workplace and the role of work in the global society.

Cross-Cultural Mentoring

Cross-cultural mentoring is very important to me. For example, I was recently in Brussels facilitating a group of CEOs from the same sector but with very different levels of working with diversity & inclusion. All the organisations were multinational and global household names. For these successful and intelligent leaders, issues of how do they lead the way forward, role model best practise to their own organisations, through the issues of diversity that include the 6 pillars of gender, ageism, disability, ethnicity, religion and sexual orientation, with the overarching expectations of differing societies and institutions, coupled with the opportunities and changes technology has brought to the work and home spheres has them, understandably, overawed.

The use of highlighting the cross-cultural issues and mentoring the experiences from the different perspectives is vital to achieve an accepted ‘norm’, or create a ‘matrix of tolerance’ as Kate Nash, CEO of RADAR named the concept. To share best practise in this area is essential, and creating an appreciation of best practise and modelling professional and personal leadership needs an ongoing exchange of information and experience to arrive at an cross-cultural understanding. But first, all these leaders need to learn what makes the mentoring and mentee relationship work so they are no longer frightened to come out of their ivory towers and listen and learn from those around them.

Fusion background

I was born in London as my parents were moving between York and Norfolk, only to start a journey that took me to Cyprus and then on to Singapore in time for my 3rd birthday. So my first memories are of the Far East, I had always grown up on warm climates and thrived; so sunshine and that free way of life were normal to me. By coincidence, we also never lived in English communities, so I was very lucky to be surrounded with others, which made me the oddity. Being a child, I didn’t notice difference. I ate Cantonese food, ballet lessons with locals, shopped in markets and while my Mother away was in hospital, I spent masses of time wandering far and wide, always being shepherded by the kindness of those around me. The foreign bits of life to me were being sent to the local forces school and mixing with other British families in the formal way ex-pats abroad do.

My brother has already been set home to school the year before. My Mother had not been well, so we arranged to come home as a family. The three week journey by sea back to the UK was the first time I had experience of the British en masse, their way of living, attitudes and food. Having been told I would live going home – a concept I did not understand – I arrived in Southampton in thick fog, wore what were supposed to be my winter clothes in the closing summer months before being sent to a Boarding school.

Even though I Iooked like the perfect English girl - blond hair, blue eyes – I could not understand how the sun could shine, and yet I was freezing cold. I had no concept of cold. Needless to say I had arrived into the coldest winter since 1947. I had not points of connection with my classmates who were gymkhana crazy, pony mad and thought my dolls house was odd as it had no chimneys in the roof or fireplaces in the rooms. The dolls house had been made in Changai jail, the backdrop to a WWII Japanese POW camp in which many soldiers in East Anglian regiments had been interned, and of which ere my classmates fathers. There was later a film made of the book King Rat that tells the story of the camp. All the experiences and interest was naturally not shared by those who’s fathers were the camp’s survivors.

At school were only allowed to have a bath twice a week, three of you bath together at on time, and the favourite song to sing during this ritual was “Slow boat to China” which sounded like complete nonsense to me. I decided the British were barbarian, which was confirmed by being offered pilchards in tomato sauce on toast at school tea one evening. Our cat loved pilchards in tomato sauce and used to lick the sauce off first – now I was being fed cat food!

I always said coming to the England delayed my development by years – the shock and differences were so great. What I find interesting is that there still is little recognition that for children, let alone adults, cultural transitions are character influencing, even if the transition is into their own culture. Recently I surveyed a group of American women living in London for their husband’s work. Even though they had be career girls in the US, they were not allowed to work in the UK. May had started families and concentrated on home life and generally found other US networks and women to create their community and support networks. I asked what the differences and similarities were in their lives, and had they been given any awareness training before coming to Europe. No they all chorused. Had they been sent from the US to France or Japan they would get some sort of induction to local life, but because the US spoke English there was no need.

They made a life for themselves outside the US, but with going through life changing new experiences like starting families, renovating properties and creating homes, they felt now they were more at home in London, and felt they had little in common with experiences and attitudes when they went back to the US on holiday. In fact, many felt they did not want to go home yet, and would prefer their husband’s career to continue outside the US, which they admitted could be detrimental to future promotion and success.

Cross-culture expectations are subtle, but very powerful and have the ability to create either a negative or positive effects instantly. Like the mentoring relationship generally, successful, valuable and sustainable cross-culture mentoring only happens when the skill of open-mindedness is learnt and practiced. Then the exchange of information can be achieved on the basis of the mentor giving experience as they learned it, and the mentee can adapt, leave or take what they need and want freely without egos personal feeling being questioned. No one need feel overawed, or unappreciated.

Nicola can be contacted via her website http://www.proactivecoaching.com/

This is a cross-post from my social media blog ZenGuide, where the post below came out yesterday under the heading “Simple Online Marketing”. I am posting it here as well as I would like to share with you the success stories of some of my Fusion View friends.

You may not have a blog or even a website. How can you market yourself online without these tools? A simple and effective way is to guest-blog on an existing blog run by someone else.

Here are some success stories of a number of people who were guest-blogged on Fusion View.

Case Study - Nicky Harman

Nicky Harman, translates books and novels from Chinese into English. She doesn’t have a website of her own for her books and translations although she is profiled briefly on her work website. I was curious to learn more about the process of translation and asked her to write a first person piece about her translation work and the Chinese author Han Dong whose book Striking Root she was working on at that time - and for which she was looking for an agent and/ or publisher. She produced the article very quickly over a weekend and I had it up on Fusion View the next week.

A few weeks later, I was contacted by a leading publisher in China who had come across the article on Fusion View, asking to make contact with Nicky. I forwarded her email and Nicky started discussions with her about publishing her book. Around the same time, a UK-based literary agent was told about Nicky’s work and Googled her. Up popped Nicky’s article on Fusion View and the agent invited her to submit her manuscript. Go Nicky!

Case Study - Pey

My cousin Pey Colborne is an aromatherapist and poet based in Bath. She doesn’t have her own website for her business. I interviewed her for a podcast on Fusion View, talking about her fusion life and how she uses her Western and Eastern experiences and interests in her poetry - and also in her aromatherapy practice, which incorporates Chinese herbal medicine as well as Western aromatherapy principles. She has gained at least one new aromatherapy client through that podcast - he specifically mentioned it as he had had a choice of therapists and decided on her after hearing more about her practice and healing principles on the podcast.

Case Study - Lucy Luck

I interviewed Lucy Luck, a UK literary agent for advice to writers hoping to find an agent in the UK - and specifically answering emailed questions from overseas writers. She talked about how to submit your work, how to write your covering letter and what agents re looking for. She also invited Fusion View readers/ listeners to submit their writing to her agency. I chatted with her last week and she told me that she has had over 30 submissions from potential new clients, mentioning the Fusion View podcast. The quality of their covering letters and submissions have been much higher than those who had not listened to the podcast, which has made the process of working through them much easier for her. She also feels that the podcast has raised her profile in the search engines, coming up just after her own literary agency website, and also generally for her business as the podcast was also featured in Mslexia, the UK journal for women writers.

Action point

So could you offer an article to a blogger you know? Here are some ideas to get you thinking:

• your article needs to be relevant to the theme of the blog you’d like to write for

• what you write about needs to be helpful, interesting or useful for the readers of that blog

• read the blog you would like to write for and read the About page

• think of the blog and its readers as a community that you’d like to be a part of

• does that blog regularly have interviews/ guestbloggers? If not, will your approach be appropriate?

• make your approach courteously

• remember that the blogger does not have to take your idea, so accept “no” gracefully

• how might you help the blogger in return, as part of his/ her community?

I am always on the lookout for interesting guestbloggers on both Fusion View and ZenGuide - please make sure you read my Guestblogger Submission Guidelines: click on that Category in the far right sidear. Email me first with an outline of what you’d like to write about, who you are and why you think the readers of Fusion View or ZenGuide would be interested in the story. If I like the idea, I can then invite you to write the full story. I may decide it’s not appropriate, in which case, I will let you know.

Pic: thanks to
www.dnrec.state.de.us

I’ve added a new gadget so you can download Fusion View posts as audio files onto your iPod or MP3 and listen to them wherever you are.

So no more being glued to the computer screen - you can enjoy my posts and guestblogger posts on the move.

All you have to do is drag and drop the Talkr badge below into your podcast tuner.

The easiest way is to minimise this screen in front of your iTunes (or other podcast catcher/ tuner screen) and drap and drop the badge into iTunes (or other podcast tuner).

The posts are read by a clever automated text reader that sounds like an American woman. It’s actually pretty realistic and natural sounding, considering she’s a bunch of bytes and digital data. Try it out and let me know what you think.

You can try it out by listening to my post on the non-stinky durian. (3 mins 02 secs)

(For Film Mondays or photographs, you’ll still have to come back to the screen to watch the movie and/ or see the photos, I’m afraid. The gadget doesn’t offer a facility where they narrate or describe the video or photo for you….)

Photo: thanks to dtechnews.com

OK, let me start off with a disclosure. Some of my best friends are American and they are super-intelligent and articulate but these folk in the video below - well, it makes me worry that America is the most powerful nation on earth.

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The durian is a South East Asian fruit that is so stinky it is banned from airplanes and smart hotels. The smell lingers like a bad fart combined with the ripest blue chees and crusty hard fetid socks that have been worn for weeks in hot humid weather without a change. Mmmmmm! I bet that’s made your mouth water.

But that’s what Asians - and in particular, Malaysians - love about the fruit. The smell is hideous. But as you eat the sticky, custardy, soft flesh, the taste is aromatic and sweet and creamy. And then you have to live with the most dreadful halitosis rotting sewer breath for hours on end.

So some smart guy has come up with a variety of durian that doesn’t smell. Thai scientist Songpol Somsri apparently spent 30 years of his life researching this project, according to the Seattle Times. The article goes on to say that in Malaysia, durian is prized as an aphrodisiac and a farmer is quoted as saying, “If the durian doesn’t have a strong smell the customer only pays one-third the price.”

I picked up this story from Seth Godin, the marketing guru, who uses it to make a great analogy for marketers who try to fix what they perceive as a problem - by focusing on the people who are not buying the product. So marketers aim to fix the problems in order to get the non-buyers to become buyers - in the meantime, destroying the key qualities that the enthusiastic existing buyers rave about and thereby turning away their core customers.

Personally I’m not a great fan and whenever my family have a great durian feast, I have to keep my distance from them all when we’re chatting afterwards! Still, it seems unnatural and sacriligeous to be tampering with the distinctive quality that makes a durian a durian. I’m not sure I’d eat more durian if I was offered the non-stinky variety - the taste and texture of the eating experience just doesn’t do it for me. I’m much more of a mango fan and I’d choose mango over any other fruit any day. So I guess I’m inclined to agree with Seth. What’s the point of a non-stinky durian if the core customers don’t want it - and neither do the ones who never wanted it in the first place?

Photo: thanks to the Seattle Times

There are many other opportunities for aspiring writers than writing merely fiction books. The posts on Fusion View have generally focused on novels and so has the conversation in the comments section. It struck me that this does not give a very wide view of the book world. So, as part of the Getting Published series, I have asked Business Coach and Mentor, Nicola Stevens to share her experiences of writing business books.

Nicola heads her own company, Nicola Stevens and Associates, whose mission statement is “People excel in an atmosphere where they can communicate honestly and without fear” which, to me, is a very powerful statement indeed. She works with business on leadership and management in issues of Corporate Governance, Boardroom dynamics and change. I asked her for a short piece about her work, writing business books and her fusion background and she came back with five A4 pages of information. I was going to try and edit it but then decided that much of what she says is so interesting and useful that I have decided to keep most of her original text.

So here is Part One of Nicola’s exclusive advice for those who may thinking about writing business books and anyone who may be curious about excelling in business:

Beginnings as a Business Writer

As a Coach and Mentor, I have written many articles that have been published both in the Arts and Business world. As a result, I was approached by a business colleague, France Kay to co-author the book, which was published as Making Management Simple. The books publishers, Howto, then asked me to write Learn to Coach. I am currently finishing a book on The Art of Mentoring for the Property Sector for EG Books, publisher for the property sector, and just started a new project co-authoring with Frances again - the working title being Get a Grip Girls to be published later this year by Foulsham.

Making the writing work

To be a writer, I think you need to have that capacity to enjoy discovering the unknown and have an ability to know enjoy not being in control. Even writing business books, which in theory sound as though they are very organised and factual, are a roller coaster of ‘what happens when” and how to show and tell the story – the information – as a fictional work. Business books also need magic of readability, need to make facts into an interesting subject.

I learnt so much co-authoring Making Management Simple - about the technical process of writing. Where information needs to be, how the information flows for the reader. In a hotel lounge off the M4 near Swindon, Frances and I got together to divide the book chapters between ourselves and agreed some guidelines. We met a month later to see how we got on, raise questions we had and read each other’s work out loud. We refined our guidelines, finished our parts of the manuscript, and sent if off the publisher 3 months later

Business Expertise

I am the Director of Coaching and Mentoring in my own company. I work with the human dynamics of business or the cause organisations and individuals serve - the human side of competitive intelligence that makes them successful and sustainable

My background is in child development and psychology, but in between travelling in my twenties, I found myself working on projects for all sizes of organisations and different individuals that would say; “I don’t know what I need, but I need someone to help”. I worked with business leaders through “conversations on the sofa” ie asking questions to get the principles involved to clarify what was happening for them, the impact on others, their expectations, and how to move forward. I dealt with human dynamics in issues such as discharges of bankruptcy, entrepreneurs taking their companies for a flotation, merging organisational cultures and emergency succession planning. At the same time, they needed to continue to run the day-to-day business, often running old and new processes concurrently until transition had been fully implemented. Sometimes it was to take time out to reflect and plan the future.

I became known for dealing with difficult situations sensitively, being trustworthy and confidential coupled with the ‘irritating habit’ for remembering facts and wishes from past conversations and holding this information in a way that kept the person accountable and responsible for their actions, impact and leaning. I also got to know the organisation from the top – it was usually the CEO or owner who employed me - to the workers at the coalface of the organisation, euphemistically called the bottom. I usually had no job title, my work was project based, linked to the implementation of the organisation’s strategic aims and objects, planned and unplanned change. I was answerable to the CEO only………. Oh and I always used everyday language and did not get sucked into sector or management jargon so everyone understood what was needed.

Being a keen believer in continual professional development (CPD), I realised my work would come under the heading of the emerging profession of coaching and mentoring. I attended the first coaching course in City University to review, clarify and refresh my learning, which I continued for the next three years with the Coaches Training Institute. I continued my CPD as a mediator, working with families and chemical substance misuse, coaching and mentoring supervision and, of course, my own coaching CPD with psychology supervisors, business organisational mentors.

Current work

My work now includes issues such as re-building trust in the Boardroom, facilitating roundtables on matters of Corporate Governance, Social responsibility (CSR), cross sector collaboration on topical themes, such as, diversity and inclusion (D&I) responsibilities and sharing best practice. I also implement frameworks to achieve success through setting up internal and external mentoring programmes and skills training. This is the human side of organisational and competitive intelligence that responses to the professional skills of coaching and mediation to create and hold a safe and courageous space to allow these discussions, agreements and on-going action to make a positive impact – holding the players accountable and responsible.

Writing as a Business Activity

As a result I am asked to write about some of these themes – and sometimes I feel moved to capture the information and on-going debates to map thought leadership trails and processes for future reference and learning. I feel, personally, a strong motive to include writing as a business activity so that others coming behind on the same path will know what has gone on before. It is my contribution to cutting across silos of thought and stops wasting time re-inventing the wheel. Then others will be up to speed to contribute to the debate, bring their perspective and added innovative thinking to the discussion.

Researching a book

Well several stages happen concurrently at the beginning, and the time line for them has varied enormously from a matter of hours to months depending on publisher’s engagement with the project and the stimulus for the project. These all include research stage, interviewing people, case studies, structure of the book and writing stage

For instance, the latest book – working title ‘Get a grip girls’ – came together in a matter of moments. Frances and I were sitting on the train bouncing down to the London Book Fair and we simultaneously said we wished women would stop pulling the victim card and get a grip. As we finished the sentence together with the same words, we scribbled down a sentence to explain the idea to a publisher we were due to meet, pitched her the idea, wrote the synopsis on the journey home and each picked one of the chapters to write. In the next week, I found a box (essential equipment for my research and data gathering) scanned though all my archive files for relevant information and statistics and wrote the first draft of my chapter, using the framework we had discussed. On this occasion we wanted to start with a story or fable to sent the tone for each chapter and agreed we would add quizzes and exercises to stimulate the readers thinking, illustrate hypothesises and focus on possible solutions.

Professional grounding

Generally, first there is the idea or concept, which in my case is based in existing experience and knowledge but comes for a curiosity stimulated by a mixture of instinctive gut feel to an unresolved, changing or new influences that I experience. I am a great one for running a personal straw poll to test my thoughts and feeling by speaking to others, reading from lots of difference sources, collating relevant information and scribbling notes that are all thrown into a labelled box sitting in a corner of my office.

In the case of Learning to Coach I agreed to do write the book providing it was not just another coaching book, but actively seeked to examine the differing influences in the world of coaching, to lay out the fundamentals of the skills and processes and set a stake in the ground that there was a profession called coaching, this was how the reader could identify it and that it did not matter if you were a highly successful CEO, and trained psychologist or known as the best listener in the world, these experiences and talents did not make you a coach. You needed to be professionally trained to coach, although your previous experiences would still be an asset to you and your future clients.

Confidentiality issues

I gather my research and case histories from contacts, and any leads I am given or contact directly. In all cases I find most people like to their contribution to be anonymous. I also change names too in case histories. I find that people are more open and honest if they know there is confidentiality is assured.

The waiting game

Personally I prefer to write books that will be backed by a publisher. But however slowly or quickly the writer gets the idea, initial research and writing together, everything seems to stop as you wait for the OK from them and contracts are exchanged. During that period I am adding current articles, scribbling more notes and tossing them into the labelled box. After gently reminding the publishers I still exist, finally some months later they give the go ahead, we agree delivery dates and I start writing the whole draft, typing up the scribbled notes, adding resourced material, working out the diagrams needed creating what I call the Master first draft, which includes further reading list, bibliography and appendix. A lot of this reference information will have already been gathered in the labelled box, and I usually get my assistant to type in and check the facts.

Working with a publisher does mean that as a writer you need to be flexible around your idea and accept that they are taking your project because it will be good for their business. They do see your book as a product and will require that it is shaped to fit their business profitability. Don’t forget though, all publishers have a different stance in the publishing arena, so the same idea can be presented in many differing ways. So it is not so much finding a publisher, but finding the right one for you with which you can mutually collaborate.

I will state here that writing is a hard work, both physically and mentally. A writer needs disciple to complete the project and hit deadlines. Lofty thoughts, finding muses and living a life of French cigarettes, wine and anti social behaviour will not make you a successful writer. The writing stage means you block out all social contact, create writing shifts try to fit around your day job – so 5 – 7.30am slots before the day starts and 8 – midnight slots for the evening. Weekends disappear. You do need to look at the diary, and plan your writing time and give yourself mini deadlines and breaks. It takes time to work out what suits you best, and from personal experience, modes of writing might change. Do the best you can, and keep your co-writers, editors and anyone else involved informed of progress and challenges. Having co-authored and sole authored books I am happy to write in both ways as the each has it own advantages.

When you have sent off the master first draft to the publisher, they will assign you an editor who will take you final process of editing, book covers and the final drafts, towards the exciting bit of seeing your book completed and in the bookshops.

Fact checking

The transfer of factual information is usually part of my assistant’s contribution to the project and she also checks details, for example website links and attributions. A good editor will check details to make sure the information is still current at the time of printing. Otherwise it is up to me as a professional to make sure information is correct, and highlight to differentiate what are my personal thoughts, experiences, and therefore subjective, so all the information is presented in the manner that it is meant.

The Business of Business Books

For me luck being asked to co-author – and then turning that luck into future opportunity to show evidence that I was professional and I could be trusted to deliver a book that was sellable. So far I have worked with four publishers but only had books published by three of them. The publisher who ‘got away’ approached me as they wanted to have a women on their publishing list – but although they were very appreciative of my ideas kept on putting decision date back. I later found out that they had had a Boardroom takeover and were suspending all new themes while they licked their wounds. I wish they had felt brave enough to tell me months earlier so I could have got on with other projects with a clear conscience. Although I advocate that as a writer you need to be regular and honest while keeping your publisher informed, lack of informative communication from your publisher is not unusual. As I said before, publishers are business people and reputations are at stake. Take nothing personally as they are doing the best they can and if you get stuck with your writing and deadlines in the future – you will find them, in my experience, to be an wonderful support.

There is a similarity of working amongst publishers and subtle differences. I have no agent – but am considering the possibility as my writing has taken a bigger role in my working life generally and I find a valuable addition to my work and for clients benefit. So far I have found little negotiation needed. In the non-fiction arena there are set fee structures. ALL Publisher has their own fee offer – as a new writer you take it or leave it. Later you can negotiate.

Contracts are basically standard – but read carefully and discuss directly with the commissioning editor anything you do not understand, or have a general query about. It may be useful for you to already have some idea as to how you want to use the information in future. With new technology there are many more opportunities available for promotion and use of material and this is something that is worthwhile you investigating with your publisher. In my experience they have always been very helpful and open minded, taking the view that all and any exposure to the material is positive and helpful to marketing the book.

Advice for Budding Business Book Authors

Most non-fiction writers are balancing a day job with it own set of targets and expectations. This means that particularly in the final stage of writing it can only be managed if other activities are postponed. My experience has revealed that:

1. Before you start writing do an enormous food and house hold shop to include all essentials from loo paper and tissues to headache, coughs and cold remedies, frozen and tinned ready-made meals. Don’t get too fussed about household cleaning materials – you don’t notice dirt and disorder while you in the flow. Oh and don’t forget the multivitamins!

2. Tell all your friends you will not be available for a while, but you will contact them again when you have delivered your manuscript.

3. Apologise to your loved ones for any bad behaviour, moodiness and general non-emotional interaction – this is normal for writer to blank the world and get cross if even the simplest worldly thing comes in to their orbit and nothing personal.

4. Create a space that is solely yours. Somewhere you can work and not have to tidy up after each writing session. A place that can have piles on the floor that make sense to you, notes on the wall if needed to prompt you and any other aids that are helpful.

5. Lack of sleep is normal – but please factor in some days when you are allowed to sleep for 8 hours or more and there are easy tasks, such as reviewing work or research to allow you brain in relax and reflect.

6. Best to book all writing time in your diary just like you would a work or social commitment.

7. Just do it. Writing nonsense is part of the process. There is nothing like having words on a page to lead to more words. It may all sound unclear, lacking in structure and often to be repeated in several different parts of the book. Put all content down first to get a first draft, for you then to edit and add into the Master first draft.

In Part Two tomorrow, Nicola explains what Mentoring is and talks about Cross-Cultural Mentoring and her own fusion background, growing up in Singapore.

Nicola can be contacted via her website http://www.proactivecoaching.com/

We had a ski-ing ostrich last week. A few weeks back, we had a man playing music through his nose. Today, we have a man making music with his rollerblades - using strategically placed and tuned bottles of water and something to tied to his blades. Yes, we are very high-brow here on Film Mondays.

(You’ll need your sound enabled to appreciate this one.)

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PS. It’s Mozart, in case you were wondering - Symphony No. 40 in G minor.