Quarter 1 Goal Assessment

Score Card

At the beginning of the year, I laid out a writing and release plan. It went through two changes before I put it into action… and then it went through a third before the end of the quarter. The following score card is based on the goals as they were before the third change:

• 1 dark fantasy: 3 completed, 2 released;
• 1 romance novel: 1 completed, 1 released;
• 1 annual: not completed;
• 1 novella: 1 completed, 1 released;
• 1 chapter book: 4 revised and released (but only 1  illustrated as originally planned);
• 0 short stories: 6 revised and released.

What I learned.

I have discovered that goals change, as plans progress and we learn how to do things better or differently. So, here’s what I’ve learnt in the first quarter of 2013:

1. My initial release plan was okay, but did not let me respond to areas that sales showed my readers were interested in. I changed it, and the new tiered system is working fine… for now.
2. Writing new words is different to preparing older works for release. I know that sounds like a no-brainer, but I have trouble doing both activities side by side. Who knew?
3. Being flexible is important, because it enables a writer to respond to changes in personal circumstances and goals, as well as to areas of reader interest.
4. Balancing health, family, day job and writing is interesting.

Changes and Other Goals

As the quarter progressed, I started to realise what could be achieved with the current commitments I had at work and home and I formed 2 new goals:

• I wanted to write and publish 500,000 words this year. (I figured it was pretty reasonable as I had around 270,000 words in completed novels that ‘just’ needed revising.) Currently, I’ve completed 348,902 words of the 500,000-word goal in 3 months.
• I also wanted to do as Dean Wesley Smith recommended a while back, and release something new each week… just for the year. This was adjusted to become: release an average of 1 new item per week over the year. Currently, I’m at 13 releases for 14 weeks—but next week, I’ve more planned and will soon be back on track with those.

I also changed the release and writing schedule, because, while I had nearly 300,000 words written to assist me this year, I realized I was going to have to write around 1,340 new words a day to achieve 500,000 words next year—and I wasn’t sure I could. To assist me in tracking these goals, I’ve been using the word tracker from Svenja Liv. It is awesome and great for motivation. It also comes in a number of great designs.