Tag: freelancing

Jeff Deck’s skills for hire. Sellscribe, Hedge Editor, &c.

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Hey friends, I’m going to be looking to add some more freelancing clients to my stable– not just editing, but writing as well.  I’ll update my experience on this site and perhaps provide a few samples, because everybody loves a free sample.  I know this because, historically, I have made a meal more than a few times out of assorted grocery store samples.  To avoid returning to those days, I desire my income to reach a livable level.  So in the meantime, if you would care to spread the word that the incomparable Jeff Deck, author and editor, is offering his services to the World, then I may just have a cookie with your name on it.  In icing.

Suit the action to the word, the word to the action

There’s a story about the headstrong actor who was dead set on doing an audition for a prestigious theatre company’s production of Hamlet, against the advice of his manager.  “What, you don’t think I’m good enough or big enough for the role?” he raged at the poor woman, overriding everything she said without hearing a word of it.  “This is my big chance, and nothing will stop me from grabbing it!”

At the audition, he privately fumed about the shocked looks of the producers as he climbed to the stage– were they really so surprised that someone of his limited fame would dare to try out for the play?  But he was able to control his anger and channel it into the performance of his life as the gloomy prince of Denmark.  He stalked about the stage, spitting lines from Hamlet’s most famous monologue, contorting his face and his voice into different realms of agony as the prince debated suicide.

When he was finished, the room was quiet, and he thought to himself, I have awed them into silence.  “Well?” he demanded.  “What did you think of my Hamlet?”

“Very impressive,” said the producers.  “But we are auditioning for Queen Gertrude.”

Maybe there’s not always room for improvement, but surely 99% of the time there is.  That’s one of the principles of editing, that a work can always be stronger.  And as a freelancer, your work can always be stronger, and more in accordance with what your clients are looking for.  That’s why asking for feedback is important.  You will want to know that you are on track, both with the assignments that you’re completing for others, and with the way you’re communicating yourself, your professional conduct.  Getting feedback and adhering to it will satisfy your current customers and increase your likelihood of obtaining new ones.

Listen to me, I sound like a real live businessman.  Maybe I should start wearing a tie again.  But this t-shirt and hoodie deal is so much more comfortable.  Your intrepid freelancer is learning lessons along the way, though.  We can posit this one as:

Freelancer lesson #2: Feedback is your friend.  (Unless you’re a sound tech.)

New Frontiers, Once More

2011-Summer-0312

Here once again at the precipice of something new, or rather, having already flung myself or been flung into the void.  I am now Jeff Deck the full-time freelancer, available for editing and writing jobs as you please, and continuing to speak on various word-related topics.  Perhaps even having the opportunity, from time to time, to actually work on the next book.  This maverick lifestyle will come with its share of knocks and bruises as I figure out the best methods of doing things– indeed there’s already a skinned knee or two– but that’s all part of the adventure, no?  I’ll try to detail what I’ve learned about the freelancing life, right here on the blog as I go along.

The event currently looming on my personal horizon for now, though, and on the horizon of Benjamin D. Herson, is the imminent release of The Great Typo Hunt in paperback.  For that I should post some buttons around these parts to encourage the purchasing of said product– for I am, as always, merely a greasemonkey for the engine of commerce– but for now you can find them on the main Great Typo Hunt page.  We’re also conducting a 50 Typos, 50 States contest in which several fabulous prizes can be won if you share your typo pictures.  Exciting stuff.

Meantime, if you find yourself in need of editing or writing services, turn to someone who’s been in the word-crafting game for a while now through various outlets, and… hey, where are you going?  I’m talking about me.  E-mail jeffdeck [at] jeffdeck.com with inquiries.  My rates are reasonable and my turnaround is swift, swift as a rushing brook.  Yes, this is one thing that I have learned already…

Freelancer Lesson #1: Be ready to promote yourself, especially with nature-themed metaphors and similes.

People love nature.  Thus people will love you if you compare your skills and business practices somehow with the aroma of fresh pine.

The Daring Independent Life of the Editor

So it has come to this. If you are an editor, you are probably either looking for a job or will soon be. And the prospects are uniformly grim, even for a world-famous author like yrs trly. The work is gone. Well, that’s not quite right. The full-time, health-insurance kind of work is gone– but that doesn’t mean that editorial labors are forever vanished, to Bangalore or the archives of obsolescence.

Nope, text still needs someone to futz with it, and people still need editors. Sometimes. They have discovered that they don’t really need to keep them around all the time, though– where’s the immediate profit in that?– and so the field has largely become contract work. As someone who may have little other career skills to her name besides editing, you may be thinking dark thoughts at this point. Stable employment is a sweet thing, only truly appreciated (like most sweet things) when lost.

Oh, but be cheery, my literate friend! The life of the freelancer is ultimately the life of an adventurer. Once you pick up the right entrepreneurial tricks, you will discover that being a free agent has its perks. Sure, you won’t be able to afford to get that molar crowned anytime soon, but you are free to seek competing bids for your time and talent. You are effectively building a small business with little overhead, as the product emanates directly from that shapely brain of yours. (Such ridges!)

Eventually, as positive word of your brand spreads, you’ll be able to take work more in alignment with your interests, rather than just the work that will keep the lights on and keep the PBR stocked in your fridge. And you may just end up with better opportunities than if you’d stayed chained at the copyediting desk of HVAC Monthly for several more years.

We are being shoved out into the cold plains of competition and commerce, my friends. Might as well have some fun with it. And as far as the health insurance goes… Psst, you can sign on with Mediabistro and then get a shitty plan for as low as a hundred-spot a month. The teeth will go, and forget about prescriptions, but death and dismemberment can at least be forestalled.