Liberate Your Bliss

Employee happiness and short-sighted bosses all over the U.S. are on my mind lately.  I currently work for myself and have been the happiest I’ve ever been in my life, but the life of a freelance writer may not be for everyone.  If you’re happy to just have a job right now, it doesn’t mean you should be treated like dirt.  But it seems to me that’s exactly what’s going on.  As this “economic recovery” plods along,  companies are sitting on piles of cash while squeezing every ounce of efficiency and productivity out of their supposedly valued talent.

A Florida State University Study (released in the Fall 2007 Issue of Leadership Quarterly) stated that a staggering 40% of us work for bad bosses.  I can only imagine that this number has increased over the past three years.

This frustrates me.   If you can’t compensate your best employees to the degree that they deserve, or hire new ones, then find alternate ways to make them enjoy working for you.  Inspiring passion and loyalty for your company is the greatest gift you can give them.  It also costs nothing!

Passion is the “ultimate productivity tool,” according to a recent article from WebWorker Daily.  The article notes, “when you’re passionate, your love is for doing the work, not for the shiny equipment, shortcuts or dental plan that comes with it.”  It’s something that comes entirely within and is formed out of an almost selfless desire to see your company succeed.

Passion can, of course, be a double-edged sword.  There’s a reason that William Butler Yeats wrote in “The Second Coming” that “the worst are full of passionate intensity,” because he could see passion at work behind the rise of fascist ideologies.  And some employees can become passionate to the degree that they become reckless and cause damage to your brand through their misplaced zeal.

But passion, when properly channeled, can be a beautiful thing. It results in top employees acting as unpaid evangelists for you and your brand, and truly enjoying their work.  You can help inspire passion by following the steps I mentioned in my last blog post, by allowing them greater freedom over their work and easing tight deadlines.

Not by micro-managing them, demoralizing them, talking down to them, or dismissing their ideas.

Or … just watch this brilliant video about what really motivates people, adapted from Dan Pink’s speech:

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

I have two other videos I’d like to share.  One is from the excellent film, “Runaway Train,” which concerns a jail break by Oscar Manheim (played by Jon Voight) and Buck (played by Eric Roberts).  Voight’s character is a hardened and violent career criminal.  But in one scene, he explains how life might have been different if he could knuckle under to a bad boss.

The second is Metallica’s video, “King Nothing,” about a person that cannot be pacified by anything, and whose greed leaves him with zilch.   “Where’s your crown, King Nothing?”

Both are presented below.  Draw your own conclusions, my friends.

The Little Bitty Spot Speech from Runaway Train

King Nothing by Metallica

I recently came across an article  (via Guy Kawasaki on Twitter) about how employers can boost the happiness of their employees.   The article is a Q&A between Matthew May and Gretchen Ruben.  Mr. May is a design/innovation strategist and author, and Ms. Ruben is the author of The Happiness Project, a memoir of  her year spent defining happiness.

The entire Q&A is fascinating, but I was particularly impressed by these passages:

Q: Why do happy people do better at work?

A: People like being around happier people much more than less-happy people. Happy people are perceived to be more friendly, warm, and even more physically attractive. Also, research shows that happy people tend to be more cooperative, less self-absorbed, and to be able to offer the empathy needed in close relationships. They’re more willing to help other people—say, by sharing information or pitching in to help a colleague. Then, because they’ve helped others, others tend to help them.

Q: So the big question is: how can employers help make their employees happier?

A: The research is clear: people’s happiness is affected by their sense of control over their lives. Being able to do your own work in your own way, or to influence your environment, gives a big boost in satisfaction. So employers can look for ways to amplify employees’ sense of control over their work, schedule, and environment.

Q: Any specifics?

A: Sure. Take commuting. Bad commutes are a major source of unhappiness. People feel frustrated, powerless and stressed. Employers can consider whether telecommuting or staggered start/end times for work might be practicable, to allow people to avoid rush hours.

Or take issues like wasted time and tight deadlines. According to one study, the factor that most upset people’s daily moods was having tight work deadlines. One way to free up work time to meet deadlines is to stop having long, inefficient meetings.

Years before I became a Portland freelance writer, I worked alongside my share of unhappy people at various workplaces (and I’ll be honest, I’ve fallen under the “unhappy” rubric myself).  It can be draining, particularly when the Grumpy Gus is in your department.

Unfortunately, some employers are “tone deaf” when it comes to policies that indirectly promote employee unhappiness.  They may believe the problem lies with the employee and point to a non-complaining employee as evidence that the policy works just fine.  They often don’t realize that the non-complainer fears for his/her job and doesn’t want to rock the boat.

Considering the sluggishness of the economic recovery, employers who have held onto their valued employees would do well to solicit employee opinions and do simple things that cost nothing (allowing employees more freedom to direct their work, for instance) or little (letting folks with long commutes go home early).  After all, these people are also your stakeholders and keeping them motivated should be your top priority.

I really need to update this blog more often.  I’m involved in a social media project, I just finished writing content for another website, and have at least one other website content writing project about to begin … and yet, I can’t even regularly update my own blog! Gaaah! lol.

More soon!

Lest you all think I’m just work, work, work all the time, I’m opening up this blog a little to talk about other interests … books, music, and films I enjoy.   Today I’ll talk a little about some of the films that helped inspire me to embark on a career as a freelance writer in Portland (okay, okay it ties in a little to work, ) In fact, I watched these films on DVD around the time I gave notice at my former place of employment.  They definitely helped give me the courage to chart my own course.

Anvil:  The Story of Anvil. Anvil was as big as Metallica and Slayer in the early 80s, but this heavy metal band never achieved the same level of superstardom.  Now in their 50s, the founding members of Anvil work day jobs and play music on the weekends.   Several comeback attempts fail (all depicted in this documentary) … until the band lays everything on the line for one final shot at the brass ring.

Star Trek. This “reboot” of the Star Trek film series is anchored by Chris Pine’s portrayal of James T. Kirk.  A rebel who chafes against authority, he blossoms when his strengths – quick thinking, inventiveness, good right hook – prove invaluable to the crew of the Enterprise.

The Matrix.  The Matrix is almost a primer for entrepreneurs!  Neo starts out as Thomas Anderson, a worker drone at a nameless corporation.  Through a series of trials, he discovers that his reality is a construct.  He also finds out that he can shape his own reality – transforming once-fearsome obstacles into nuisances.

—

All films are about due diligence, working hard, and – most importantly -  not giving up, even when you’re up against seemingly insurmountable odds.   Sounds like the entrepreneurial/freelancing path to me,

People surfing the web for a certain product or service – such as graphic design – are already half-sold when they visit a website.

Well-written website content makes your products/services enticing.  It compels the prospect to click “order,” “buy,” or “e-mail for more information.”  Badly-written copy does the opposite.   Confused or bored surfers will leave your site and go to the next one.

It’s my job as a freelance writer to create website content that converts prospects into customers.

Website content is my most favorite type of non-fiction writing. I first wrote web content for Starry Starry Arts, a gift gallery I co-owned with my Mom. Starry Starry Arts closed a few years ago, but you can still see some of my website copywriting here.

What do I believe makes effective website content?   Glad you asked!  Exceptional website content uses The Three Bs:

• Brand focus.  Your website needs to communicate your identity and what makes you memorable.
• Brevity.  Show prospects what you offer by using clear language.  Don’t inundate them with too much information.
• Best products/services.  Highlight your “flagship” products and services in prime website “real estate” areas like your home page.

Naturally, your website content should communicate everything that is central to your business operations.  If you’re an e-commerce site, you will obviously need product descriptions for all the items you sell.

I am currently writing website content for a business consultancy.  There are six pages with varying amounts of information – each page is meant to give enough “good stuff” to have prospects e-mail or call for more information.

I have also done some “pro bono” website content writing, helping my Mom, sister, and wife with their respective businesses. Pro bono copy helps keep us human!

I would love to help you and your business have a stronger brand and identity on the World Wide web.  Please e-mail me at maheshrajmohan@yahoo.com for more information!

I’ve stayed steadily engaged with freelance writing all year, but May has been my busiest month as a freelance writer.  I hope this is a good indicator for the rest of the year (or summer, at least!)

Here’s a run-down of May’s freelance writing projects so far:

• Technical writing project for the upcoming launch of Portland-based client PublicMarketspace.com. I delivered the documents a day early and then finished a quick pass of revisions in two hours.

• Several tech-oriented business documents for another previous client. All projects delivered at least a day in advance.

• Website content for a new client, which I turned in on time.

• Wrote brochure copy for another previous client, turning it in a day early.
• Currently writing a business proposal/presentation for a previous client, HILI Media.

If you’d like me to work on your project, whether it’s website content writing, technical writing, business writing, marketing copy, editing (or something other work), please e-mail me at maheshrajmohan@yahoo.com

Business plans are strange documents. Because they involve dream businesses, people tend to pour their emotions into them and lose all objectivity.

Depending on your requirements, a business plan is an internal roadmap with milestones that you define. Or it’s a document you present to a bank officer for a loan. Or it’s a proposal you submit to angel investors or venture capitalists for funding.

In my opinion, the best business plans are simple documents that state how you can solve a problem that plagues your prospective customers. The worst business plans are bloated behemoths with pages and pages devoted to redundant market analysis, over-optimistic pro forma financials, and needless paragraphs about your intended marketing tactics.

Business plans entered the mainstream in the late 1990s and early 2000s, due to all the “dot-com” start-ups that got funded by venture capitalists and angel investors. Lots of mistakes were made during the feeding frenzy. Check out the Business Plan Archive and you’ll see what I mean.

Shortly after the dot-com bust, my cousin put business plans on my radar. He wanted my help in creating a web-based comic book, and he had a business plan-in-progress (with a template from bplans.com, I think). I remember being intimidated by the scope of the business plan, and especially in writing all of the sections. Keys to Success, Management Summaries, and Market Analysis, oh my! I remember calling Diamond Distributors to determine statistics about buyers and bothering sellers at the San Diego Comic-Con about their demographics. I think I spent weeks staring at the plan-in-progress, paralyzed by all the moving parts. We ultimately abandoned the project, but what I remember most about the experience was how daunting an essentially simple process became.

Eventually, I moved to Portland, Oregon, and – wonder of wonders – worked for a start-up business plan writing company. During that time, I wrote or edited thousands of plans for all levels of intended investment. Under the tutelage of my managers, I saw how simple these plans truly were, and how they were made complex by the fears of our clients.

And, honestly, the vast majority of those documents were not true business plans. They were certainly full of business-speak and many were bona fide technical documents (with pages devoted to discussing virtualization, software-as-a-service, and net metering). But few followed the KISS (Keep it Simple and Straightforward) model, and quite frankly, I had to do what the clients wanted me to do. If they wanted bloated docs, that’s what I gave them.

What do I think constitutes a good business plan? Define the problem of your intended market, have a cogent solution, know your total addressable market (TAM), list your top services/products, have a marketing strategy in place, write concise bios of the principals, and build reasonable pro forma financials. Make sure the text is consistent, well-supported, and free of careless typos. Thirty-five pages, tops. That’s the baseline, of course. If you know your investor and s/he wants a 50-100 page document, then by all means … bloat away!

Dozens of the plans (even the big ones) I worked on went on to receive funding. I made sure the funded documents were either well-written or well-edited, but all credit for convincing the investor to fund the business lies with the entrepreneur. The entrepreneur pitched the concept/model well, understood the market, and knew how to deliver a return that was worth the initial cash outlay.

So, if you get paralyzed as I did several years ago, who can help you write your plan? Many people offer free advice. Martin Zwilling is one of the best advice-givers; check out his advice here.

There are, of course, numerous businesses that can write the plan for you. As a freelance writer, I can write or edit a business plan for a start-up or existing business. There are several amazing writer/editor friends of mine who can write business plans, as well. However, we can’t do the financials.

For the whole package, I suggest going to Google, typing “business plan writer” into the search bar and choosing the first name you see in the Sponsored Listings. You should be in good hands there. Good luck and happy hunting!

A recent “People@Work” article on AOL’s daily finance section focused on the 42 million U.S. freelancers. The article highlights a survey from the Freelancers Union about the lack of a safety net for freelancers, including unemployment insurance and a healthcare pool. It’s an important issue, and one I’ll be following. There should certainly be some kind of a safety net, particularly when you are too sick or injured to freelance. There should at least be a form of unemployment insurance to help freelancers during leaner times. I am hopeful for the exchanges that are provided for by the recent healthcare reform.

I also think freelancers need to keep things in perspective.

When I was a salaried worker slogging through the worst economic downturn of my generation, I went through two massive pay cuts, taking on the work of three people, and the loss of healthcare, on top of a two-hour daily commute. I didn’t complain a lot (except to my wife or family) because I knew other folks (as well as people throughout the world) had it worse than me. It’s part of the buy-in when you are a salaried worker in a mixed economy.

With freelancing (whether you’re a freelance writer, editor, designer, programmer, and so forth) you take on a degree of uncertainty in exchange for the freedom. You wear the hat of salesperson, AR, HR, producer, accountant, and CEO simultaneously. You have to hustle and chase every lead that comes across your computer screen or networking lunch. It’s not meant to be easy, and, to my mind, every freelancer should have a Plan B for the lean times. That could be a savings account, a CD, playing the market, or stuffing dollar bills in a box under your bed.

The freedom to write our own check (literally) in a mixed economy comes with certain risks, and we should prepare for them.

In the spirit of staying active (which I wrote about previously), I added a couple of writing examples to the Portfolio area of my website. One is an example of technical writing for a healthcare technology application. The other is an example of SEO writing, using high quality text and targeted keyword density. They’re both in PDF form to ensure better readability (er, I hope).

Check ‘em out!

Technical Writing

SEO writing

I added a “Testimonials” page to my website. Not everyone has a LinkedIn account, so this is another way for people to see comments from my happy clients, and statements from my peers.