Souping it Up
Image by Tôn Thất Phước Điền, for Unsplash
I know a lot of business writers who have nice, orderly processes for content development. They go something like this:
Research
Outline
Draft
Edit
Approvals
Proofread
Publish
I’m sure that’s very nice for them. I’ve never followed those steps in sequence, however. Not once. And I’ve been at this a long, long time.
Here’s how the process goes in the real world of multiple deadlines, stressed-out clients, and ADHD-afflicted writers.
Step 1: Research. Okay, I do start with Step 1 sometimes, to do at least part of my research before I start writing. If I’m writing about trends, the research will include data collection and analysis, followed by some graphing.
If I spot a trend — say, a surge in freight availability in Central Illinois — I’ll look it up. That’s when I’ll discover that there was an unusually large pumpkin harvest this season, for instance, and the surplus had to be moved to canners in a different part of the. country. Who knew? That could be the hook for my story. I need more information. Repeat Step 1.
One minute, I’m writing a story on freight trends, and next thing, I’m delving into pumpkin crop yields in Central Illinois. It’s a wild ride.
Step 2: Outline. Here’s where I leave the orderly process behind. I don’t write outlines. I may make a list of key points, or take a highlighter to my research notes, but that’s it. Of course, if a manager or a client requires an outline, I’ll deliver. It’s just not part of my process.
Step 3: Draft. No thanks. I haven’t written a draft since my sophomore year in college, when I discovered a typing paper that let you rub out mistakes with a standard eraser. (Okay, boomer.) Once it became commonplace to use computers for word processing, drafts became quaint artifacts of an earlier era.
Step 3.5: Write. (a.k.a. Make Soup.) I gather my thoughts, glance at my research notes, and start writing. This is the soup. I throw all the ingredients in, raw and uncut.
Freed from the constraints of an outline, and with unlimited cut-and-paste capabilities, I might start writing in the middle. I’ll pull together a few sentences or paragraphs about each topic on my list, and maybe add captions for the graphs or images.
When I have a critical mass of text, I stir, rearrange, and tweak the sentences and paragraphs until I like the flow. After that, I write an introduction and a summary, save the file, and take a break. I need a little distance before the next step.
Step 4: Edit. I do something different for a while, and then I come back to the same piece and read through it again. Have I conveyed the right information? Is my tone appropriate for the intended audience? Most important: is this the best I can do?
If I answer “no” to any of those questions, I repeat step 3.5, rewriting portions of the text, cutting others, and generally tuning up the piece before submitting it to the internal or external client. (In some organizations, there’s another editor assigned to review everything before the client sees it. I’ve been on both sides of that red pencil, and I count it as part of the approval cycle.)
Step 5: Approvals. Clients and managers can’t resist tinkering with the text. That’s okay. Learn to embrace criticism. It’s a learning experience, and it’s almost never personal. When they’re done with this round, repeat steps 4 and 5 until everyone is satisfied with the result.
Step 6: Proofread. You can be the best writer in the world, but if you publish a piece with misspellings and grammatical errors, you’ll look unprofessional, and so will your client. So no matter how many people reviewed and edited this @#$%^ thing, it needs to be checked one more time. Don’t do this yourself. You’re too familiar with this piece of writing to detect any flaws, and the autocorrect feature won’t catch everything. Recruit a friend or coworker to proofread, preferably one who is a stickler for grammar, spelling, and all other details.
Step 7: Publish. Hooray! You’ve reached the finish line. Serve this one up, and get started on your next assignment.
It’s soup!
