What If You're Not The Writer?
Part 2: Lack of Leadership
Project management (sometimes called “project coordination”) is a skill-set in itself. I've seen multiple project managers fail to bring their projects to completion or get them out to an audience because they hoped that enthusiasm, money, and perhaps a reward/punishment approach would be enough to make their project succeed.
It wasn’t. Here is a blog post with an overview of the skills you will need to use as a project manager. There are plenty more blog posts across the internet on the same subject if you want to research it further, and I highly recommend that you do. Please note that I do not manage projects aside from my own. I can advise a project manager on their project management technique, but I consider my position in your team to be one of creative and audience development consultant, not of team manager. That’s your job and I will consider you responsible for it.
Efficiency
This brings me to the subject of working efficiently – something a project manager should be able to do.
Worldbuilding is a time-consuming process. With that in mind, I show my customers ways to do some of the work on their own time so they don’t have to pay for as many hours to work with me. To see how much it can cost to get a full set of worldbuilding done, check the following:
- Full map. This map would have cost around £500 to make, although it would include several variations that each provide different information.
- Finished species profile. The work it took to finish this species cost around £300, not including artwork.
- Ghostwriting. This is where I make an ecosystem, develop histories, and create a culture, for you.
See why I try to offer you the chance to cut the cost? If you are prepared to listen to my techniques I can show you how to do some of this work yourself so that you don't have to pay me to do it. If you don't want to do the work yourself, or feel you can't, then the above provides a guide for the costs of this type of work.
Doing parts of your worldbuilding (and/or your audience development) yourself requires for you to make a commitment to learn what I am teaching you. Learning new skills is your responsibility.
Responsibility vs. Control
One of the problems you may experience as a project manager is the balance between responsibility and control. Two of my project managers hoped that having TCC on their team would guarantee their projects’ success, but refused most of my suggestions to help make this success happen. The password for this section is vermillion.
Please be clear: if you want me to take responsibility, partial or complete, for your project’s success, then you will need to allow me to influence how that success is achieved. Note: influence is not the same as control, but it is related to it. If you don’t want me to influence how you manage your project, then responsibility for your project’s success or failure remains with you. I cannot, and will not, take responsibility when you retain full control and don't allow yourself to be influenced. I can only make suggestions, introduce you to tools, and teach you techniques. It is you who must use them if you want to benefit from them.
Read part 3: Keeping The Team Apart
Credits
Title image by gilgamesh0 and used with their kind permission; grey character also belongs to them.
Brown bat character belongs to AnomalousLynx; they also gave permission.
