Everyone's a critic

A little over four years ago I finished writing the textbook that we use for our job search classes. I was very excited and very pleased with myself for having completed such a project. Even now, people ask me how long it took me to write the three hundred page book. The answer is probably twenty years, since all I did was write the book I always wished I had had as an instructor, pouring everything I had learned over the years into it.

A few small schools around the country have adopted it; students at my own college buy most of them. Last year we actually had to reprint some to cover the demand, so that was gratifying. Naturally, I asked the publisher to help me out with a marketing campaign to promote the book, since people constantly remarked on how helpful it was and how much they liked it.

The other day the publisher’s answer came in the form of a spreadsheet put out by their marketing department grading my book on different factors. One item that stung a bit was the rating of “7” out of 10 for the quality of the writing. This struck me as odd, since in my world, people come to me looking for just the right phrase or for sharp edged editing. I have never gotten anything approaching a “C” for my writing, as this rating seems to indicate.

I received a zero for “Outside Adoptions”. This struck me as nonsensical, since it begs the question: how can someone adopt it if they don’t know it exists?

Worse, they had “comments”. Essentially, they said that the information was rather basic and should probably be sold to two year colleges. Nothing against community colleges, but I wrote it for use in universities. The information is pitched at a certain level, the whole book talks about Bachelor degree candidates and third and fourth year internships.

Enough about that, though. I am disappointed and that spreadsheet did knock the wind out of me, but it also woke me up to the fact that this is just a business transaction. Kind of takes the romanticism out of it for me; makes it less fun somehow. As long as they pay me, I’ll keep cranking out new editions, perhaps with less enjoyment and enthusiasm for the project.

This brings me to another story altogether.

Last weekend I spent my Saturday at a downtown church, working at a special career transition day. Dozens of people had been laid off at our big city newspaper, and one of the well known columnists organized the event to help them and other people in the business who were out of work.

I brought three other people from my office to help out, since the organizers expected a crowd of over one hundred people. We weren’t sure we would make it downtown safely, since we had to drive through a heavy snowstorm that dropped ten inches of frozen sunshine on us. A car in front of us slid right into a ditch as we navigated the on ramp to the interstate.

The day turned into a five hour career advising marathon for me and the other “career coaches” who had volunteered to do resume critiques and transition brainstorming with the participants. I was completely drained by the end of the event.

I talked with a crime reporter, a fashion writer, a cartoonist, even a PhD candidate who wanted to teach journalism and several other job seekers with the same sort of newspaper experience. These were people who had received numerous awards for their writing from the Associated Press and others, and you want to know something? Not a one of them had any idea of how to write their own resume. In fact, the phrasing was abysmal. I was so surprised. I went into this project feeling a little intimidated by the prospect of telling professional writers how to construct a resume

So how is my book “too basic” when people who make their living with words cannot even put together an effective description of their experience and skills designed to move their career to the next level?