Getting the best from an author: three key principles for publishers

Every publisher wants authors who can deliver, on time, to or above standard, in a way that satisfies, or exceeds market expectations.

Once commissioned, what can #publishers, or their #editors, do to ensure that happens?

If you wanted to answer such questions who would you ask? A best-selling author? One who had worked with the amazing Malcolm Stern (who had, among other stellar achievements, been the editor to Peter #Drucker)? One who also coaches at C-level?

What would such an author want to share with publishers/editors to enable them to get the best from their authors?

1. Find the strengths in your author

Every author has #strengths, find them and build on them. For instance, there was a famous novelist, who was, by all accounts, and sales records, a brilliant storyteller. However, that author was at the other end of the market in terms of their written expression of their stories. A skilled publisher would and did focus on the storytelling #genius, and found a way to deal with the sub-GCSE standard of delivery. Skilled editors are plentiful; #creative #geniuses are rare. Harness one to ensure the strengths of the other makes success for all.

2. Expect the best from your author

In the main, people will raise their game to meet positive expectations of them. The opposite is also the case: if you expect the worst from people they will take your cues and deliver as anticipated. Great #teachers across the globe harness this phenomenon to secure stellar performances from pupils once thought average.

Check out the #Rosenthal experiments to find out more. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pygmalion_effect

3. Know the subject as well as your author, or be on that journey.

Imagine two scenarios.

i.??????You are one of the world’s leading experts in a field. You have agreed to publish your original material. Your publisher puts a green-behind-the-ears, fresh-out-of-university, full-of-theory and no-knowledge-of-practice graduate on your book project. You can already see how southbound you are headed.

ii.??????Let’s follow the compass in a more fruitful direction. Your editor is either deeply knowledgeable about, or is a passionate student of, your subject. She/he/they (we live in inclusive times) wants to help you make the work so clear, so compelling, that even people new to the subject are drawn in. How do you feel about your destination now?

If an editor has the same love of the author’s subject, or genre, they can help each other toward a better outcome.

Of course, there are many more techniques, used by the best editors, to bring out the best in an author. In my view, every great publisher/editor is also a great coach; able to take an author to standards they thought were unreachable. I know from first hand experience. Thank you, Malcolm Stern!

Prof Nigel #MacLennan has written 17 books, with several more under development. He hopes to meet another Malcolm Stern!