Journey’s End

 

Eight years ago, when we first discussed writing “the book every HR person threatens to write,” we never imagined it would be a journey. Okay, some of you are saying, “What took them so long? What about those contests to write your novel in 30 days?” Well, let’s share a bit about how this book came together and why it is coming out in 2020 and not in 2012 when it all began.

Our plan was simple, or so we thought. Interview a hundred or so (well, not that many) of our HR and business colleagues and friends. and ask them to share their zaniest stories of workplace behavior. With those stories in hand, all we would have to do is write them up just like we’d written The Big Book of HR. (“It won’t take us very long to write.”) After all, we wrote The Big Book of HR in less than six months. Once written, it would be edited and published – probably within a few months. 

It didn’t quite turn out that way. First, enter our publisher, who kept asking us for more books – three to be exact and a revised edition of The Big Book of HR. Next, we realized that gathering the stories was fun and easy, but we couldn’t tell them exactly as we heard them. We’d have to use the idea of the stories, but camouflage the details to maintain confidentiality and assure we’d have friends left when we were finished.

What to do? The answer was simple. Write a creative nonfiction book that is like historical fiction where you take a part of a story or fact and create a narrative around it. How to do it? That was our challenge.

Since the other books we’d written together were nonfiction, we had much to learn. So, we took classes, attended writer’s conferences, and listened to podcasts and webinars to learn about story arcs, writing dialogue and transitions, and creating characters. Then we created a fictional company and characters and used them to tell the stories. And don’t forget the endless reviews, rewrites, and edits – which every writer goes through. Finally, we have book that portrays the people issues that can arise in any workplace; tells stories that spotlight the world of HR leaders and how they keep things on an even keel; and provides a glimpse behind the scenes into compelling and relatable tales.

It’s time to announce that They Did What? Unbelievable Tales from the Workplace is finished. To say we are beyond excited is a vast understatement. It will be available on December 1 either directly from our publishing partner at https://store.bookbaby.com/book/they-did-what or wherever books are sold. See our website https://www.bigbookofhr.com/they-did-what for more information.

No matter your preference, ebook or physical book, there’s a copy available for you from your bookseller of choice. We hope you enjoy reading it as much as we enjoyed writing it. And positive reviews on Amazon are always appreciated.

Thanks for being on this journey with us.

Cornelia and Barbara

Everyone Has a Story

Think about the last presentation you sat through or the latest speech you heard. What do you remember? Odds are, you remember a story the speaker shared but maybe not all the details that were also included in the presentation.

Why? Because people love to hear stories and people connect to stories. Stories are interesting. Stories can be emotional. Stories can be humorous.  Stories are easy to remember and easy to repeat! 

Our friend and colleague, Sally Strackbein, (www.definingstories.com) says it best: “Facts bore. Stories score.”

Wherever you are called upon to present, if you can tell stories, your odds of being heard and remembered go up exponentially. 

I remember being at a client’s office just after a new CEO had been introduced at a town hall meeting.  People couldn’t wait to share how excited they were about what he was bringing to the organization. They repeated stories they’d heard from him. Some were funny and personal, while others told them about his values. One story he shared was about something he’d been part of that hadn’t been a success.

They loved hearing him honestly share that he didn’t think he was perfect and that he wasn’t going to expect perfection from them.  

 Here’s the best part — everyone has stories! Keep yours short and simple and practice before going public with your story. Odds are, you will begin to see the impact you’re having on your team or others in the organization.

Your story needs to be jargon-free and relevant to the topic — don’t be that person who tells a story that gets the group off target! Your story should have a beginning, middle, and end.  And, if you possibly can, include something in the story that your audience won’t be expecting.  If appropriate, use emotion — that’s where your story will have the greatest impact.

And speaking of stories, we told you last month that we’re working on a new book that will be released during 2020. It is a very different type of book from our usual business books. It’s based on stories we collected from business colleagues around the world. So, we’re committed to the power of telling stories, and as the months go by, we’ll be sharing more about what’s to come next year.

In the meantime, we hope you’ll incorporate some powerful stories of your own into your work!

Commencements and Commitments

It’s June, the month of graduations and weddings — commencements and commitments. 

Graduations.  They occur at the end of an academic phase — the end of high school or college, for example — with a commencement ceremony. A commencement is a beginning or start of something new. So, graduations are about ending one phase and starting a new one. 

We are in a commencement phase ourselves. Since 2011, we’ve been writing and publishing nonfiction business books of a prescriptive nature. Now, however, we’re on the cusp of a new chapter — writing and publishing in a new genre — narrative nonfiction. Narrative nonfiction is like a novel. It tells a story or stories.

We've been on a journey writing this narrative nonfiction book. Recognizing there are many stories to tell about the dynamics of workplace behavior, we set out to gather them from our colleagues. Since we wanted to write a compelling and enticing book, we took many storytelling liberties. The stories we heard were molded, tweaked, and often combined with others to fit the structure of the scenes we created throughout this book.

In order to preserve the privacy and identity of the individuals and organizations involved, we created a fictitious company and cast of characters as a backdrop against which we tell these tales. The characters portrayed are composites of a large number of professionals across a wide variety of industries and throughout multiple careers. 

Weddings. They represent commitments. A couple on a journey is looking forward and making commitments to each other about the future.  Our idea for this work of narrative nonfiction formed in 2011 as we concluded writing The Big Book of HR. Along the journey — gathering stories, countless drafts, rewrites, and edits — we were interrupted with requests from our publisher to write three more books. Then there were other life events that stalled us. 

Now we are rocking it. This year alone the manuscript has been in the hands of four HR colleagues for peer review and now it’s been turned over to three beta readers for their critique.  Once we get all this feedback, more rewrites will be done. Then we can move onward to get the book to market.

We know there’s still a great deal more to do — cover design, editing, formatting — but we’re on a solid path to the next stop on our journey. Publication and book launch are planned for 2020. 

Many of our readers have been along on this journey with us.  Now, we invite all of you to keep up with our progress and hold us to our commitment. We’ll be sharing more information in our weekly blog — makingpeoplematter.blogspot.com — and in this monthly newsletter, so please be on the lookout for them. 

Barbara and Cornelia