Hello everyone. My name is Andrew and just like Emma and Daniel I'm also a young writer. I'm at the tail-end of a Professional Writing and Editing Course I began nearly two years ago. If all goes well I will have my Diploma by the end of the year.
For this post I would like to discuss future employment opportunities within the writing industry. For those of you studying a writing course you must by some stage have begun to wonder what sort of employment opportunities await you.
First of all you really need to evaluate exactly what skills you have attained from your course and what skills you can picture yourself utilising in the future to attain that dream job. If you perceive yourself to be a good writer what styles of writing best suit you? Do you really enjoy journalistic writing? Or are you more of a creative writer? Maybe you are more into editing and proofreading. If you are having trouble getting even this far, ask for help. Get other people's opinions. Ask your teacher/tutor what they think your strong and weak points are with your writing. While you're at it why not approach someone who already works in the writing industry? They are surely the most qualified to tell you on the spot exactly what skills are required for the job you want. Just don't be afraid to ask for help. Ask and you shall receive.
Okay so now you've identified your strong points. You know what style of writing best suits you. From here I'm going to briefly explain my personal experience in discovering my strengths and weaknesses in writing and how I began turning them into realistic job opportunities.
So late last year I had already finished one year of study with my course. I had just completed subjects such as journalism, editing, short story and novel writing. Subjects such as novel and short story writing I really enjoyed participating in but it made me realise that creative writing was not one of my strong points. As far as editing class went I wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed but I managed to meet the competency. Journalism ended up being my best subject. I achieved top marks and enjoyed participating in this class the most. Coincidence, I think not. Because I enjoyed this subject I was willing to put in the effort to chase people up for interviews, research for hours and write good articles. It was from this experience that I ascertained that I loved to write articles and it would be awesome if I could make a living out of doing this.
So where to now? I still had another year left of study. As much as I wanted to go out and get that dream job straight away, I still wanted to finish my course and I still had to work my dull retail job to earn a living. However I still wanted that justification of knowing that working a job that required me to write articles would be rewarding and possible. I decided I would try and get an internship.
For those of you unaware, an internship is essentially like the work experience you did back in high school. You get the opportunity of working for a company for a brief period of time. It gives you the informative experience you need to decide whether or not you would like to be employed in this field of work. Each company has their own approach to internships. Some companies will let you intern for them over a period of three months, making you work five days a week. Some might give you the opportunity to only work one day a week over the space of a couple of months. Your participation in this internship will ultimately be influenced by the company’s needs and how much they can afford to have you around without significantly interrupting their work flow. At the same time it doesn’t help to ask. Companies will often be willing to negotiate hours that suit both you and them. They should understand that as much as you want the experience of working with them you still need time outside the internship to work and study. Last but not least don’t naturally expect to be paid for this internship. Some companies can afford to but most cannot or simply choose not to.
After deciding where I wanted to do my internship at, I did a little investigative work. I contacted a company I was interested in and requested the email address of the manager for the communication department. I then emailed the manager and outlined my intention to intern for their company. I summarised in the email the type of course I studied, the skills I had attained and what type of work experience I was looking for. From there I received an email back and organised a time to meet with the manager and discuss the possibility of interning with his company.
The interview was a great success and I ended up getting the internship I wanted. I managed to organise a couple of days a week I could work for them on a regular basis. As I mentioned previously I had a real passion for article writing. Some of the tasks I was required to do included writing articles for the company’s intranet, proofreading webpage content and even editing some strategy plans and brochures that were being prepared for publishing.
I came out of the internship with a real enthusiasm for what I was doing. Interning gave me a clear mindset for what I wanted to do for my future career in writing. Fast-track to a year later and I’m now busily sending my resume off to companies. I’m not just applying for jobs, I’m also asking for internships. Because even if I get an internship with some of these companies who knows? They might offer me a job after they see what kind of a worker I am. If they don’t, then I get to add more to my resume which will only add to my skills and experience and give me an even greater chance at landing that dream job next time around.
Another great positive out of this experience of me interning is that I now know exactly what kind of job I am looking for and where to look for it. All of this came out of me simply asking people for help and advice. I hope that this blog post was helpful and inspirational for those out there like me who were initially a little nervous about trying to plot out a career in the writing industry. So until next time, good luck fellow writing peeps!
