Work Intrudes

 I’ve had to take a break from my creative writing. Which is too bad. I was hitting a good daily clip of writing at least 600 words a day. But, as always, work and life intrude on creative writing and I had to refocus my attention for a bit. 

BUT, that doesn’t mean I’ve not been writing. In fact, the work that intruded had everything to do with writing. 

We have a very high profile product. It’s a disruptor in the industry and within our learning community, and I think it’s a really good step in a very positive direction not only for our organization but also for the learning community and the industry.

Well, we like to have a n annual update course that is innovative and pushes the envelope of what can be done and how it can provide effective training. I got a chance to look at our script so far, and I was alarmed to say the least. Red flag were waving. 

To a great degree this was my fault. I wasn’t focused on it enough. BUT, since all development ultimately falls on my shoulders, it isn’t just my fault, it’s also my duty to try and rectify. The best way I saw to rectify it, was to sit down and start knocking it out. 

So I bunkered up. I sat down (and with the help of my manager) I started chipping away at the script. This is interesting to me. The chipping. I try to explain this to others, and it never hits home as cleanly as I hope. There are those who think the process is very standard and defined. It’s not. Script writing and instructional design is actually amazingly fluid. One must be very comfortable with fluidity. If you’re someone who like structure and defined processes, you’ll hate script writing, you’d despise novel writing, you’d hate instructional design. 

So all weekend, chip, chip, chip, I moved and pushed and added and deleted. Now? 5 days later? Where are we? Not too much better. I see a shape I recognize, but wow, it still has a way to go. 

So, that’s the update? Is that it?

Nope, I also had to do a bunch of writing for our leadership training. That’s an entirely different type of writing too. Takes a special mind. You have to jump this way and that, and all the time move the writing in one way. 

I’m hoping to get back to creative writing this week. I’m hoping to shove this “barely shaped” script off to a contractor this week. We shall see.