Cash Flow Planning: Income
Like the P&L and balance sheet, cash flow can be looked at historically. In this context, it is used to show how changes in the balance sheet have occurred over…
Accounting Statements: Introduction
In the past two articles, we’ve looked at what records we need to keep in our small business; records both of income and of expenditure. Now we’re going to start…
Giving It Away: Should We Write For Free?
[By pure co-incidence, fellow-writer Patsy Collins has also been blogging about the same topic this week, although she is talking about the provision of free books for Kindle. Read her…
Thinking About Finances
One phrase that is often quoted by experienced business people is: turnover is vanity; profit is sanity. The long-term objective of any small business is to be successful, otherwise why…
Business Start-Up: Getting Paid
We’ve talked about finding the customers; we’ve looked at getting the work (i.e. the writing) done. Now we’re going to focus on the third element: getting paid. Talking about money…
Business Start-up: Doing the Work
[There was no post last week, due to long weekend in Paris, and just a quickie today, as I’m in the middle of extended celebrations for a BIG birthday. Normal…
Business Start-up: Reaching the Customers
Setting up a successful small business is a major step — and is not one we should take lightly. It’s also a huge topic, so I’m going to cover it…
Business Plans for Writers
The starting point for every new business should be a good, clear business plan — and our writing business is no different. It’s an important tool, for example, in talking…
Objectives That Help, Not Hinder
Recently, someone asked me “how do I deal with multiple projects; how do I sort out what I should be doing?” My immediate response was that she should work on…
Swanwick Day 6: It Doesn’t Happen By Magic
It’s all a bit of a blur: Malcolm Chislholm showed us how to use Twitter and Facebook; how to set up a website for free – and how to publish…
New-Time Publishing and Old-Time Music Hall: Day 5 at Swanwick
Wednesday already! Normal weather conditions have been restored; it poured at Swanwick today — there was no sitting outside this afternoon. The inspiration, enthusiasm and chattering are still evident —but…
Authorpreneurship and Fish-Nets: Swanwick Day 4
It’s been another brilliant day at Swanwick, but I can’t help thinking that when I said at lunchtime I’d enough material to write today’s blog — I should have actually…
Titantic Tweets and Furious Facebooking
Well, it’s been a strange day and a long one. It started with a (virtual) Welsh Male Voice Choir in ‘Lift Up Your Hearts’ and finished with Elvis and family…
Swanwick: Scurrilous Rumours and Graphic Murders
A delegate has been caught in bed with one of the lecturers at Swanwick just minutes after an “individual tuition” session. Half the class walked out of the Enticing and…
Swanwick: Intelligent Silliness and Thelma’s Pants
This posting should have been a detailed account of how hard we’re all working and all the writerly activities we are getting up to. As the title suggests, I may…
Swanwick: S Day minus 1
Every year, during the second week in August, around 300 writers gather in Swanwick for the Writers’ Summer School, which has been running for more than sixty years. I don’t…
Time Management for Grasshoppers
I’ve been thinking a lot about time management recently.I’ve been a writer for three months now. Well – that’s not strictly true – I’ve been a writer for a long…