We know that dolphins are a highly intelligent species. They travel in pods to compensate for their smaller size when facing predators.
As authors, we face predators in different forms. Self-defeating self-talk. Fear of failure. Fear of success. Confusion. Tech stumped.
I mentioned in class that my mission is to bridge the gap between self-publishing and traditional publishing. And it's more than just a gap in marketing. It exists in strategic planning, production, distribution, and ongoing operations.
If you aren't where you want to be in life, surround yourself with others who are!
The POD exists to divide and conquer. To motivate and support. To surround you with others who have a shared vision. A separation of duties within the pod is vital because there's far more work than we can do on our own. No successful author is an island. To succeed, we need the support of others!
One author may be responsible for reader reviews, another for email marketing, another for Facebook and Goodreads, one for twitter and one for LinkedIn. One can proof, another can format. You will find your role in the pod. The collective intelligence (and effort) benefits every author in the pod. Everybody has a role to fill, but you have to be willing ask for help.
"Life shrinks or expands according to one's courage." ~ Anais Nin
The upside of delegation.
When you delegate to a colleague, you are making an ask and entrusting that individual with ownership of the task. Once the delegate commits to due date, they have taken ownership. The process is easily managed via milestones in AuthorDock. If you are uncomfortable asking for help, consider this your sandbox.
If you don't want to make an 'ask' of yourself, take time to be sure your ask is detailed enough, so the individual knows what you need and doesn't have to come back to you for more info.
If you're not yet ready to delegate it to someone else, assign it to yourself and commit to getting it to a point where you can hand it off.
It's not your job to say no for other people; it's theirs.
Hours you put into the pod can be logged in AuthorDock. In the spirit of an hour exchange (aka time bank. Time you log into milestones are 'banked' as credits you can expect to redeem in the output of others. The idea is to encourage contribution and discourage 'freeloaders.' Every author will find a way to contribute to the whole.
You may find it's easier to promote somebody else's work. That's the reason for the POD. They'll see the activity and will likely reciprocate. By logging our time in AuthorDock, we are able to see where our effort (and time) is being directed.
Time you spend solely on your own book is not logged as part of the collective. But if the effort will benefit others in the POD, log it.
Accountability becomes less of a problem when we are driven by shared purpose. We need to have skin in the game. The pod exists to support one another where we get stuck. A publically declared goal carries more weight. We succeed when we have each other's best interests at heart.
If you still need to create an AuthorDock account:
I hope I've inspired you to join us!
My best,
Brian Schwartz
805-225-1251