- Feb 14, 2004
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I am writing a book. It's about careers.
Basically, there aren't any great books about what jobs are really like. I found books with lots of statistics, like how much you make an hour and what kind of training and education you need, but nothing that really told me what specific jobs were all about. What did people like about them? What did people hate about them? What did people learn from their jobs that I could use? You're going to spend 40 years of your life in the workforce, so it's pretty important to find something you enjoy doing so you don't have to dread waking up every morning.
So, my brothers and I decided to write a book about careers. The first part is about finding a career - how to identify your interests, talents, and so on - basically what kind of jobs you'd be interested in. The second part consists of interviews. We decided that our first book (there may be more) would be about all kinds of different jobs, rather than specific job categories (no specialists, just the common job types in different areas). So we made a list of jobs and sorted them into over 20 categories. Everything from the medical field to government jobs to computer jobs. Then, in each category, we identified fix or six common job types. For example, in the medical field, there are doctors, nurses, EMTs, etc.
So, for the past few years, we've been finding people and interviewing them. We're just about done and will be publishing it this year. We have over 170 interviews, everything from entrepreneurs to tech support agents. If this book does well (if people actually use it and find it useful), we might get a lot more specific, like doing a book on a specific field like the medical field and interview specialists, like brain surgeons, feet doctors, etc., rather than soley the more generic doctor, nurse, etc., type of jobs.
We're going to self publish it for starters and do a run of about 1,000 books and see how it does locally. The book is mainly targeted towards high school students who are graduating and will be needing a job or needing an idea of a job so that they can choose a college major. It's also for students of any age, college students, or anyone who isn't sure of what job they want or isn't satisfied with the job they have. It's a great resource because you may not know somebody who works in the CIA or who takes photographs for a living. Instead of wondering what their job is like, you can now flip open the book and read the interviews of anybody we have in there. We asked them what they liked about their jobs, what they didn't like, how they got into it, what lessons they've learned from it, what misconceptions people have about it, etc.
What do you guys think? And if you have any publishing experience, anything to know?
Cliff's Notes:
1. I'm writing a book about jobs
2. We interviewed over 170 people about what they like, dislike, what they learned, how they got into it, etc.
3. What do you guys think?
Basically, there aren't any great books about what jobs are really like. I found books with lots of statistics, like how much you make an hour and what kind of training and education you need, but nothing that really told me what specific jobs were all about. What did people like about them? What did people hate about them? What did people learn from their jobs that I could use? You're going to spend 40 years of your life in the workforce, so it's pretty important to find something you enjoy doing so you don't have to dread waking up every morning.
So, my brothers and I decided to write a book about careers. The first part is about finding a career - how to identify your interests, talents, and so on - basically what kind of jobs you'd be interested in. The second part consists of interviews. We decided that our first book (there may be more) would be about all kinds of different jobs, rather than specific job categories (no specialists, just the common job types in different areas). So we made a list of jobs and sorted them into over 20 categories. Everything from the medical field to government jobs to computer jobs. Then, in each category, we identified fix or six common job types. For example, in the medical field, there are doctors, nurses, EMTs, etc.
So, for the past few years, we've been finding people and interviewing them. We're just about done and will be publishing it this year. We have over 170 interviews, everything from entrepreneurs to tech support agents. If this book does well (if people actually use it and find it useful), we might get a lot more specific, like doing a book on a specific field like the medical field and interview specialists, like brain surgeons, feet doctors, etc., rather than soley the more generic doctor, nurse, etc., type of jobs.
We're going to self publish it for starters and do a run of about 1,000 books and see how it does locally. The book is mainly targeted towards high school students who are graduating and will be needing a job or needing an idea of a job so that they can choose a college major. It's also for students of any age, college students, or anyone who isn't sure of what job they want or isn't satisfied with the job they have. It's a great resource because you may not know somebody who works in the CIA or who takes photographs for a living. Instead of wondering what their job is like, you can now flip open the book and read the interviews of anybody we have in there. We asked them what they liked about their jobs, what they didn't like, how they got into it, what lessons they've learned from it, what misconceptions people have about it, etc.
What do you guys think? And if you have any publishing experience, anything to know?
Cliff's Notes:
1. I'm writing a book about jobs
2. We interviewed over 170 people about what they like, dislike, what they learned, how they got into it, etc.
3. What do you guys think?
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