Whats the motivation to work in publishing?
Yes, we all love the written word but it’s so important to have an understanding of the commercial imperative, to embrace the rapidly increasing verticalisation of the industry and truly to want to fulfil the needs of a target market. It’s not all about glamour and publishing beautiful books, darling. Attitude to learning Guy LeCharles Gonzalez, chief executive optimist of Digital Book World, posted a great piece about the importance of embracing the need for continuous self-education. Hire people who have the passion to drive their own skills forward and you won’t go far wrong. This has always been important but has become more so as the turbulence affecting our industry increases. Attitude to change The more staff you have who are pushing for change rather than against it, the better. Hewlett Packard famously awarded a medal of defiance to an engineer who overcame hierarchical approval processes to get a new product to market. The best innovation comes from those closest to the coalf
