Ramble Ramble

Um, so yeah, I disappeared for a few days. What can I say? A holiday weekend, followed by a stomach virus added to crazy pants time at work means that this poor little blog gets the shaft for a bit. But I’m back, at least for now.

The biggest thing on my mind lately (besides babyness of course) is work. Crazy crazy pants work. Insano-land work.

For starters, we’ve just finished up the fiscal year, so the last few weeks were taken up with finalizing all the budgetary stuff for my department. Being that I’m in marketing, I have one of the largest budgets in the company which is fantastic and all, but means that getting through the budgeting process is that much more tedious and time consuming. At the end of the day, I always end up having to sacrifice big chunks of money and redo the budget at the last second. We always make it work, but it can be annoying. Welcome to marketing.

Next up, it’s annual review time. Woohoo!! Who doesn’t love the review process at a big corporation? Seriously, how exactly does one quantify “Respect?” Anyway, the review process for me is actually pretty light–I’ve just got to do my own self-review and one review for my direct report. But even with just those two, it’s very time consuming and ends up hurting my brain. Particularly for my direct report’s review–I feel so much responsibility to do her justice in her review that I stress over it up until deadline day.

Then there’s the two-book project that seems to have a sole goal of killing each member of the marketing and publicity group. This project drives me nuts because the books? Are fantastic. Or will be if they don’t get hacked to death by “the committee.” It’s a definite case of too many cooks in the kitchen–and those cooks are starting to try and run the marketing plan as well. Which would be fine and all, if any of them had any idea of how to market the darn things. Instead of taking the advice of my marketing department, and our years of experience, these folks keep trying to come up with ideas that are guaranteed to 1) not sell a single book 2) cost a boatload of money and 3) drive me insane.

Of course, we’ve also got the giant, enormous, monster project I’m working on…planning the revamp of 4 (yes FOUR) websites simultaneously. With almost all of the actual work to be done during my maternity leave. Um, yeah, this is my pet project, one I’ve been working on for at least a good 8 months, and we’re finally through the approval process and about to start the nitty-gritty actually get shit done process–and ALL my plans have to be in place before I leave to have the kid. Getting through the approval process alone almost killed me, but now that we’re through that, I’m stoked to get started, even if I’m completely stressed about it. Is it ideal that it’s going to be going on during my maternity leave? No, but that’s what happens when it takes this long to get approvals!

And, speaking of maternity leave, I also am trying to put 3 months of marketing plans into place, so that the department can continue to operate while I’m out. 3 months is a long time to be gone from this department–so many marketing decisions are made on quick turn around deadlines. I’m not nervous about the marketing department so much as I’m nervous about the other groups we work with. I’ve worked really really hard to get everyone in my division to understand the role of marketing, and what we can and can’t do, and I’m nervous about losing that forward momentum I’ve worked so hard for. So I want to have as much as possible detailed out before I leave, as a small little buffer for my group. It wo’t be completely successful, that much I know, but if it helps even a little, it will be worth it.

One of the things that is so strange to me is that I’m “grown-up” enough for these to be issues in my life. I’m definitely at a point in my life where my career is past entry level, and that is weird for me sometimes. And obviously, can cause stress and such. But at the same time, I’m proud of myself that I have a job I’m good at, that can be fulfilling, and that isn’t just…filler in my life.

Yesterday was a baaaaad day at work. It was one of those days that saps your will to do anything but bitch and moan and then sit on the couch eating potato chips. I was stressed about something at work, had coworkers who refused to help me by doing their jobs and one thing after another piled up to add to the misery.

Today, of course, there are repercussions. Because I spent so much time on this one issue yesterday (read: my entire day), I now have about 3 things that are down to the wire with deadlines. Because my coworkers were so uncooperative yesterday, today I am not mentally able to do the jumping through hoops that I normally do for them. Because I was such a stress case yesterday, today I’m having to double check the work I did in my frantic state.

Everyone has off days at work–everyone–but something about yesterday went beyond an “off” day. And in my reflections on everything that happened, I think it comes down to respect, or lack thereof. I’m not sure my coworkers respect my job. Not me, per se…I think they think I’m good at what I do, professional, thoughtful, and engaged. But my job? Not so much.

What is it about marketing that makes people think, “oh you can work magic, that’s your job” but also to think “oh hey, I don’t really need to provide marketing with anything–they can wait until my project is done/I’ve had my lunch/I’ve taken a nap.” Why is it so hard to understand that I’m marketing YOUR product/project/baby, and that if I’m asking you for things, it’s only going to help YOU in the long run? Don’t help me and I can’t work the magic you expect. Don’t help me and I’ll be forced to move on to other projects. Don’t help me and you’re shooting yourself in the foot.

Look, I don’t expect everyone to know the ins and outs of what it takes to be in marketing. I don’t expect you to understand all the little things that go into one project. That’s not your job, I get it. But what I do expect is that if you are asking something of me, and I tell you I need something, respect me and my job enough to know that I’m asking for a reason.

This post is going to be a trip into my professional world, and what has been on my mind regarding the economy. Just to forewarn anyone who isn’t interested in that stuff.

So, in case you don’t know, I work in book publishing. I have worked in publishing for several years now–I moved to New York to get a job in publishing, worked for two major publishing companies, and even managed to find a job in publishing when I moved out to the west coast. I’ve worked on teeny tiny books that sell less than 1000 copies, and I’ve worked on some of the biggest books of the past few years that sell millions and millions of copies (I can promise you that you’ve heard of at least a few of them, since Oprah is a fan of them).

I say all that to not to brag, but so that you understand that I have a little knowledge when I say this: this Christmas is going to hurt for publishers. Which is really problematic, since this is usually a kind of key quarter for profits, like most industries that sell goods into a retail space. People will buy books, they always do, but numbers are already way down and they show no real signs of perking back up too much.

One of the main reasons this pains me so much is that it will mean that independent stores will be closing. I hate to be a downer, but if the largest book chains in the country are struggling through this time, then local indie stores are going to be even harder hit. And that’s not even taking into account the credit crunch & the real estate issue. The little bookstores, that give so much of their hearts and souls, just won’t all be able to survive if the holiday season is as bad as indications show.

Publishing is an industry that is touched by, and touches, many more folks besides just author and publisher. Freelancers, designers, bookstores, libraries, distribution companies, small gift shops, stationary stores, mail order catalog companies, printers, agents, sales people, and the employees for any retail space that sells books. When any of those have problems, it will affect publishing…and vice versa.

Look, publishing is a weird industry. In some ways it’s the stupidest possible business model (anyone who knows about the returns issue in the industry will understand what I mean). At the same time, it’s an extremely old-fashioned industry. Some publishers have gotten on board with things like online marketing, ebooks, digital content distribution, but it’s been a long slow fight for most. And some still aren’t coming along very quickly. This holiday season may serve as a wake-up call for some publishers: adapt and change for the times, or die living the old life. For many, though, it will be time when they hunker down, layoff staff, stop buying so many manuscripts, and cut marketing budgets, hoping that the end of this economic valley comes soon so they can get back to business as usual.

I don’t know that I had a point to this post, other than to try and walk through my thoughts about this. I don’t really feel like I’ve captured what I want to say, but this will have to do for now. It’s a complex bunch of thoughts in my head, just like it’s a complex set of issues in the real world.

I’ll just leave with this…if possible, support your local, non-national chain shops this holiday season. Whether you’re buying books or other gifts–they’re going to need it.

Today was a day where I confirmed, yet again, what I’m best at (in the working world): Crisis Management. Not creative, not marketing, not managing, not outside-the-box thinking (or for that matter inside-the-box thinking). It’s not that I’m bad at those things, on the contrary I am good at those.

But I’m GREAT at crisis management.

Don’t get me wrong, it makes my blood pressure go up, and I start doing things very fast and staccato–walking, typing, calling, etc. I become a little self-contained whirling dervish. But I’m efficient, calm (on the outside), and firm about fixing problems. There is no shy shrinking flower when I’m dealing with a crisis, no discomfort in talking to people I don’t know, no fear in being the bad guy. There is only getting it fixed.

And honestly, I love it.

I kind of wish I could have that all the time.

Well, sort of. I’m quick to acknowledge that I would, most likely, burn out very very quickly if it were really all crises all the time. And let’s be realistic, a crisis in the marketing world is not the same as a crisis in health care, or other fields that affect individuals. If today’s crisis hadn’t been fixed, the most that would have happened is we had a pissed off author. We might have lost some budgetary dollars fixing it. MAYBE we would have had to cancel the book if the author was pissed enough. So I’m aware that there are varying levels of the word Crisis.

But, the feeling of being efficient, of being the person who knows how to fix something and who does, of being the calm in the middle of the storm–THAT I like. THAT I wish I could be a part of more often. THAT makes me go, damn, I’m the absolute right person in this job.

I’ve realized that I’m the kind of person who needs a boss I can learn from, someone who can push me, who can motivate me, inspire, aggravate, etc.

I always thought I would prefer to work for myself, but I’m currently in a situation where I basically am working for myself (except I still have to get sign-offs from others to spend money). And while I’m doing ok, and can come up with solutions, etc., I don’t have the joy I used to have in my work.

I think it stems in large part from not having a true boss. I currently answer to someone who is the “interim” marketing director. And she’s absolutely fabulous in a lot of respects—I know more about the business side of things than I ever did, she brings me into all sorts of decisions and conversations, and she allows me to ask questions ad nauseum.

But–and this is a big but–she’s not a marketing person. She’s acting as one, but her background isn’t marketing, her role isn’t marketing and she’s basically filling in until a larger decision is made about a marketing director.  So I can’t learn that part of the job from her. Because that’s not what she knows how to teach me.

I need someone to learn from on the marketing side. I didn’t major in business or marketing in college (good old English major for me), so all of my marketing skills are on the job training. Everything I’ve accomplished has been thanks to supervisors who pushed me, taught me, and allowed me to learn from them. Without that, I’m sort of stagnating in my career because it’s been over a year since I’ve had any sort of meaningful mentoring/learning. It’s been over a year of just doing what I ALREADY KNOW how to do. It’s been over a year of not having a boss to push me to be that much better, think that much more creatively, be that much more innovative.

I’m good at my job, but if I don’t get a mentor or someone to learn from soon, I’m going to stay “just” good and “just” at the level I’m at currently. And that’s not ok with me. I’m not someone who needs to reach the highest pinnacle of the career ladder but I do want to continue learning/growing/expanding my knowledge base.

So what should I do? Should I join the local AMA to try and find a mentor outside of my job? Should I just try to push myself harder to not need that teacher/student role? Should I try to shift my focus to be satisfied with having my current boss as my teacher in the OTHER aspects of my job?

Knowing what I know about myself, how do I continue my career growth on my own?