Becoming a Competent Communicator

Early 2014, I joined The Regional Municipality of York as the Region’s first Corporate Social Media Specialist – a dedicated resource to support the Region’s social media and online communications efforts. Since the role was brand new, I was able to shape the position, and I quickly began a flurry of training sessions and presentations to raise awareness about and familiarity with social media in the organization. These activities included a considerable amount of public speaking – something that was new and slightly terrifying for me. I’m a definite introvert and get my energy from being alone. At the same time, however, I was grateful for the challenge to step outside of my box and work on skills that I was previously unable to practice.

A few months after joining the Region, I was invited to attend a meeting for TROY Toastmasters – York Region’s corporate Toastmasters club. I’d heard of Toastmasters previously, mainly through my father, who has worked in a number of positions that has required him to assume roles in spotlights. He mentioned the merit of Toastmasters to me in the past but, short of being invited and escorted to a meeting, I never thought of actually seeking out a club.

I never thought I’d enjoy the Toastmasters experience so much. As a corporate club, TROY Toastmasters is somewhat smaller than public clubs. As a result, there are more opportunities to speak and participate. I enjoyed the opportunity to willingly step outside of my comfort zone with a supportive group of people and practice the various skills needed for effective public speaking. Furthermore, the certification process of Toastmasters appealed to my very process-oriented self. I enjoyed the clear guidelines, supportive reading material and step-by-step guide on how to go from step A – delivering an initial Ice Breaker speech – to the final step of being deemed a “Competent Communicator” (CC). Each step in the process also included a peer evaluation to provide constructive criticism.

I began my Competent Communicator journey in the fall of 2014 and secured Competent Communicator status by July 2015. My first few speeches focused entirely on work – offering mini training sessions on social media and conversation “netiquette.” As I progressed, however, I began offering speeches on more personal topics, which I found much harder to do. Speeches that delved into the benefits of writing and why I personally write and speeches that shared information about me and my personal life. The process forced me to learn and grow at every step.

Once securing your CC, Toastmasters encourages you to explore more refined levels of communication and leadership by using advanced manuals. They send you two advanced manuals for free as part of a reward for obtaining your CC. I chose Public Relations and Storytelling. The first for work, the second for writing (a whole other kind of work). I’ve found over the years that I’ve learned a few key things about my personality: I love a challenge. I like the reward of certification or course completion – I’d be a lifetime student if I could afford it! And I’m happiest when work meets my passion – my Toastmasters experience of being able to hone my professional skills while exploring those related to writing being a prime example. I’m looking forward to continuing my Toastmasters experience. I’d love to hear from you: Have you ever considered a Toastmasters club? What key things inspire you?

CAPM Arrival

Look what I found in the mail today! I must admit, the thick paper and gold embossed seal make me feel a bit better about the past four months of school/work/business-juggling torture.

Project Management Progress

As previously mentioned, this January I started a course in Foundations of Project Management. The course proved to be extremely challenging. Though hard work gave me an 80% average for coursework, the course’s final exam left me feeling downcast. Meticulously applying knowledge to plans and charters was one thing, but rote memorization of processes, inputs, outputs, tools and techniques was something different.

My certification exam was scheduled shortly after my course’s final exam but, after leaving school, I knew I might not obtain my certification unless I really hit the books. What ensued was 12 hours straight of studying each day until my certification exam. And I’m happy to say that the studying paid off.

I am officially a Certified Associate of Project Management! Now, I just need about a year more of related work experience before I can write my PMP exam. Would anyone like to employ me in a project managing capacity? I need relevant work experience, please! : )

PMPin!

As I previously mentioned, starting in January I’m taking courses in Project Management through the University of Toronto’s School for Continuing Education. In no way have I given up on writing, but as I mentioned earlier, rejection for the YRAC grant gave me a moment of clarity that made me realize that it would be pretty foolish of me to quit my day job in pursuit of art. Even if I were an amazing writer, I still need to eat and live. And I do have other interests beyond writing. I really love Excel, for example, and have fun spending hours creating budgeting sheets for this year, the next and, if it weren’t a little too obsessive, the next after that too. I also like calendars, agendas, and lists of all sorts. For Christmas one year, I asked for a filing cabinet from my family members. These are somewhat embarrassing confessions, I know, but I suppose you could say that I just like to keep organized.

Taking that into consideration, I made use of my alumni credit to UT’s School of Continuing Studies and enrolled in Foundations of Project Management. After I’m finished this course, I’d be qualified as a Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM). The plan is to work towards my Project Management Professional (PMP) certification and hopefully apply it to my current company to take it a step further and become a Certified Law Enforcement Planner (CLEP).

Of course, these plans are all relatively new, freshly sown seeds. I have no doubt that I can achieve my goals, it’ll just take time… time to complete my courses, pass my tests, and find the proper work placement and hours.

With that being said, I’m pretty pumped. Project Management is completely separate from writing, and I think that might be a good thing. Everyone needs some space and distance sometimes, I suppose, plus I’m pretty hyped about going back to school. I’ve been out of it for a little while and have been missing the grading atmosphere. Wish me luck!

Career Change

Tomorrow morning will mark the beginning of a new stage in my life. After much thought, I have finally decided to make the big jump and leave my position as Creative Writer at Ganz, Inc. Now, I will be working as…

The beginning of my work as a Marine Biologist

… a marine biologist specializing in the adjustment of stingrays to artificially constructed habitats! I know it’s a big change, but I was feeling for something a bit different.

Okay, well all kidding aside, and taking into consideration the fact that I am deathly afraid of the ocean and most creatures living in it, I really will be starting a new job tomorrow, just not in the aforementioned field.

After much consideration, I found it would be best for me at this time to work in an environment with a more changeable schedule. As a result, tomorrow I will be starting work with the York Regional Police. I’ll be doing something completely different from video game writing, but it will hopefully be something that will allow me more time to focus on my writing and personal life on my off days.

With that being said, I have just returned from an amazing vacation to Miami and the Bahamas, and am more ready than ever to write. I can’t believe it’s been almost a year since my time in Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia! At the moment, I’ve been hammering out work for the print and online publications I am writing for, but there was a glorious three hours during my flight from MIA to YYZ that led to the beginning of a new short story.

I suppose that’s all for now, folks. If you want to catch me in print, check out the new SideStreet Review and C&G Monthly. Au revoir!

In other news: Books and Games and Freelance Writing

It is with great pleasure that I’d like to share the news that I recently landed a freelancing gig with SideStreet Review  and C&G Monthly. Find me online or on newsstands within the next few months, writing game and book reviews/articles. I’ll update more in regards to my assignments as they are published. Now, all I have to do is land about 15 more gigs like this one, and maybe I can become a full-time work-from-home writer!

                                                                     

A General Update: My breakup with Writing

Aloha lovely readers! Please pardon my infrequent posting. My writing in general has been spotty as of late, and as someone who said her blog was one that “documented her writing journey”, I feel I’ve failed thus far in not tracking my progress the way I promised I would.

As I mentioned earlier, I was offered a job this September by Ganz, Inc. – an opportunity I couldn’t refuse considering the awesome position (Creative Writer working with online games). That being said, once I started working I naturally didn’t have the time to do all the things I’d originally planned for my post-grad self (y’know, sleep in, lounge in my pajamas, ponder the stucco on my ceiling and sometimes colour-code my writing folders). Though anxiety would occasionally niggle at me during my “time off” for not having a “real job”, my anxiety then was nothing compared to the anxiety I experienced after starting work. Suddenly, the days of stucco-gazing (aka writing with complete abandon at any time and in any place I desired) seemed far away and long gone.

The crisis I experienced once I started working was deep and dark, though I’m not going to pretend I alone am privy to this despair. I am certain that almost every young adult experiences this at some point in their life. It usually hits around the time he or she has to enter the “real world” and is quickly gaining attention as society’s new ailment: The Quarter Life Crisis.

A large part of my crisis arose with this first, extended encounter with the “real world”. While I was in school, my parents and siblings would wonder why I was rushing to graduate. “You better enjoy yourself. You don’t want to run into the “real world” too quickly. You’ll have much less time to do the things you want to do.” I scoffed at their cautious remarks. I’d grown up in an age of technological miracles. Every day someone or something exceeded human limits. What defined the “real” in this world? Nothing but the limitations one imposed on oneself. Applying this mentality to myself, I was certain I’d have an awesome life: the perfect job, the perfect home, the perfect balance between writing and occupation and travel; I’d have it all together, all at once. The real world was vast and promising.

Promising, that is, until I started a regular, permanent job and I had to suddenly navigate a world beyond my yellow room, my coffee shop discussions about life and writing, and my juvenile scribbles about hopes and dreams. Though it was an adjustment to realize I’d only have two unstructured weeks a year to travel, it was an even greater adjustment in regards to my writing. Unused to waking up at regular hours since Gr. 11, I’d fall asleep as soon as 7pm came around. I’d desperately try to force myself to write after work, against my shell-shocked body’s fatigue, feeling like it was my number one duty as a “real” writer to persevere. Suddenly writing became a chore – harder than work itself.

If only I never loved writing. With school finished early, a great job right out the gate, and no financial worry because of the hard work of my parents before me, my life should be blue skies and daffodils. I would be content, if not for my writing. I was hit hard with an unlucky combo of physical exhaustion and writer’s block.

And that’s when I started to hate writing.

I’m ashamed to admit that I stopped scheduling writer’s meetings and missed deadlines for Live In Limbo; those once-fun activities were now painful reminders of my incapable, mundane, uncreative existence.

Suddenly lost passion feels similar to losing one’s God. It is that grave. It is waking up one day and realizing that some constantly definitive aspect of yourself is absent and, no matter how hard you try, only a cold, unfeeling door presents itself to you – closed and inaccessible.

Finally, I decided that I’d give up on writing because it had given up on me. I could only stare at a closed door for so long until I started to feel like writing’s desperate, psycho ex-girlfriend. I let go.

The next day, I started thinking of supplements to a life without writing. So, I wasn’t going to be a world renowned author. Now what would I be?

Perhaps the best part of this experience was discovering other options. I could no longer define myself solely as a writer. Within a few weeks, I remembered that I was also an editor, a student, a volunteer, a planner. I could still be involved with the literary world, just not in the way I’d initially planned. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. Furthermore, by suddenly losing my main focus, I realized that within my month or so of stucco-staring, I’d lost sight of everything else I was and could still be.

And you know what the funny thing is… weeks after I’d broken up with writing, I met with a friend for a writing session – one that had been organized well before the crisis occurred. I was reluctant to meet and eager to finish the session before it even began. While he was critiquing my work, I pitied his waste of breath, knowing I could never write the book we were discussing because I was no longer the writer I’d imagined myself to be.

Until he said, “I’m really curious to know more about this character”. And suddenly, for the first time in a long time, I was curious too.

Getting a Job

On Tuesday, September 8th, I started working as a Creative Writer for Ganz, Inc. As a Creative Writer, I work with a team of other writers to write creative briefs for online entertainment projects, write website content, work with the Creative Director to develop plans for an overall (top secret, upcoming, and super cool) project, and review and analyze competition to aid in the development of creative projects (Note: Most of this description is copied, pasted and re-worded from the job description available on Workopolis.com). Currently at work I’m reading up on old research and conducting some of my own – tasks that allow me to re-visit some of my favorite games with a new and critical eye.

I applied for the job mid-August, went for an interview a week later, and was hired a week after that. The job is a full-time, permanent position. I hadn’t mentioned it earlier because I was afraid of jinxing it. Retrospectively evaluating the steps I’ve taken towards this point, I had (and still have) a strong feeling  that I’ve been fatalistically led to this position; even the most chance encounters and decisions have added up to form the requirements needed to land this job – a belief that both unnerves and soothes me in turns.

To be honest, I’m still getting adjusted to the schedule. I’m still not used to the 9-5 workday, and the apprehension and excitement of getting a job has put a stopper to my current creative endeavors. I hope to start again soon. Writing is, after all, my number one love.

At the moment, as I’m settling in, I’m going with the flow. Life seems to be directing me somewhere. I guess it’s up to me to find out exactly where I have to go.

P.S. In regards to my work situation, I’d like to thank Johnson, my manager at MGA Entertainment, for being constantly supportive throughout my job search, Sean Chin for being such an awesome person to work with as I write for him on Live in Limbo, and my friends and family who admirably tolerate my dramatics as I stress over school and work.