Daniel Smith

Anyone looking to build and sustain high performance should consider these 5 tips.

1. Routines

The first tip comes from Tony Schwartz author of The Power of Full Engagement and Be Excellent at Anything. In his contribution to Maximize Your Potential, he recommends harnessing the power of a ritual.

A ritual is a highly precise behavior you do at a specific time so that it becomes automatic over time and no longer requires much conscious intention or energy.

Willpower and discipline are over-rated.

In his book, Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength, Roy Baumeister contends that the most successful people don’t make better decisions because of their willpower. Rather, they develop routines.

These routines reduce the number of decisions we need to make (as well as reducing stress). Thus it becomes easier to use your limited resources of self-control to avoid, rather than solve, crises.

Developing these routines are key. In Michael Lewis’ profile of President Obama, he writes:

You also need to remove from your life the day-to-day problems that absorb most people for meaningful parts of their day. “You’ll see I wear only gray or blue suits,” (Obama) said. “I’m trying to pare down decisions. I don’t want to make decisions about what I’m eating or wearing. Because I have too many other decisions to make.” He mentioned research that shows the simple act of making decisions degrades one’s ability to make further decisions. It’s why shopping is so exhausting. “You need to focus your decision-making energy. You need to routinize yourself. You can’t be going through the day distracted by trivia.”

If we spend energy making too many little decisions, we’ll have less to make the more important decisions. Some companies are cluing into this.

“I think that the leadership at Google has an intuitive understanding of human nature and the way attention is a limited resource,” says David Rock author of Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long.

Google organizes their environment to make allow their employees to make fewer decisions.

The formula at Club Med is to include pretty much everything in the price, activities, food, even drinks, giving you fewer decisions to make. Now I know the research on decision making, and how making any conscious decision uses a measurable amount of glucose, but I wasn’t prepared for how relaxing it was not having to think anywhere near as much, even about simple things. It turned out to be a remarkably restful holiday.

When you work at google, you get to save your limited mental resources for the most important decisions. As Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt said, “Let’s face it: programmers want to program, they don’t want to do their laundry. So we make it easy for them to do both.”

…Other companies could do well to do the same, noticing what their employees end up wasting their attention on, and doing something about it. It’s sure making me rethink my own company’s benefits policies.

… as well as minimizing distractions and respecting attention, Google does other things to help its people be more productive, in particular being more productive at complex problem solving.

2. Focus

Your routines should be geared towards helping you focus.

In Your Brain at Work, David Rock writes:

One of the most effective distraction-management techniques is simple: switch off all communication devices during any thinking work. Your brain prefers to focus on things right in front of you. It takes less effort. If you are trying to focus on a subtle mental thread, allowing yourself to be distracted is like stopping pain to enjoy a mild pleasure: it’s too hard to resist! Blocking out external distractions altogether, especially if you get a lot of them, seems to be one of the best strategies for improving mental performance

Combining routine and focus is the sweet spot. Here are two examples you can put into practice today.

First, Mark McGuinness argues in Manage Your Day-to-Day that you should put your most important work first. It’s much easier to deal with less taxing things, like email, later.

The single most important change you can make in your working habits is to switch to creative work first, reactive work second. This means blocking off a large chunk of time every day for creative work on your own priorities, with the phone and e-mail off.

Another way to think of this is to pay yourself first: you are your own most valuable client. That’s what Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger do.

Another useful routine is to deal with email in batches, say from 10-11 and 3-4 each day. The rest of the day, turn the email client off so you’re not constantly interrupted with ‘new mail.’ (How to deal with email.)

Consider the wise counsel of Herbert Simon:

What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention, and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.

3. Practice

Experience doesn’t always make you better.

In Talent Is Overrated, Geoff Colvin writes:

In field after field, when it comes to centrally important skills—stockbrokers recommending stocks, parole officers predicting recidivism, college admissions officials judging applicants—people with lots of experience were no better at their jobs than those with less experience.

Wait. What? That doesn’t make sense.

We typically operate in the OK Plateau.

Bestselling author of Moonwalking with Einstein and USA Memory Champion in 2005, Joshua Foer explains:

In the 1960s, psychologists identified three stages that we pass through in the acquisition of new skills. We start in the “cognitive phase,” during which we’re intellectualizing the task, discovering new strategies to perform better, and making lots of mistakes. We’re consciously focusing on what we’re doing. Then we enter the “associative stage,” when we’re making fewer errors, and gradually getting better. Finally, we arrive at the “autonomous stage,” when we turn on autopilot and move the skill to the back of our proverbial mental filing cabinet and stop paying conscious attention. … The OK Plateau is that point when we reach the autonomous stage and consciously or unconsciously stay to ourselves, “I am OK at how good I have gotten at this task,” and stop paying attention to our improvement. We all reach OK Plateaus in almost everything we do. We learn to drive when we’re teenagers, and at first we improve rapidly, but eventually we are no longer a threat to old ladies crossing the street, and we stop getting appreciably better.

If we want to perform better beyond some basic competence researchers say we must engage in deliberate practice. These are designed, mindful efforts, to master even the smallest detail of success. To get better you have to get out of the autonomous stage.

One way to stay out of the autonomous stage is deliberate practice. Expert musicians, for example, focus on the hardest parts not the easy ones that would allow them to sink into autopilot. The way to get better is to push your limits.

Unfortunately, deliberate practice isn’t something that most of us understand, let alone engage in on a daily basis. This helps explain why we can work at something for decades without really improving our performance.

Colvin continues:

Deliberate practice is characterized by several elements, each worth examining. It is activity designed specifically to improve performance, often with a teacher’s help; it can be repeated a lot; feedback on results is continuously available; it’s highly demanding mentally, whether the activity is purely intellectual, such as chess or business-related activities, or heavily physical, such as sports; and it isn’t much fun.

Consider a coach.

In his fascinating New Yorker article, Doctor Atul Gawande writes “In theory, people can do this themselves.”

But most people do not know where to start or how to proceed. Expertise, as the formula goes, requires going from unconscious incompetence to conscious incompetence to conscious competence and finally to unconscious competence. The coach provides the outside eyes and ears, and makes you aware of where you’re falling short.

In other words, the coach provides objective feedback and structure.

Commenting on what it’s like to have a surgical coach, Gawande offers:

Osteen (Gawande’s coach) watched, silent and blank-faced the entire time, taking notes. My cheeks burned; I was mortified. I wished I’d never asked him along. I tried to be rational about the situation—the patient did fine. But I had let Osteen see my judgment fail; I’d let him see that I may not be who I want to be.

This is why it will never be easy to submit to coaching, especially for those who are well along in their career. I’m ostensibly an expert. I’d finished long ago with the days of being tested and observed. I am supposed to be past needing such things. Why should I expose myself to scrutiny and fault-finding?

It takes a special person to bring in a coach mid-career and subject themselves to “scrutiny and fault-finding.”

Maybe you’re thinking, I don’t need a coach because “I’m my own worst critic.” That may be the case, however it is really hard, but not impossible, to be your own (objective) coach. You need structure and objective feedback.

(I don’t want to get into too much nuance, but you also have to think about feedback systems. Part of deliberate practice is immediate and constant feedback. This enables course correction. The time-to-feedback can derail deliberate practice if it’s too long.)

4. Exercise

In Brain Rules, John Medina explores the relationship between exercise and mental alertness:

Just about every mental test possible was tried. No matter how it was measured, the answer was consistently yes: A lifetime of exercise can result in a sometimes astonishing elevation in cognitive performance, compared with those who are sedentary. Exercisers outperform couch potatoes in tests that measure long-term memory, reasoning, attention, problem-solving, even so-called fluid-intelligence tasks. These tasks test the ability to reason quickly and think abstractly, improvising off previously learned material in order to solve a new problem. Essentially, exercise improves a whole host of abilities prized in the classroom and at work.

5. Rest

Taking time to rest won’t make you a slacker. While the corporate culture of “back-to-back” meetings from 9-5 may seem “cool” it is actually crazy. Rest is a critical component of creating and sustaining excellence.

Sponsored by #ogilvychange — Little ideas from big thinkers

David Caruso, fiery orange hair ablaze against the blue-tinged Miami background, slowly takes off his sleek titanium Maui Jim sunglasses, his stone-cold, magisterial face reminiscent of a life lived with almost too much manliness, his SUV parked behind him, exploding (for no apparent reason at all) in a majestic, slow motion show of pure awesomeness. And only one thing comes to mind as you prepare for an exciting episode of CSI: Miami: This is forensic science!

Isn’t it? Wait – it’s not? Not even a little bit? “Uh-oh, I just signed up for a degree because I thought it looked really cool thanks to David Caruso’s sunglasses … I mean, show. Oops!”

Television and film have shown us great, albeit far-fetched – and many times ridiculous! – variations on the forensic scientist and detective, over the years. And CSI: Miami, along with its numerous counterparts, continues this grand tradition. But this is what many people think of when they imagine forensic investigators out in the real world – a stylized work environment full of guns, babes, bullets, and blood, in which our star scientists solve a case in 42 minutes flat, with time to spare for soaking up the Miami sun and grabbing a few brews with colleagues.

The actuality is a bit different. While TV and movie portrayals tend to push the bounds of plausibility, forensic science is an important and fascinating asset to our society as a whole. It’s worth a closer look to see what makes forensics so interesting, as well as to learn more about a career that will allow you to make a real difference within the ever-growing and always exciting field of forensic science.

Why So Fascinating?

Forensic science is the discipline of combining a variety of scientific and technical means to reconstruct past events from still-existing evidence. In criminology, the focus is on civil and criminal cases. Within this broad spectrum of forensic science, there are roles as a forensic engineer (with a focus on traffic accidents, fire investigations, wrongful injury and product failure cases), medical examiner (ascertaining cause of death), or forensic science technician, among many other positions and specializations.

A Focus on CSI Types and Lab Rats

The work of forensic science technicians embodies a great deal of what the forensic world has to offer. In most instances, workers will specialize in one of two categories:

1. crime scene investigation – for those who work at actual crime scenes
2. laboratory analysis – where forensic science technicians are most commonly found

According to the American Academy of Forensic Sciences and the National Institute of Justice, they are – at the most basic level – scientists interested in putting together the disparate puzzle pieces left after a crime has been committed.

If this is you, you may be in charge of collecting, analyzing, and, many times, presenting your findings in a court of law. The diverse and complex investigations may include crime scenes, arson, missing persons, mass fatality, and cold cases. Your job is to provide a clearer picture of a crime to the police, a jury, and the interested public. You have the chance to provide the ending to the story.

What Will You Do?

At crime scenes, you may:

- take photographs
- make sketches
- collect evidence (weapons, bodily fluids, fingerprints, and more)
- attend autopsies, in certain cases

As a laboratory technician, you may:

- use scientific analysis to classify evidence found
- reconstruct crime scenes in order to figure out what really happened
- use diverse and expensive laboratory equipment and chemicals in order to properly analyze materials
- conduct testing on fingerprints, DNA, blood splatter, ballistics, and more

Most laboratory workers have a specific focus on, say, ballistics, DNA, or blood spatter. Depending upon inherent differences in each unique case – whether arson, kidnapping, or murder – investigators employ a range of different methods and techniques in order to solve the underlying mystery. These experts often have backgrounds in fields like chemistry, mathematics, biology, physics, or computer science.

How does it sound so far? Pretty cool, right? Maybe not in a “David-Caruso-car-exploding-glasses-off-not-a-care-in-the-world” kind of way, granted. But it is much more helpful and beneficial to society, don’t you think?

Prerequisites and Requirements of the Field

How do you become a forensic science technician, you ask? Let us count the ways, courtesy of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Job	Prerequisites	On-the-Job Training	Work Conditions	Pay and Job Outlook
Crime scene investigator	Bachelor’s (some rural agencies accept a high school diploma or equivalent).	Apprentice to more experienced investigators.	Staggered day/evening/night shifts are normal. Expect overtime work, too.	$51,570 per year with 19 percent growth potential from 2010-20.
Forensic science technician	Bachelor’s in either forensic science or a natural science (such as biology or chemistry).	Learn laboratory specialties on the job. Time required varies depending upon the specialty.	Standard work week.	$51,570 per year with 19 percent growth potential from 2010-20.

You may need copious amounts of on-the-job training before you can work independently on cases. You’ll also want skills like good public speaking and the ability to write reports that are not only technically accurate but also understandable to non-technical readers.

You’ll have the opportunity to work in a variety of environments: police departments, morgues, hospitals, universities, medical examiner/coroner offices, crime laboratories, and more. Developments in technology – as well as jurors’ growing knowledge of forensic techniques – is expected to lead to steady growth in coming years. Also, due in large part to its portrayal in the mass media – thank you very much, David Caruso and your exploding car! – there will be substantial interest from students for years to come.

What Does It All Mean?

If you want to make a difference while doing work that will both challenge and satisfy you creatively, forensic science may just be the perfect choice. You’ll have a wide variety of specialties to choose from and the chance to solve interesting problems using cutting-edge technologies. David Caruso, eat your heart out!

*Article by www.criminaljusticeprogramsonline.com

First thing you may want to check out after getting a new iPad or iPhone is the availability of free books for iBooks app.

In this post I’ll list most popular sites. Apple’s own ebookstore, iBooks Store, is included, but it doesn’t have a regular website, so I’ll also explain how to get access there.

What kind of files iBooks supports? It’s pdf and epub. If you add own books, these files have to be DRM-free, otherwise you won’t be able to open them in the app.

Before moving to descriptions of sites, let me share basic tips on how to add own books to iBooks app on iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch:

1. Via iTunes desktop app
You have this app pre-downloaded on Mac computer, and you can also get it for Windows. To add own books you have to connect the iPad or iPhone via cable to the computer. Worth the effort for bulk downloads, but it’s not the most convenient way to add one or few titles.

2. Open an email attachment in a Mail iOS app
Luckily, there are other ways that don’t need the cables. The most common method is to send an email to yourself, with epub file as an attachment. Then open the email in a native Mail app on the iPhone/iPad.

3. Use iOS cloud service app
Download epub books in bulk to Google Drive or Dropbox on your computer and open them from within Google Drive/Dropbox app on your iOS device.

4. Use Safari to open a file from url address
Some sites (Project Gutenberg, Feedbooks are among them) have clear url addresses of ebook files. When you tap on a link to epub file (ending with .epub), you should be able to open it with iBooks.

8 sources of free ebooks for iBooks

1. iBooks Store

As I already said, unlike other ebook sites, iBookstore is not available on the web. You can access it only from iBooks or iTunes app.

If you search for “ibookstore” on the web, you may come across the site with the address ibookstore.com. It’s not what you’re looking for, believe me. The site offers ebooks for Kindle, not for iBooks, and they link to Amazon, not to iBooks Store.

So far, iBooks Store has launched in about 50 countries – one-third of where iTunes Store is available. If you want to make iBooks your default book reading app, please keep that in mind. You won’t be able to get any paid content from the iBooks Store, if it hasn’t opened in your country.

To find free titles within the iBooks app, in the home screen tap on Store button in the top right corner, then select Top Charts section, and you’ll see a heading saying “Free Books”. This is the list of the most popular free books, and it includes 300 titles at most.

To find free titles in the iTunes app, tap on Books in the top navigation bar, and then locate a list “Books Quick Links” on the right side (See screenshot below).

If you want to browse for other free titles, use the search box. Type the author, genre, or title, and in the list of search results pick up the titles with a price set to free.

⇢ iBooks Store

The link may prompt you to open external application – iTunes.

2. Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg is the top place to download free classics. It’s a mother of all ebook sites, where you can find a first ebook ever made (it’s free) - http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1.

Currently there are almost 44,000 public domain books in the catalog. There are two kinds of epub files: with or without images. The one with images takes much more disc space – and that also means it will take longer to download it.

Project Gutenberg offers also a very convenient way to keep up with newly added books – you can subscribe to an RSS feed. You can also get notified of new entries via email.

If you are going to add books to iBooks via Dropbox or Google Drive, you’ll love the fact that PG offers one-click downloads to connected accounts of these two cloud storage services.

⇢ Project Gutenberg

3. Smashwords

Smashwords is one of the most popular places of ebooks from independent authors and publishers. Books are available in several languages, all are DRM-free, and many authors make their publications available for free.

The site distributes books to major ebookstores, and iBooks Store is among them. However, not all authors set their books to distribute in Apple’s store. Also, I observed that some books that are free on Smashwords are paid in the iBooks Store (it’s usually $0.99).

To quickly get to the list of free ebooks, simply use the combination of the three top filter bars. For instance, here is the link to: bestsellers – that are free – that are 50k words or longer.

Currently there are more than 25,000 free ebooks on Smashwords. You can first pick a category, and then select Free tab to get a list of free titles in your favorite genre. For instance, there are 2,100 science-fiction books that are free on Smashwords.

⇢ Smashwords

4. Internet Archive

The Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library with the mission of “universal access to all knowledge.” The website is a huge digital library of text, audio and video files. It offers over 3.8 mln ebooks and texts. Sub-collections include American Libraries, Canadian Libraries, books from Project Gutenberg, titles from the Million Books Project, and books for children.

When you find the interesting book, you’ll see in the left panel the list of available formats. In most cases epub will be included.

⇢ Internet Archive

5. Open Library

Open Library is another initiative of the Internet Archive. The site positions itself as ”the world’s classic literature at your fingertips”. There are over 1,000,000 free ebook titles available.

The biggest benefit of Open Library is that it’s driven by a strong community. It’s like Wikipedia for ebooks.

If the book had more than one edition, you’ll see them listed on Open Library. For instance, Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain, first published in 1876, have 306 editions altogether and most of them have separate download directories.

⇢ Open Library

6. Feedbooks

On Feedbooks you can find both public domain (Public Domain section) and free contemporary books (Original Books section), both fiction and non-fiction. As the site is based in France, there are a lot of titles in French, as well as in other languages, not only in English.

The site offers RSS feeds of specific categories, so you can subscribe to them and get new books the moment they are added to offer.

⇢ Feedbooks

7. ManyBooks

The site offers 29,000 free ebooks. The site is very well-organized and it’s easy to browse for books or follow recommendations.

The book detail page displays not only the usual fields like the author or publish date, but also word count and the reading ease. The number of available formats is impressive. Epub included.

⇢ ManyBooks

8. DigiLibraries

The site is an online ebook catalog, where you can find almost 30,000 titles – all of them are free.

There are several categories to choose from. The most popular are Poetry, Juvenile Fiction, and Literary Collections.

⇢ DigiLibraries

• • •

Remember that iBooks is not the only way to read books on the iPad or iPhone. You can install apps that connect with your Kindle, Kobo, or Nook account. You can also start using a new breed of highly advanced book-reading apps like Marvin.

Any of the apps mentioned above supports epub and pdf. You can only add DRM-free books to them, so the conditions to add own books are exactly the same as to iBooks.

To get more posts like this, please subscribe by RSS or email. Let’s also connect on Facebook and Twitter.

Check out other posts about iPad and iPhone:

• Over 60 Sesame Street books arrived in the iBooks Store
• 50 best iPad case covers to buy in 2013
• Frozen iPad [cartoon]
• Is iPad changing the face of education? [infographic]
• Leaked video of the upcoming iPad 5 [video]

HP has joined Best Buy and Yahoo! in an attempt to turn back the clock on remote working. Like the other two wounded, flailing giants, HP undoubtedly yearn for the late 90s, when they all were flying high. But reenacting the work principles of decades past is not likely to make mana rain from the sky again.

Neither is the hilarious corporate doublespeak that’s being enlisted to make the case. Here’s a choice bit on just how important employees are to the Vapid Corporate Slogan of The Day.. uhm, I mean HP Way Now:

Belief in the power of our people is a core principle of the HP Way Now. Employees are at the center of what we do, we achieve competitive advantages through our people. HP has amazing employees who are driving great change.

So we have great people, but we can’t trust them to get anything done unless we see butts in seats from 9-5? Who cares whether all these great people have designed a lifestyle around not having to commute long hours or live in a given city. That’s all acceptable collateral damage in the “all hands on deck” playbook for sinking companies.

Here’s a few thoughts: Perhaps HP isn’t sinking because Jane works from home, avoids the commute, and has more time to spend on hobbies and family? Perhaps HP is sinking because of strategic and managerial mismanagement? Perhaps morale won’t actually improve until the beatings stop?

It’s sad when you see once-great companies reduced to this smoldering mess of mistrust and cargo culting. But hey, at least we know now the pitch of the whistle that says its time to abandon ship. It’s “all hands on deck”.

Photo and copyright by CubaGallery


Check this out.  How did you do?

I was excited to read John Durant’s book The Paleo Manifesto: Ancient Wisdom for Lifelong Health. Whether or not you’re interested in paleo, it’s full of interesting nuggets.

Especially the part where Durant explains how fasting can help fight infections.

One indication of this effect comes from the behavior of sick animals, including humans, who often lose their appetite until an illness has passed. Farm animals, pets, zoo animals, and wild animals often just stop eating altogether when facing an acute infection or a serious injury. The widespread nature of this phenomenon suggests it’s an adaptive response. Loss of appetite isn’t a bug, it’s a feature.

Like attacking the supply lines of an invading army, dietary restriction weakens pathogens while the immune system mounts a counteroffensive. Tiny pathogens don’t have large nutrient reserves and rely on the host for nutrition—therefore manipulating our nutrition is a way to manipulate their nutrition.

This may help explain why religious fasting became so prominent.

The benefits of fasting transcend chronic infections. It’s one of the promising areas of cancer research, especially in response to chemo.

“Fasting alters the playing field by activating ancient starvation defences in the cell. Fasting is a signal to the body that resources are scarce. Healthy, nonmalignant cells take the hint and stop dividing as often, focusing instead on cellular repair mechanisms that conserve resources. So even as chemo damages healthy cells, they are hard at work repairing chromosomal damage. But malignant cells don’t stop dividing; they’re “cancerous” because they refuse to do anything but grow and grow.

This part on Gluten was also interesting.

In wheat, for example, gluten makes up the majority of wheat protein. Even though gluten is associated with the small percentage of people with celiac disease, it causes gut inflammation in over 80% of people. The gut is the digestive tract, which plays a central role not only in digestion, but in metabolism and immune function as well. Persistent gut inflammation can damage intestinal lining, and large molecules and bacteria can ooze out into the bloodstream—which initiates a reaction from the immune system. Autoimmune disorders occur when the body chronically attacks itself, and a wide variety—lupus, type 1 diabetes, and multiple sclerosis—are associated with a leaky, inflamed gut and wheat consumption.”

The book is broken into three parts. The first part is a brief history of humanity through five ages of existence—Animal, Paleolithic, Agricultural, Industrial, and Information. Each of these stages provides lessons for how we can be healthier today. The second part looks at how we can apply these lessons to “multiple areas of modern-day life: food, fasting, movement, bipedalism (standing, walking, running), temperature, sun, and sleep.” The book wraps up with a speculative vision of how our ancient hunter and gatherer roles can inspire us to build healthy lifestyles.

Durant started eating paleo in September of 2006 and some amazing things started to happen. After ten days

“I had much more consistent energy throughout the day. There was no more “head on the desk” after lunch. My mood improved, too. I felt more confident and optimistic. When something negative occurred in my life, I found that I was able to weather it with greater ease. The energy and mood gains in and of themselves were enough to tell me I was on the right track. … Due to the low sugar content in my diet, I stopped getting a thin filmy residue on my teeth. Industrial food started tasting way to sweet, and I came to enjoy natural flavors more. I lost the cravings for refined carbs — cookies, cupcakes, pasta, muffins, and bagels — and I found bready foods to be both salty and bland. My immune system improved dramatically.

…

Overall, it felt like walking up from a perpetual state of hangover. And once I knew what “good” felt like, it made “bad” feel a whole lot worse.“

When it comes to a healthy diet and overall lifestyle, here are Durant’s 5 recommendations.

1. What to Eat: Mimic a Hunter-Gatherer (or Herder) Diet

Stop counting calories. Eat the right foods: meat, seafood, roots and tubers, leafy vegetables, eggs, fruit, and nuts. Experiment with full- fat fermented dairy. Aim for a diet where the bulk of calories comes from seafood and animals, but the physical bulk comes from plants. Don’t be afraid of fat, eat nose to tail, and eat a variety of plants.

2. How to Eat: Follow Ancient Culinary Traditions

Respect ancient culinary wisdom. Follow traditional recipes. Eat fermented foods (sauerkraut, kimchi). Eat raw foods (sashimi, ceviche, tartare). Make broths and stocks. Cook at low heat, using traditional fats and oils (coconut oil, beef tallow, butter, ghee, olive oil). Eat your colors. Eat time-honored “superfoods”: liver, eggs, seaweed, cold water fish. Enjoy real butter. Salt to taste. Drink tea.

3. What Not to Eat: Avoid Industrial Foods, Sugars, and Seeds

Avoid processed foods of the Industrial Age, including sugar (sweetened foods, table sugar, dried fruit, plus artificial sweeteners) and vegetable oils (canola oil, soybean oil, corn oil, peanut oil). Avoid eating large, concentrated quantities of the seed-based crops of the Agricultural Age, such as grains (wheat, corn, barley, oats) and legumes (soy, beans, peanuts). If grains are eaten, go with rice.

Beverages: Drink water as thirsty. Drink traditional beverages in moderation, if desired (tea, coffee, wine, alcohol, milk). Avoid industrial beverages (soda, energy drinks, skim milk).

4. Make It Meaningful: Experiment, Customize, Enjoy

Use these guidelines as a starting point for your own experimentation. Modify according to your own health, goals, tastes and preferences, background, and budget. Make your diet meaningful (family recipes, ethnic cuisine). Be comfortable breaking away from it to enjoy life (celebrations, unique experiences).

5. Lead a Healthy Lifestyle

Sleep as much as possible. Move and exercise regularly. Stay on your feet (stand, walk, run). Get regular, moderate sun. Try some intermittent fasting. Try some hot and cold exposure. Make it meaningful in order to make it an ongoing lifestyle.

If you’re looking for diet tips, Durant personally follows the guidelines in Perfect Health Diet by Drs. Paul and Shou-Ching Jaminent.

No, this is not another paleo diet book; It is a lifestyle book full of ancient wisdom and practical advice on everything from diet and sunscreen to barefoot running and screen time. It just might change your life.

Sponsored by #ogilvychange — Little ideas from big thinkers

Cops are a unique breed. They dress differently. They speak differently. They’re in a class all to themselves, and it’s a “Members Only” sort of group where those on the outside looking in simply don’t understand what it is that officers do and why they do it. Unfortunately, law enforcement is an operation that sometimes, to best protect us from harm, must do things out of public view. And that lack of understanding and wondering “what they’re up to” often leads to mistrust.

Some members of society reject any form of authority. Others distrust police officers because they’ve heard friends or family members say they don’t like cops. In some corners of cities, counties, and states, young children, even before they’re taught to read and write, are taught to hate the police. Then there are the bad apples of law enforcement who commit acts that go against the very meaning of their badge and oath.

Of course, compounding the trouble is the necessary evil called secrecy, which drives an even larger wedge between the general population and the police. Therefore, over time, police officers metaphorically circled their protective wagons in order to survive in a world populated by people who simply don’t like them, for whatever reason(s). And, unfortunately, the circling of those wagons transformed the wedge into a nearly impenetrable wall between citizens and the officers who’ve taken an oath to protect and serve them.

The wall is there. No doubt about it. But what many people don’t understand about the “wall” is that one of its cornerstones is fear—fear of abuse, fear of beatings, fear of racism, and even fear death. Yes, some people live their entire lives being deathly afraid of the police. Are those feelings justified? Sadly, in some cases, the answer is yes.

As a detective in charge of certain operations, I devoted much of my time attempting to tear down the invisible wall. I wanted people to know that police officers are human, and that we do good, and that we were there FOR them, not AGAINST them. And I still try to convey that message through this blog and through my writings. I also had the same goal in mind when starting the Writers’ Police Academy five years ago.

Well, I knew the instructors at the WPA were the best in the business at what they do, but when I received the letter below, I also knew the event had achieved far more than helping writers “get it right.”

Finally, after all these years, there was a crack in the wall. And I want to say THANK YOU to everyone involved in the WPA for merely being you. It is because you’re who you are that someone took the time to let me know the WPA had a huge and emotional impact on their life.

Here’s the letter (I’ve omitted names and locations to protect the writer’s identity, and, please, if you think you recognize the author of the letter, keep the name to yourself).

Dear Mr. Lofland:

It’s been almost a year since I attended the Writer’s Police Academy in September of 2012 and I am writing to share my experience during that weekend.

I learned about your Academy from a book on getting one’s book published (I don’t remember the title of the book) that I was skimming through in a Barnes and Noble store in early September of last year. Since I have no law enforcement background, I was looking for a way to verify that the information in the novel that I’ve been working on for some time is correct; that’s when I saw the piece on your Academy. I couldn’t believe it; especially since the Academy was being held in a few weeks. I quickly signed up and prepared to go along with my wife, my little daughter, and my mother-in-law.

The Writer’s Police Academy was a life-changing experience; but not in the way I imagined.

You see, I’ve never had a good relationship or opinion of the Police and I’ll explain why.

I was about 8 years old and it was a summer night in the mid 1970’s when suddenly I had a terrible cough just before going to bed. My mother is a praying woman and she taught us that when we’re sick God can heal us; so that night I asked her to pray for me. Quickly, the cough was gone and just before I dozed off into sleep I remember seeing the reflection of Police car lights on my bedroom wall.

The next day I awoke to find that my 16 year-old brother was missing. As my mother finished praying for me and I fell asleep, my mother saw the Police lights on the wall, too, and quickly ran to the window. Two policemen were surrounding my brother. What happened was that a car was stolen in my neighborhood and my brother was accused of being the person who stole the car.

My mother quickly ran downstairs and stood between my brother and the Police; the two men smelled of alcohol and their eyes were bloodshot. One Police officer pulled his weapon on my mother.

The owner of the car ran up to the officers and told them that his car was found by other officers and that my brother was innocent. One of the officers refused to let my brother go and wanted to take him in. My brother panicked and ran.

You see, we lived in the **** area of the **** and this was in the mid 70’s. Police abuse was rampant and crime and fires in the area were out of control. There was little trust in the Police from the community.

They shot at my brother as he ran down the park stairs and he was captured by other officers from three squad cars that suddenly appeared. They took him to the ******** and beat him to a pulp. My parents went to the precinct and were told he wasn’t there and had been released; it was a lie. Later on, the officers took him to an industrial area called *****, beat him some more and left him there in the middle of the night. My brother showed up at my house at 12 in the afternoon the next day.

Investigating officers reported that no such incident occurred and that one of the officers whom allegedly was present that night, whom my brother remembered his name and badge number, didn’t exist. An officer told my mother that she better get my brother out of the area or he would be killed by the police. She obliged.

Since then, my experiences with the Police haven’t been positive. There have been incidents in which I was treated well so I don’t want to over generalize but the bad has far outweighed the good. During the **** years, it was hell! I am of **** **** descent and although I am fair skinned, college educated and have worked all my life; I felt that I had a target on my back as I walked the streets or drove in the City. ….police brutality cases have only made me less trustful of the police. I have often wondered why I am even writing a novel related to the Police.

So, last year, when I went to your Academy, I was very uneasy. I was entering an actual Police Academy and was going to be surrounded by Police. I was nervous, apprehensive, and at times, felt like a hypocrite for even being there. But then the Academy started.

Friday morning began with a presentation on the Jaws of Life. The dedication and care for the public from the presenting officer just oozed out of him and impressed me. I then attended “Making a Lasting Impression” with Robert Skiff and David Pauly: I was blown away. The commitment from those two gentlemen to find the truth in order to protect the public blew me away. I slowly began to see that the Police weren’t necessarily out to get me but to protect me.

I then went to “Fingerprinting” and it was awesome. Next, I attended “Cold Cases and the Realities of Investigations” by David Pauly and Dr. Ramsland; this is where things really started to change. The openness of the presenters in sharing their knowledge was incredible. I could feel their passion and dedication to getting the truth and solving murders. More importantly, I could see and feel their humanity.

Friday evening after the Night Owl Presentation, I had to go to the Bar and gather myself. My head was spinning. Not only from the information I received in the classes but my emotions were everywhere. Then McMahan sat next to me in the bar and began to talk to me; my heart was racing and my palms were sweating. A law enforcement officer was sitting next to me and talking to me man-to-man. He is truly a gentleman. I found out he’s a dedicated dad and husband and I was humbled by his humility and integrity.

We were joined by David Pauly and Dr. Ramsland; they talked to me like I was a human being. You see, Mr. Lofland, in dealing with the Police in my past, I often felt less than human. David Pauly bought me a beer (please tell him I owe him one) and the four of us talked for a while. It was great. They are great people and their knowledge and dedication just blows me away.

Not long after that, Detective Conelli joined us and we had a brief talk; he was exhausted from his trip and needed rest. I couldn’t wait for his presentation on the following morning “Anatomy of an Undercover Cop”.

Saturday came and I was seated on the floor in Detective Conelli’s classroom (the room was full to capacity). He started out by showing a picture of “His Office” which was a building in the Grand Concourse in the Bronx. My heart stopped, I went cold, and I was almost brought to tears. I had been in many buildings like the one in the picture! He then showed us a picture of him while undercover. He had no weapons and was taking a huge risk in going into those buildings. It was during the Crack epidemic and I witnessed, firsthand, how it devastated neighborhoods.

Hearing Mr. Conelli talk transformed me. I began to see the other side of what it is to be a Police Officer. I began to see them as being on my side, for me, and not against me.

On Sunday, during the debriefing panel, I was struck by the Chief’s words and his assistant. I’m sorry but I don’t remember their names. They urged the writers present to write positively about the Police profession. They said it was very easy to portray cops in a negative light but we were witnesses that weekend to the goodness found among law enforcement professionals. I take that advice to heart.

On the plane on my way home I thought about my experience. I have a coworker whose brother is a **** Captain. I decided I would reach out to him in order to not only get information for my novel but most importantly, bury some painful experiences I had been carrying for many years. I realized that the experience with my brother had colored my view of Cops and I needed to change that.

Captain **** **** so happens to be the Captain of *** homicide. When we texted each other in order to set up a meeting, he told me he worked out of the ****! The same one in which my brother was abused. But the *** **** had since moved so I thought nothing of it. It turns out that the **** has indeed moved but the original building (in which my brother was abused) is used to house Captain **** and other administrative offices.

So, on a cold December night around 11pm I went to meet Captain ****. It was surreal walking into that building. I confessed my feelings about the Police to Captain **** and told him that if he felt uncomfortable with me that it was okay if he didn’t want to share and continue our meeting. He was very gracious and understanding. He confessed that the **** doesn’t have clean hands and didn’t have clean hands during those days in the 70’s in ***** but he shared his side of things.

I made peace with a lot of things that night, Mr. Lofland. It all started with your Academy and your gracious speakers. You have a very special thing going there. My mother would call it a ministry; something God-given.

My wish is that your Academy could be duplicated throughout the country and be used as a tool not only for writers but to bridge the gap between the Police and the communities in which they serve. I would like to see young people attend your Academies and receive healing just as I did.

I would also like to see you guys do a documentary on the Police. My vision is to have several Police recruits from several Police Academies from different parts of the country be followed from just before they enter the Police Academy to about five or more years into their careers. The documentary would show their everyday lives and their struggles and maturing process. I think the public would love it and gain a lot from such a program.

As for me, I don’t know if I will ever finish my novel or have it published. I am currently working on getting a Master’s of Social Work (MSW) so that I could work in the **** Schools helping kids in the inner city; kids much like me when I was younger. I can’t attend this year’s Academy because we can’t afford it and because of my studies.

However, I will forever be grateful to you and to Mr. McMahan, Mr. Skiff, Mr. Pauly, Det. Conelli, Dr. Ramsland, and all the others who were there last fall. I’m a better man for attending and am at peace now.

I am eternally grateful to you and to your partners. May you guys have the best Writers’ Police Academy yet and may God richly bless you and yours.

Thank you,

Name withheld

 

Michael Dearing, an associate professor at Stanford, gave an interesting (albeit speculative) presentation on the five automatic thought process (cognitive distortions) of people who get things done.

The five distortions are:
1. Personal exceptionalism
2. Dichotomous thinking
3. Correct overgeneralization
4. Blank canvas thinking
5. Schumpeterianism

Personal Exceptionalism

… a macro sense that you are in the top of your cohort, your work is snowflake-special, or that you are destined to have experiences well outside the bounds of “normal;” not to be confused with arrogance or high selfesteem

Dichotomous Thinking

being extremely judgmental of people, experiences, things; highly opinionated at the extremes; sees black and white, little grey …

Correct Overgeneralization

making universal judgments from limited observations and being right a lot of the time

Blank-Canvas Thinking

sees own life as a blank canvas, not a paint-by-numbers

Schumpeterianism (I am a creative destruction machine.)

In Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, Joseph Schumpeter writes:

The opening up of new markets, foreign or domestic, and the organizational development from the craft shop and factory to such concerns as U.S. Steel illustrate the same process of industrial mutation–if I may use that biological term–that incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one. This process of Creative Destruction is the essential fact about capitalism. It is what capitalism consists in and what every capitalist concern has got to live in. …”

Dearing defines Schumpeterianism as:

sees creative destruction as natural, necessary, and as their vocation

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BY CHIP MACGREGOR

We’re living in a new publishing economy.  Over the past five to ten years, nearly everything about the publishing industry has changed significantly. The way information is gathered, tracked, and shared has changed. We now live with digital royalty reports and catalogs. There are fewer bookstores, fewer editors working for publishers, yet more books being published than ever before. There’s less editing, smaller advances, and a bunch of new, more nimble start-up companies that are gaining a toehold in the market. The move from brick-and-mortar stores to an online experience is completely different – there are more titles than ever, and I can get anything delivered quickly, but the online shopping experience isn’t nearly as fulfilling as wandering through the aisles of a bookstore, exploring unknown authors and discovering hidden treasures.

Publishers no longer worry about ink/paper/binding costs, or transportation & warehousing expenditures, so their margins have grown. At the same time, while authors are being offered greater royalties for digital books, their per-book earnings are down. And while the growth of the web has offered those authors more opportunity to market their titles to readers, with the opportunity has come responsibility – to the extent that many writers feel they are full-time sales people and only part-time writers.

But the biggest change of all, of course, is that Amazon and Smashwords allows for ANYONE to claim to be an author. Just write some words, post it on Amazon, and – voila! You’re an author. It’s led to what I call “Publishing as Amway.” Those of you who lived through the 80’s will remember the Amway revolution… You were told all you had to do was sign up, buy some soap products, and start signing up your friends to do the same. They’d sign up their friends, who would in turn sign up their friends, until, through the miracle of multiplication, you’d have this awesome downline – a bunch of people, all buying products and giving you a small piece, and the money would come rolling in. You’d be buying a Cadillac and taking that trip to Hawaii in no time.

We all tried it. None of us succeeded. We bought the shampoo, wrote our dream circles, talked our friends into joining, and… no money came in. The magic Amway money didn’t show up, except for the occasional rare person who got up to speak at gatherings of other wannabe millionaires, and who somehow seemed to harbor some knowledge the rest of us just didn’t share. I have nothing against Amway personally, and I’m sure there are a handful of people who shared their dream circles and saw them all come true, but the fact is for most of us the entire experience was more promise than reality, more dreams than dollars.

And that’s the same dream being pushed, by people who see publishing as Amway. “Just post your book on Amazon and watch the money roll in.” Like the million you’re about to make in multi-level marketing, it’s a myth. Amazon saw its list of titles increase from 2 million to 4 million titles in just a couple years due to wannabe authors posting their self-published novels, yet most sold fewer than 100 copies. For every author who made a thousand bucks, there are hundreds of authors who made almost nothing. In fact, it’s only the occasional breakout book — THE SHACK or GONE GIRL or FIFTY SHADES OF GRAY — that keep authors chasing after the unlikely dream of posting their novel and hitting the big time.

I write this because I was at a conference recently where some people made a big deal about not needing agents in this new publishing economy. “All you need to do is post your book,” one said to me. “You can always call a lawyer if you’ve got a contract question.” That’s an interesting perspective, particularly coming from someone who spent a lot of time bragging about THE SHACK.

Take a look at THE SHACK, which at first seemed to provide a compelling argument for self-publishing. The three authors worked together, created a story that talked about God in creative ways, and worked hard through social media to get the word out. While I was never a fan (I couldn’t get past the turgid prose or the heavy-handed spirituality), the book took off, sold a million copies, and eventually they sold the whole thing to Hachette, who went on to sell another several million more copies. The authors were quick to proclaim how they’d never needed an agent – they did it all on a handshake, and it worked great… until it didn’t. Because eventually those authors started suing each other. It turns out one guy thought he wasn’t getting enough money, and another that he wasn’t getting enough credit, and then they were worried that the publisher (which happens to be the company I was a publisher for) wasn’t doling out the money correctly. Everybody sued everybody, and the whole thing turned into a mess. Now? They all have agents.

You see, in the complex, changing environment that is contemporary publishing, it’s nice to have somebody who knows what’s going on. In the early days of publishing, authors were frequently cheated. They weren’t paid, they had bad contracts, and they didn’t know how to negotiate. Authors didn’t know the systems, or have access to the people in charge, so there was a paternal aspect to publishers. Worse, there wasn’t anyone to look after the author’s best interests when they diverged from that of the publisher’s.

Enter the agent. You could argue that my job, as a literary agent, is fundamentally the same as it’s always been: locate talent, nourish it, land them at a publishing house, and do a good job representing their best interests. But in reality the details of my job are completely different than just a few years ago. I could spend nearly all my time discussing marketing with authors – something I didn’t use to do. The market changes faster than ever, and contracts have moved from three page documents in the form of a letter to thirty-page monstrosities written by lawyers for whom English is apparently not their first language. A good agent manages backlist, interprets your royalty report, sings your praises, and says the hard things to the publisher when they need to be said. They still talk through a story, and offer insight into the system, and negotiate your contract, but more than anything a good agent looks after your career in difficult times.

The publisher has a team of accountants and lawyers looking after their interests. In today’s complex publishing environment, who do you have? That handful of authors who sold a million copies of their ebook and now are looking at landing a mega-deal with a huge publisher? They’ve all got agents now. Perhaps there’s a lesson in that.

 

One of the best things about teaching screenwriting in my spare time is how much the writers I work with provide insights and resources so that as a result, I find myself learning something on almost a daily basis.

In a recent Screenwriting Master Class course, we were talking about Protagonist and Nemesis characters. A writer in the class Deborah Goodwin posted this excerpt from “Night Film” by Marisha Pessl:

Be the good guy, he said…

How do I know I’m the good guy?

A very wise question. You don’t. Most bad guys think they’re good. But there are a few signifiers. You’ll be miserable. You’ll be hated. You’ll fumble around in the dark, alone and confused. You’ll have little insight as to the true nature of things, not until the very last minute, and only if you have the stamina and the madness to go to the very, very end. But most importantly– and critically–you will act without regard for yourself. You’ll be motivated by something that has nothing to do with the ego. You’ll do it for justice, for grace, for love, those larger heroic qualities only the good have the strength to carry on their shoulders. You’ll listen.

If you’re the good guy, you just might survive…

That is about one of the best expressions of a classic movie Protagonist I’ve ever seen, down to the point of articulating the conflictual nature of their physical and psychological journey. Indeed that final point — “you will act without regard for yourself” — brings to mind Joseph Campbell’s description: “A hero is someone who has given his or her life to something bigger than oneself.”

How many hundreds of movies does that sentiment bring to mind?

Next time you start developing your story’s Protagonist, why not use this quote from Marisha Pessl to inspire and guide you along the way?

Thanks, Deborah!

“You’re looking for three things, generally, in a person,” says Warren Buffett. “Intelligence, energy, and integrity. And if they don’t have the last one, don’t even bother with the first two.”

Ideally you want all three but people don’t always cooperate. These qualities tend to be difficult to judge in hiring someone.

So we end up with all sorts of combinations and permutations in organizations.

A lot of people feel that stupid people are the ‘worst’ problem. (I’d argue that intelligent people without integrity are even worse. They know the system, play politics well, and often end up in grey areas). With or without integrity, it’s easier to get rid of an unintelligent person than an intelligent one.)

Simplifying greatly (and removing integrity from the equation), we end up with four combinations: stupid and hard-working, stupid and lazy, intelligent and hard-working, and intelligent and lazy.

So what happens with smart lazy people?

* * *

Erich von Manstein, one of the top strategists in Hitler’s German Military, described Kurt Gebhard Adolf Philipp Freiherr von Hammerstein-Equord, the former Commander-in-Chief of the Reichswehr as “… probably one of the cleverest people I ever met.*”

Both men, according to Ben Breen, are widely credited with the following quote that gets to the heart of the matter.

I divide my officers into four groups. There are clever, diligent, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined. Some are clever and diligent — their place is the General Staff. The next lot are stupid and lazy — they make up 90 percent of every army and are suited to routine duties. Anyone who is both clever and lazy is qualified for the highest leadership duties, because he possesses the intellectual clarity and the composure necessary for difficult decisions. One must beware of anyone who is stupid and diligent — he must not be entrusted with any responsibility because he will always cause only mischief.

* * *

This actually makes quite a bit of sense to me.

Stupid and Lazy
You can accommodate unintelligent and lazy people by separating work into chunks. We do this all the time by breaking jobs down into routine tasks, creating policies and procedures that remove any need of judgment.

(My guess is this happens eventually in every organization because at some point the response to consistently poor judgement calls is to create a bureaucratic process/policy that (attempts to) remove that error.) It’s all a very McDonald’s like and these people tend to be easily replaceable.

Stupid and Energetic
von Hammerstein-Equord recognized these people cause “nothing but mischief.” To him, they should be fired immediately. I tend to agree. Despite good intentions, they often create more work for others.

Intelligent and Energetic
You want these people around. I’m guessing that von Hammerstein-Equord thought they’d be fit for middle management. Which makes sense. I imagine he saw them as company men: safe, reliable, rule following.

He likely saw them as people that didn’t challenge authority or speak up. I think this is a bit of a leap, I know plenty of hard working smart people who, occasionally, challenge authority. I think this happens for a few reasons. Perhaps they’ve grown too frustrated with what they see as absurdity. Or perhaps, and this is more likely, they put away ambitions of climbing the corporate ladder. (Depending on your organization, smart and unquestioning can be the easiest way to a promotion).

Intelligent and Lazy
An under-appreciated aspect of today’s workforce that von Hammerstein-Equord thought fit to lead “because he possesses the intellectual clarity and the composure necessary for difficult decisions.”

These people can be challenging to work with. They delegate and trust people to do their jobs. They don’t micromanage; They question. They avoid unproductive things (think meetings, paper shuffling, busy work). They don’t seek consensus because often that means more work, not less. They focus on a few key priorities. They don’t run around with solutions looking for problems.

Often they have no desire to ‘move up’ in an organization. This gives them the freedom to be different.

Maybe von Hammerstein-Equord was onto something.

Considering the framework above, it’s interesting to contemplate the consequences of mis-matching types and jobs.

What do you think?
Leave a note in the comments.

(inspiration via @planmaestro; sources include: *straighttogo)

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This is quite the fascinating video to watch in the study of human behavior. Here we have a husband waking up from hernia surgery (his 5th one!) and he doesn't seem to recognize his wife.

When I first watched it, I didn't buy it.  I see him hold back a smile and not very good--shortly into the video. I then watched the couple talk about this video on a morning talk show and they seemed genuine.

It took me some time to process everything I saw, but I think I can finally articulate what happened.

I suspect when Jason woke up from surgery, he was totally out of it. That's normal.  If you've had surgery, you know the fog you wake up into. According to his doctor it is possible not to recognize people, but that is very, very rare.

What does happen in surgery, at least for me, and he seems to experience it, too, is a whole new perspective, albeit very short-lived.  I don't know whether it is from the drugs or being knocked out, but what happens is your "perception of what's before you" is cleaned, and you see things from an unattached (unemotional) perspective, if that makes sense.

I attributed it to the fact I was in pain, and my emotions about things around me were muted to cope with the pain (my body was in survival mode), and hence when I looked around, I didn't see things through my normal emotional (biased) lens.  I simply saw them for what they were.  Hence, Jason doesn't see his wife "as his wife" -- he simply sees her as "a beautiful woman"--what she is at her basic core.

Does that make sense?

This is very short-lived, if you've experienced it. It goes away a day after surgery.

Jason may have looked at her in a groggy state and not recognized her for an instant, but decided to have fun with it once he put two and two together which was pretty quickly. Then I suspect he had fun with it and flattered his wife, because he was seeing her beauty through a  totally different lens.

Jason, if you want my opinion, is a natural born comedian type who loves to play jokes on people, and he clearly enjoys making his wife feel good. I think he was aware of who she was, but he played up on it and had fun with it. It's completely consistent with his personality.

And when he tells us now that he doesn't remember it--it totally fits with after surgery experiences. He may not remember it, but he likely was aware of who she was and had fun making her feel like super important in the moment.  And his wife captured that moment.  What's the harm in that?

The goal of interviewing users is to learn about everything that might influence how the users might use what you’re creating. Good interviewing is a skill you develop with practice. The great myth is that you need to be a good talker. Conducting a good interview is actually about shutting up. This can be very hard, especially when you’re enthusiastic about the topic.

Remember, the people you’re interviewing want to be liked. They want to demonstrate their smarts. When you’re interviewing someone you know nothing. You’re learning a completely new and fascinating subject: that person.

Preparation

Once you have established who you want to talk to and what you want to find out, create your interview guide. This is a document you should have with you while you’re interviewing to ensure that you stay on topic and get all of the information you need.

The interview guide should contain:

1. The brief description and goal of the study. This is for you to share with the participant and use to remind yourself to stay close to the topic.
2. The basic factual or demographic questions for putting the participant’s answers in context. These will vary depending on the purpose of the interview, but often include name, gender, age, location, and job title or role.
3. A couple of icebreaker or warm-up questions to get the participant talking. Most people know this as “small talk.” Feel free to improvise these based on the demographic information.
4. The questions or topics that are the primary focus of the interview.

You should also gather a bit of background information on the topic and people you’ll be discussing, particularly if the domain is unfamiliar to you. Talking to homeowners about how they selected their mortgage brokers? Read up on mortgages. Sitting down with the head of customer service? Review the support forums or frequently asked questions.

Interview structure: three boxes, loosely joined

An interview has three acts, like a play or a spin class: the introduction and warm-up, the body of the interview, and the conclusion.

Introduction

Introduce yourself with a smile, expressing genuine gratitude that the person you are interviewing has taken the time to talk (even if they’re getting a large incentive and especially if it’s a busy staff member who has taken time out of their workday).

Describe the purpose of the conversation and the topic without going into so much detail that you influence the answer. Explain how the information will be used and shared. Obtain their explicit permission to record the conversation.

Ask whether they have any questions about the process.

Move on to the demographic information or facts you need to verify. Use the collection of this information as the basis for the warm-up questions.

“Oh, you live in San Diego. What do you like to do for fun there?”

Body

Once you’ve covered the formalities and pleasantries, it’s time to dig into the interview meat. With a sufficiently talkative subject, you might get all of the answers you wanted and more without asking more than the initial question directly.

Ask open-ended questions that encourage the subject to talk, not closed questions that can be answered with “yes” or “no.” (Closed question: “Do you communicate with the marketing department often?” Open question: “Tell me about the internal groups you communicate with as part of your job.”)

If the subject doesn’t offer enough information on a topic, ask a follow-up or probing question, such as “Tell me more about that.”

Allow pauses to let the story through. Silence is uncomfortable. Get used to it and don’t rush to fill gaps in the flow of conversation. You want your subject to do that.

Use your list of questions more as a checklist than as a script. If you read the questions verbatim, you’ll sound like a robocall survey.

Conclusion

Once you have the information you were looking for, and hopefully even more, make a gentle transition to the wrap-up. Say something like “That’s it for my questions. Is there anything else you’d like to tell me about what we discussed?”

Thank them for their time and cover any administrative topics such as incentives or next steps on the project.

Don’t be afraid to shut it down early if you find yourself in an unproductive interview situation. Sometimes an interview subject goes taciturn or hostile. It happens and the best thing you can do is move on to the next one. There is no rule that says you need to hang in until you’ve attempted to have every single one of your questions answered.

Just do your part to remain friendly and respectful to the end.

Conducting the interview

You, the interviewer, play the dual role of host and student. Begin by putting the participant at ease with your demeanor. The more comfortable a participant feels, the more and better information you will get. A relaxed participant will open up and be more honest, less likely to worry about putting on a good impression.

Once you’ve done your part to get the subject talking, get out of the way. You should strive to be a nearly invisible, neutral presence soaking up everything the other person has to say. Think of them as the world’s foremost expert on themselves, which is the all-absorbing matter at hand. Insert yourself only when necessary to redirect back on topic or get clarification. You will know when your interview is going particularly well because you won’t be able to get a word in, but you will be getting answers to all your questions.

Breathe

It’s easy to feel like you’re on stage and tense up without realizing it. Your own tension can be contagious, so remind yourself to breathe and remain relaxed and observant.

Practice active listening

As long as you’re breathing, make interested mm-hmm sounds. If you’re interviewing in person, make sure to look at the speaker directly and nod. Unrelated thoughts might start to pop up, especially if an answer goes on at length. Stay alert and focused on the other person.

Keep an ear out for vague answers

You want details and specifics. Always be ready to bust out a probing question such as “Why is that?” or “Tell me more about that.”

Avoid talking about yourself

Sometimes, what starts as active listening turns into, “Let me tell you about a similar experience I had….” The interview isn’t about you or your opinions. This can be very hard to remember and takes practice to avoid. So, if you find that you’ve inserted yourself into their narrative, just stay relaxed and steer the conversation back on track.

Handy checklist

This checklist for effective user research was adapted from the Ethnography Field Guide produced by the Helsinki Design Lab, powered by Sitra, the Finnish Innovation Fund (http://bkaprt.com/jer/10/):

• Create a welcoming atmosphere to make participants feel at ease.
• Always listen more than you speak.
• Take responsibility to accurately convey the thoughts and behaviors of the people you are studying.
• Conduct your research in the natural context of the topic you’re studying.
• Start each interview with a general description of the goal, but be careful of focusing responses too narrowly.
• Encourage participants to share their thoughts and go about their business.
• Avoid leading questions and closed yes/no questions. Ask follow-up questions.
• Prepare an outline of your interview questions in advance, but don’t be afraid to stray from it.
• Whenever possible, snap photos of interesting things and behaviors.
• Also note the exact phrases and vocabulary that participants use.
• Pay attention after you stop recording. You might get a valuable revelation.

Try to be as conversational and natural as possible. If the user volunteers the information in the course of your conversation without you having to ask, that’s terrific. Your questions are just prompts to help the participant tell you a story that reveals situations, attitudes, and behaviors you didn’t even think to ask about. Offer enough information to set the scope for the conversation, but not so much that you influence the response.

Here is a sample set of questions, based on our museum website design example, for you to modify to meet your needs:

• Tell me about your job.
• Walk me through a typical week in your life.
• How often are you online?
• What computers or devices do you use?
• When do you use each of them?
• Do you share any of them?
• What do you typically do online?
• What do you typically do on your days off?
• How do you decide what to do?
• Tell me about how your children use the internet.
• How do you decide what to do on your days off with your kids?
• What are your particular non-work interests? What do you read online besides the news?
• How frequently do you visit museums in your town? Which ones?
• What prompts you to go?

What to do with the data you collect

The interview is the basic unit of ethnographic research. Once you’ve completed your interviews, analyze them all together to find themes, including user needs and priorities, behavior patterns, and mental models. Note the specific language and terms you heard so you can better reflect the way users think and talk in the actual interface. If you are doing generative research, look to the needs and behaviors you discover to point out problems that need solving. Turn the clusters around user types into personas that you can use for the life of the product or service you’re working on.

Jordan Dane
@JordanDane

I am very excited to have Michelle Gagnon as my guest, but she is definitely no stranger to TKZ. Many of you know Michelle was a former contributor extraordinaire to our blog and I’m excited to hear her thoughts on trilogies and her latest release. Welcome, Michelle!



Hi folks, I’ve missed you! So good to be back on TKZ.

With the success of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and The Hunger Games, trilogies are all the rage these days. In fact, when I first pitched an idea for a young adult novel to my publisher, they specifically requested a trilogy. I agreed, because hey, what author wouldn’t want to guarantee the publication of three more books? Besides, I’d written a series before. How much harder could a trilogy be?

The first one, DON’T TURN AROUND, turned out to be the easiest book I’ve ever written. The rough draft flowed out of me in eight weeks; it was one of those magical manuscripts that seemed to write itself.

I sat back down at the computer, confident that the second and third would proceed just as smoothly; even (foolishly) harboring hopes that I’d knock the whole thing out in under six months.

Boy, was I wrong.

Here’s the thing: in a regular series, even though the characters carry through multiple books (and occasionally, plotlines do as well), they’re relatively self-contained. In the end, the villain is (usually) captured or killed; at the very least, his evil plan has been stymied.

Not so in a trilogy. For this series, I needed the bad guy—and the evil plot—to traverse all three books. Yet each installment had to be self-contained enough to satisfy readers. 

Suffice it to say that books 2 and 3 were a grueling enterprise. But along the way, I learned some important lessons on how to structure a satisfying trilogy:

1. Each book has its own arc. Well, that’s obvious, right? But what this really means is that book 3 can’t feel like a mere continuation of book 2. Even if your villain/evil plot spans all three books, you need to provide resolution at the end of each installment. This is a good place to employ what I’ve dubbed, “The Henchman Rule.” At the end of each book, someone needs to be held accountable; otherwise your hero/heroine won’t seem to be making any headway. And the best solution for this? Get rid of the main baddie’s number 2, his right hand man. My favorite example is the stripping of Saruman’s powers at the end of The Two Towers. Sauron must wait to be dealt with in The Return of the King, but his main wizard is handily dispatched by Gandalf (suffice it to say, I didn’t have much of a social life in junior high school). 
2. Avoid “Middle Book Syndrome.” What I discussed above is particularly challenging in the second book of any trilogy. This is the bridge book, the one where the characters need to move forward in their quest, but not too far forward. Traditionally, this is also the book that concludes with your main character (or characters) beaten down, exhausted, and uncertain of the possibility of success. Which can be a pretty depressing note to end on, unless you also provide them with a key: something that will help them surmount obstacles in book 3. That key can be any number of things: more information about the evil plan, the villain’s only vulnerability, etc. But the main goal is to set the stage for book 3, while still wrapping up enough threads to keep your readers happy.
3. Character arcs need to span all three books. In a standalone, the main character faces some sort of incident that jettisons her into extreme circumstances (ie: Katniss’s sister losing the lottery). An escalation of events follows: the character is forced to confront her own weaknesses, and to discover her hidden strengths. At the end of Act 2, the character is usually at a low point, facing potential failure. Then, in the final act, the character rises to the occasion and ends up saving the day. In a trilogy, these same rules apply: but the conclusion of each book corresponds with the act breaks. Example: at the end of The Girl who Played with Fire (#2 in the trilogy), Lisbeth is horribly injured; she needs to overcome that incapacitation in order to finally vanquish her father in book 3.
4. Avoid information dumps. Always a good rule, but trickier with trilogies. While working on the final installment, I kept butting up against this issue: when characters referred back to earlier events, how much background information was necessary to keep readers from becoming irrevocably lost? In the end, I provided very little. The truth is, it’s rare for people to start with the third book in a trilogy; I’m sure it happens, but it’s the exception, not the rule. So what you’re really doing is giving gentle reminders to people who might have read the last book months earlier. Provide enough information to jog their memory, without inundating them. It’s a tricky balance to strike, but I’d recommend erring on the side of giving less, not more.

So those are my tips, earned the hard way. Today’s question: what trilogies (aside from those I mentioned) did you love, and what about them kept you reading?




Michelle Gagnon is the international bestselling author of thrillers for teens and adults. Described as “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo meets the Bourne Identity,” her YA technothriller DON’T TURN AROUND was nominated for a Thriller Award, and was selected as one of the best teen books of the year by Entertainment Weekly Magazine, Kirkus, Voya, and the Young Adult Library Services Association. The second installment, DON’T LOOK NOW, is on sale now (and hopefully doesn’t suffer from “middle book syndrome.”) She splits her time between San Francisco and Los Angeles.

A key revelation scene from my favorite movie, the 1960 The Apartment, written by Billy Wilder and I.A.L. “Izzy” Diamond.

Plot Summary: A man tries to rise in his company by letting its executives use his apartment for trysts, but complications and a romance of his own ensue.

INT. BAXTER'S OFFICE - DAY

Bud ushers Fran in, and is confronted by a strange couple
necking in the corner. He gestures them out, crosses to his
desk.

                         BUD
            Miss Kubelik, I would like your
            honest opinion. I've had this in my
            desk for a week -- cost me fifteen
            dollars -- but I just couldn't get
            up enough nerve to wear it --

From under the desk he has produced a hatbox, and out of the
hatbox a black bowler, which he now puts on his head.

                         BUD
            It's what they call the junior
            executive model. What do you think?

Fran looks at him blankly, absorbed in her own thoughts.

                         BUD
            Guess I made a boo-boo, huh?

                         FRAN
                   (paying attention again)
            No -- I like it.

                         BUD
            Really? You mean you wouldn't be
            ashamed to be seen with somebody in
            a hat like this?

                         FRAN
            Of course not.

                         BUD
            Maybe if I wore it a little more to
            the side --
                   (adjusting hat)
            is that better?

                         FRAN
            Much better.

                         BUD
            Well, as long as you wouldn't be
            ashamed to be seen with me -- how
            about the three of us going out
            this evening -- you and me and the
            bowler -- stroll down Fifth
            Avenue -- sort of break it in --

                         FRAN
            This is a bad day for me.

                         BUD
            I understand. Christmas -- family
            and all that --

                         FRAN
            I'd better get back to my elevator.
            I don't want to be fired.

                         BUD
            Oh, you don't have to worry about
            that. I have quite a bit of
            influence in Personnel. You know Mr.
            Sheldrake?

                         FRAN
                   (guardedly)
            Why?

                         BUD
            He and I are like this.
                   (crosses his fingers)
            Sent me a Christmas card. See?

He has picked up a Christmas card from his desk, shows it to
Fran. It is a photograph of the Sheldrake clan grouped
around an elaborate Christmas tree -- Mr. and Mrs.
Sheldrake, the two boys in military school uniforms, and a
big French poodle. Underneath it says:

                     SEASON'S GREETINGS
                     from the SHELDRAKES
                Emily, Jeff, Tommy, Jeff Jr.,
                         and Figaro.

                         FRAN
                   (studying the card ruefully)
            Makes a cute picture.

                         BUD
            I thought maybe I could put in a
            word for you with Mr. Sheldrake --
            get you a little promotion -- how
            would you like to be an elevator
            starter?

                         FRAN
            I'm afraid there are too many other
            girls around here with seniority
            over me.

                         BUD
            No problem. Why don't we discuss it
            sometime over the holidays -- I
            could call you and pick you up and
            we'll have the big unveiling --
                   (touching the brim of
                   his bowler)
            -- you sure this is the right way
            to wear it?

                         FRAN
            I think so.

                         BUD
            You don't think it's tilted a
            little too much --

Fran takes her compact out of her uniform pocket, opens it,
hands it to Bud.

                         FRAN
            Here.

                         BUD
                   (examining himself in
                   the mirror)
            After all, this is a conservative
            firm -- I don't want people to
            think I'm an entertainer --

His voice trails off. There is something familiar about the
cracked mirror of the compact -- and the fleur-de-lis
pattern on the case confirms his suspicion. Fran notices the
peculiar expression on his face.

                         FRAN
            What is it?

                         BUD
                   (with difficulty)
            The mirror -- it's broken.

                         FRAN
            I know. I like it this way -- makes
            me look the way I feel.

The phone has started to ring. Bud doesn't hear it. He
closes the compact, hands it to Fran.

                         FRAN
            Your phone.

                         BUD
            Oh.
                   (picks up phone from desk)
            Yes?
                   (throws a quick look
                   at Fran)
            Just a minute.
                   (covers mouthpiece;
                   to Fran)
            If you don't mind -- this is sort
            of personal

                         FRAN
            All right. Have a nice Christmas.

She exits, closing the door. Bud takes his hand off the
mouthpiece.

                         BUD
                   (every word hurts)
            Yes, Mr. Sheldrake -- no, I didn't
            forget -- the tree is up and the
            Tom and Jerry mix is in the
            refrigerator -- yes, sir -- same to
            you.

He hangs up, stands there for a moment, the bowler still on
his head, the noise from the party washing over him. He
slowly crosses to the clothes-tree. picks up his coat -- a
new, black chesterfield. With the coat over his arm, he
starts out of the office.

Here is the movie version of the scene:

If you want a master class in how to write a scene, look no further than this one. What’s the point of the scene? To reveal to Baxter that Fran is Sheldrake’s mistress. How to do that? Payoff the broken compact mirror which was set up previously.

But how to do that artfully? What about a reversal? Party scene. Baxter is feeling grand. Promotion, his own office, now he gets to make his play for his longtime love interest. Just preceding this scene, Sheldrake’s current secretary (and former lover) lets Fran know she (Fran) is just another in a long line of Sheldrake’s paramours. Hence her foul mood as she enters this scene. Since we saw the exchange with Fran and the secretary, and Baxter didn’t, we have the knowledge of why Fran is acting the way the she is, but not Baxter.

This allows for all sorts of irony: “You know Mr. Sheldrake,” Baxter asks. Oh, she most certainly does. Showing off Sheldrake’s Christmas card, rubbing salt in Fran’s wounds. And then the subtext:

* “This is a bad day for me.”

* “Too many girls here with seniority over me.”

* “Makes me look the way I feel.”

Ending with the bitter pill Baxter has to swallow, confirming with Sheldrake that his apartment is all set up for Sheldrake’s tryst… with none other than the woman Baxter just discovered is his boss’s mistress.

All great stuff. But the piece de resistance? The hat. Wilder and Diamond do this type of thing all the time, where they provide the characters what I call a BOB (Bit Of Business), something to do around which they can wrap the scene. So there’s this whole thing with Baxter messing around with his hat, of course symbolic of his recent success, meanwhile his life is unraveling… and he doesn’t even know it… until he makes the connection from the broken mirror.

Absolutely brilliant scene, a huge turning point in the story, and deftly done.

Which is why when you compare the script to the screen version, you see virtually no differences because Wilder and Diamond almost always cracked their scenes in the script phase.

God, I love The Apartment.

One of the single best things you can do to learn the craft of screenwriting is to read the script while watching the movie. After all a screenplay is a blueprint to make a movie and it’s that magic of what happens between printed page and final print that can inform how you approach writing scenes. That is the purpose of Script to Screen, a weekly series on GITS where we analyze a memorable movie scene and the script pages that inspired it.

Be careful if you ask Ernest Hemingway for his opinion.

F. Scott Fitzgerald once asked Hemingway for an honest opinion on his book. Hemingway responded “You see well enough. But you stop listening.”

While Hemingway never wrote a book on the art of writing (would it have suggested writing standing up?), he did leave behind many tips in his letters, articles, and books. The best of which are assembled in 1984 by Larry W. Phillips into a book, Ernest Hemingway on Writing.

I want to highlight three tips from his October 1935 article in Esquire, Monologue to the Maestro: A High Seas Letter.

Hemingway offers this advice:

1. Stop when you know what happens next.

The best way is always to stop when you are going good and when you know what will happen next. If you do that every day when you are writing a novel you will never be stuck. That is the most valuable thing I can tell you so try to remember it.

2. Before you start read what you have written.

The best way is to read it all every day from the start, correcting as you go along, then go on from where you stopped the day before. When it gets so long that you can’t do this every day read back two or three chapters each day; then each week read it all from the start. That’s how you make it all of one piece.

3. Use a pencil.

When you start to write you get all the kick and the reader gets none. So you might as well use a typewriter because it is that much easier and you enjoy it that much more. After you learn to write your whole object is to convey everything, every sensation, sight, feeling, place and emotion to the reader. To do this you have to work over what you write. If you write with a pencil you get three different sights at it to see if the reader is getting what you want him to. First when you read it over; then when it is typed you get another chance to improve it, and again in the proof. Writing it first in pencil gives you one-third more chance to improve it. That is .333 which is a damned good average for a hitter. It also keeps it fluid longer so you can better it easier.

Sponsored by #ogilvychange — Little ideas from big thinkers

“To Protect and Preserve.” Those are the words that should be on the mind of every officer who responds to the scene of a homicide. First responders have an immense responsibility. Not only do they have to assess the situation in a hurry—the victim may still be alive, etc.—, the possibility of the killer still being on scene is quite probable (the danger level is always extremely high). And, those officers must realize that the key to solving the case—evidence—must be protected. So, while facing the threat of personal harm and saving the life of others, patrol officers almost need to step through the scene as if walking on eggshells. That’s not asking too much of them, right?

Crime Scenes

* Crime scene and scene of the crime are not synonymous. A crime scene is anywhere evidence of a crime is found (a dumpster where a killer dumped the murder weapon, the killer’s home where he deposited his bloody clothes, where the body was found, etc.). Scene of the crime is the location where the actual crime took place (where the killer actually murdered his victim).

Keep in mind, there’s no set-in-stone method of investigating a murder, because no two scenes are identical. And, no two officers/detectives think exactly alike. However, there are certain things that must be done, and there are mistakes that must not me made. Here are a few of each.

The Do’s

1. First responders must proceed to the scene as quickly and safely as possible. Why? Possibly catch the bad guy and to prevent the destruction/removal of evidence. Also, the first responders must be extremely vigilant as they approach a scene, because they just might pass the killer as he makes his escape.

2. Quickly start the crime-solving wheels in motion by contacting the necessary parties, such as investigators, coroner, EMS, etc.

3. Arrest the suspect, if possible.

4. Document EVERYTHING.

5. Preserve and collect EVERYTHING and anything that looks like evidence.

6. Assume that EVERYTHING is potential evidence.

7. Secure the scene. Absolutely no one is allowed to enter who’s not a key person in the investigation. This includes the chief, sheriff, and mayor. Locard’s Principle, in short, states that everyone who enters a scene leaves something behind. Everyone who leaves a scene takes something away. You definitely do no want to contaminate the crime scene, unnecessarily. And you certainly don’t want trace evidence disappearing on the shoes of your sheriff, simply because it was election year and he wanted to see his name in the paper.

8. Treat every single suspicious death as a homicide until the investigation proves otherwise.

9. Keep an open mind. No tunnel vision!

10. Photograph, photograph, photograph! And then take more pictures just to be sure you’ve captured everything in the area.

11. Study the victims. Learn everything there is to know about them. Know them. Know what they ate, what they liked to do, where they liked to go, who they liked and disliked, who liked them and who hated them, etc. Uncover every single minute detail of their lives. The victim is often the single most important piece of evidence in the case.

12. Share information with members of your investigative team. Bounce thoughts and ideas around among the group. Talk to everyone involved—patrol officers on the scene, the coroner, other investigators, the crime scene techs, etc.

13. Look for clues at the scene (fingerprints, lights on or off, temperature of the room, glasses in the sink, footprints in the carpet, blood, etc.), but also look for things that aren’t there, too—car keys, cellphone, computer, etc. The killer may have these items in his possession, or he may have dropped them or sold them.

 

The Don’t’s

1. Do not assume anything. Sure, the call came in as a suicide, but that doesn’t mean that’s what actually happened. That’s merely what a witness told the dispatcher. And definitely do not assume there are no weapons present at the scene simply because that’s what your dispatcher told you. Again, he/she was given that information by someone at the scene who may or may not know…or may not want the police to know!

Never assume anything. For example, victims such as Chris P., above, found in burning buildings may have been murdered prior to the fire.

2. Do not assume the suspect has left the scene. Consider everyone there as a possible murderer until you learn differently. Be smart and safe.

3. Do not allow anyone to leave the area until you’ve interviewed them. Treat every single person as a possible witness. Sometimes people don’t realize they’ve seen an important detail until they’ve been questioned by police.

4. Failure to secure a scene. Family members have a tendency to get in the way. They feel the need to be a part of the picture. They want answers. And they will try their best to see what’s going on. They may even block exits and entrances in their attempts to reach deceased family members.

Be safe. Keep your emergency retreat routes clear!

Absolutely do not allow anyone inside the scene. This includes members of the police department if they’re not part of the investigation.

Everyone has a camera/video recorder these days. And they take photos and videos that will be published to social media sites. If at all possible, do not allow them close enough to the scene to take photos that could jeopardize the investigation.

5. Releasing information to the media—hold your cards close to your chest until you have an idea of what information can be released to the public. Remember, what you say will be on the evening news! I know this one all too well…unfortunately.

6. Don’t get a case of tunnel vision. Keep your mind open to everything, at first. Then as the case starts to come together, the focus of the investigation will narrow. A murder investigation works like pouring liquid into a funnel. First you dump all you’ve found into the large end. Then you keep pushing and pushing until finally the killer’s name pops out of the other, smaller end.

7. Failing to take enough notes and photographs. You only have one shot at this, so take more than you need while the scene is still intact. There are no do-overs.

8. Don’t take sloppy notes and/or keep sloppy records. Remember, everything you write down could eventually be seen in court. And that will be a reflection of how the investigation was conducted. Clean notes = a clean, tight investigation.

9. Don’t discuss a case where members of the general public have an opportunity to hear the conversation! Words are too easy to misunderstand and that can certainly come back to bite a detective in the…well, in a place where the sun doesn’t shine. Think about it…A trial witness says, “Yes, I heard the detective say…”

10. A case is not a suicide until the investigation proves it is. How many murderers have “gotten away with it” because of lazy officers? Sure, it’s easy to take a peek at a victim and assume suicide. But every case should warrant a closer look. You never know, especially if the circumstances are suspicious. And never discount that detective’s “gut feeling,” The investigator’s 6th sense.

11. Do not rush into a crime scene without first taking everything in. Take a moment to assess the area. Are there any dangers, including hidden ones, such as gas leaks, poisonous chemicals, A KILLER WITH A GUN!

No, you’re eyes aren’t playing tricks on you. The woman with the gun is THAT Marcia Clark

12. Don’t assume the victim is dead. Check for vital signs. You certainly don’t want him to lie there suffering while you stand around waiting for the coroner. A few seconds could mean the difference between life and death.

13. Don’t assume that the cooperative witness with the happy face is innocent. He/she could very well be the killer. Remember, things are not always as they seem.

 

These three genres can seem almost interchangeable, and they tended to share the same shelf space at video stores, back when those existed, but their underlying structures are surprisingly different.

The first surprise is that thrillers have almost the same underlying structure as comedies. As with Comedy, classical thrillers tend to focus on a hero who creates his own problem by transgressing society’s norms, creating this very similar quartet: Discontent / Transgression / Consequences / Victory or Defeat

• Double Indemnity
• Rear Window
• Strangers on a Train (punished for a transgression he only considered)
• Bonnie and Clyde (surprisingly)
• Body Heat
• Blood Simple
• Blue Velvet
• Fatal Attraction
• Silence of the Lambs (Sort of: transgression = sharing with Lecter / consequences = Lecter’s escape. Actually, this movie proves to be surprisingly slippery, and could be squeezed into any of these three categories)

But that definition leaves out movies that are driven by conspiracies, so we have to give them their own category. These movies feature little or no transgression by the hero, and focus on exterior antagonism. The arc is: Injustice / Overconfident Investigative Crusade / Betrayals / Revelation

• Maltese Falcon
• Manchurian Candidate
• Chinatown
• All the President’s Men
• L. A. Confidential
• Crimson Tide (surprisingly, since it feels more like thriller or action)

What about action movies? Surprisingly, they’re closer to Mystery/Conspiracy movies than they are to thrillers, since both are focused on external problems rather than personal flaws. The arc is: Injustice / Kicking Ass Overconfidently / Getting Ass Kicked / Victory or Defeat

• Goldfinger
• The Great Escape
• The French Connection
• Star Wars
• Raiders of the Lost Ark
• Die Hard
• Speed
• Batman Begins

Once again, many movies end up in very different categories than I thought they would:

• Thor feels like straight-up action and not at all like a thriller, but it’s structured like the latter than the former: It’s focused not on the external threat but on the hero’s folly and culpability in all that follows. The movie is more critical of Thor than Loki.
• Donnie Brasco feels like a thriller, but doesn’t fit into any of these categories. Instead, it charts like a tragedy, which is a structure we’ll look at later in this series.

The final surprise: Certain movies (each of which were adapted from several years worth of stories in another medium), combined more than one of these arcs, but in each case, they didn’t overlap—One arc wraps up and then the other begins immediately thereafter:

• The Fugitive (compressed from a four-year TV epic) crams an entire action arc into its first 40 minutes, then fits a mystery arc into the remaining 80 minutes.
• Spider-Man (covering the first ten years of the comic) zips through a thriller arc, in which the power goes to Peter’s head and he suffers the consequences, then it wraps that up and devotes the rest of the movie to an action arc, as he deals with the external threat of the Green Goblin
• Iron Man (covering 20 years of the comic) does the opposite: first we have an action arc, dealing with the external threat of the warlord, then a thriller arc, as Tony comes home and lets his powers get to his head, and deals with the consequences at the end.

Tomorrow, something similar and yet very different: Horror

Just to review, the general arc of classical structure, as I identify it, can be boiled down to four quarters separated by three turning points:

1. First quarter: Longstanding problem becomes acute through a humiliation and a new opportunity to solve that problem is identified.
2. ¼ point: Hero commits to the opportunity.
3. Second quarter: Hero tries to solve the problem the easy way.
4. Midpoint: Disaster and loss of safe space
5. Third quarter: Hero tries to solve the problem the hard way.
6. ¾ point: Spiritual crisis
7. Final quarter: Wiser hero solves or succumbs to problem.

For now, let’s just focus on the four quarters. The essential quartet of Problem / Easy Way / Hard Way / Resolution is vague enough to apply to just about any story about a large problem, but eventually you get tired of having to squint all the time. When we opened our eyes all the way and tested this structure against some actual movies, we found that different genres tended to have very different takes on that quartet. This week, we’ll look at hour several different genres tend to define those four quarters.

Surprisingly, although there are many profoundly different subgenres of comedy, I was able to identify on more-specific quartet that applied to almost all of them:

Discontent / Transgression with Mask / Deal with Consequences / Growth Without Mask:

• Easy Living (mask = false identity that is thrust upon her)
• The Awful Truth, His Girl Friday (mask = pretend to no longer to be in love)
• Sullivan’s Travels (mask = phony poverty)
• Some Like It Hot (mask = drag)
• The Apartment (transgression has already begun, then escalates, mask is unwanted but adopted to get ahead at work and explain strange goings on to his neighbor)
• The Producers (mask = scam)
• Breaking Away (mask = Italian accent)
• Risky Business (mask = sunglasses)
• Tootsie (mask = drag)
• Raising Arizona (literally with and without masks)
• Swingers (mask = phony pick-up persona)
• Rushmore (he’s been wearing the mask for years, but now it escalates)
• Wedding Crashers (mask = fake identities)
• The 40 Year Old Virgin (mask = fake confidence)
• Juno (first transgression has already happened, second transgression happens late)
• Superbad (mask = fake ID)
• Mean Girls (mask = fake personality)
• The Hangover (transgressions not seen, revealed as part of lengthened consequences section)

Even the exceptions I identified were slight:

• In Bringing Up Baby, Cary Grant has no mask but it doesn’t matter because Hepburn insists on treating him as something he isn’t, so he gets the same benefit, in that he gets to flee his responsibilities for a time.
• I was surprised that Bridesmaids, which feels like a very classical comedy, is the most atypical of the comedies I looked at, since our hero engages in almost no transgression, but merely attempts to be dutiful. She does wear a mask, however, to the extent that she pretends not to be broke and not to be horribly depressed about friend’s wedding and life in general.

Though, as we’ll see throughout the series, some movies end up jumping into other categories altogether:

• Dr. Strangelove didn’t fit at all, but I think that that’s because it’s a conspiracy movie that’s played as a comedy and thus fits the “mystery” arc that we’ll look at tomorrow. (It was adapted from a dead serious novel)
• Annie Hall, likewise, doesn’t fit, because it’s really a drama arc played for laughs.

Tomorrow: Thriller, Action and Mystery

Okay folks, we’ve tried this before:

• First I spent most of The Hero Project rethinking the conventional wisdom on structure.
• Then I conducted The Great Guru Showdown, where I pitted previous structure gurus against each other.
• Then I did a quick rundown of How to Structure a Movie, but I didn’t go into much detail about each step.
• Then I did a week on the idea that “inciting incident” wasn’t a very useful concept, so it should be replaced by three ideas: Problem-Opportunity-Conflict.

Now we’re back to make more sense of it all.  First of all, as you can see, I’ve changed the title.  For the purposes of the upcoming book, I’ve been expanding my definitions to apply to different storytelling media, but I also want to make it clear that there’s lots of stories that these steps don’t apply to, such as long-form TV or comic book serials, and also movies with atypical ambitions.

I don’t want to imply that beloved movies like Weekend or Slackeror Pulp Fiction are doing anything wrong simply because they’re notabout the solving of a large problem.  This structure doesn’t describe some sort of “inherent nature of celluloid”, it merely describes the natural progress that most humans go through when we try to solve a large problem, which is why, if you’re writing that kind of story, in whatever media, you should probably hit most of these steps in roughly this order.

In this series, we’re going to walk through the steps of the most common structure, but that will actually start nextweek.  First we’re going to spend a week expanding my previous thoughts about specific genre structures.  Over the course of the Checklist Road Tests, it seemed that the concept of “the promise of the premise” was unclear, partially because I borrowed it from Blake Snyder.

It emerged that this could mean very different things depending on the genre.  In some genres, such as comedy and thrillers the audience and the hero are having fun together, but we also saw that in horror movies such as Alien, the audience is having fun because the heroes are suffering.  So this week we’ll tackle…

• Mon: Comedy
• Tues: Thriller, Action, Mystery
• Wed: Horror
• Thurs: Drama, Tragedy 

Let’s get to it!

If people really pay attention to directors, a lot of them found out who Shane Black is this weekend. Iron Man 3, his second best film as a director, sees him transitioning to a phase that he’s lived in before as a screenwriter. He found success in his twenties after acting in Predator and selling his script for Lethal Weapon, following-up with even more stories about kidnapping and Christmas.

He’s brash, great with a comeback, and known for inserting fourth wall-breaking jabs into his scene descriptions, but he’s also been on both sides of the studio coin. That’s given him a front row seat for great success, backlash, a re-emergence that didn’t strike it big, and now another resurrection. It was clear before that he had talent, and now he’s got wisdom.

So here’s a bit of free film school (for fans and filmmakers alike) from a man who knows what you find when you look up “idiot” in the dictionary.

 Writing a Script Doesn’t Make Writing Easier

“Here’s what I didn’t know when I was starting out that I now know. . . I thought when you were starting out it was really hard to write because you hadn’t broken in yet, you hadn’t really hit your stride yet. What I found out paradoxically is that the next script you write doesn’t get easier because you wrote one before. . . each one gets harder by a factor of 10.”

This seems a bit counter-intuitive, and might not be echoed by all writers, but it might have a corollary in marathons. Running one doesn’t make the next one easier — it doesn’t subtract miles from future races, and you still have to train to keep up the performance (or get better).

On the other hand, presumably finishing a script lets you know what it feels like to have finished a script, creates a sense of satisfaction there and helps sharpen the tools you need to train for the next one (even if it’s not really easier).

 You Are Not Immune to Peer Pressure

“Interestingly, out of the blue, I decided to apply for the Academy Of Motion Pictures. I had done at that time The Long Kiss Goodnight, Lethal Weapon, pictures with Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis, Sam Jackson, and they turned me down for membership. They sent me a letter saying maybe next time, when you have more credits, we’ll consider you. Then I looked at the criteria for being a member – you must have at least two works of substantive, literary merit that have been produced on screen. So according to the Academy, I did not even have two pieces of substantive work. I thought, ‘Man, people must hate me if they are not going to let me in their club after I’ve made six movies.’ So it was strange. It was almost as if writing movies had given people one more reason to hate me, or dislike or resent me. And I just want to tell a story. . .  I think in the back of my mind I was thinking, ‘I’m going to show them, I’m not going to write an action picture. I’m going to show them I can do more.’

And that’s ridiculous; I should have written what I felt like writing. But I wanted to do a drama or something that would convince people that I’m truly serious about what I want to do. So the writer’s block was me for a couple of years trying to think of something and trying to write a romantic comedy a la James Brooks, who was my mentor at the time.

One day Brooks came to me and we sat down to lunch. He had read some pages and he said, ’You know, really like what you are doing but it’s wandering.’ I said, ‘I know, I feel like I’m sort of at sea, I’m not on quite familiar ground.’ He said maybe it was because I was trying to take too much of a leap from action pictures when part of the charm of my work was melancholy and edginess.

Brooks said he always pictured me doing something like Chinatown which was character driven with a lot of twists. I thought, ‘Okay, that’s what I’ve been doing wrong.’ What I really wanted to write was a murder mystery with romance in it. The edge was coming off this romantic piece and rendering it vicious and distasteful, and it wasn’t funny.”

Black goes on to talk about feeling like a fraud because of how many people dismissed the enormity of his success. He started to imagine that they were right, that he was paid too much for his previous scripts, and that thought combined with a search for legitimacy that ultimately got him stuck in the writer’s block mud. The murder mystery that pulled him out was, of course, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang.

Talent Changes Your Odds

99% Preparation

“I’d love to say that [directing] was incredibly difficult and murderous, but it was a snap. If you’ve done your preparation, including storyboarding the more complex sequences, ultimately your only job on the set is to execute your preparation and be flexible enough and social enough to go beyond it in places and hopefully get something better, and change things according to the order of the day, like if the actors come up with something better. I would watch movies all night to prepare. I can almost give you shot-for-shot on Panic Room just because I watched it so many times. I would go to the set for as long as I could to just sit there, and look around, then you have all the possibilities in your head. Then you take your cinematographer with you, and you ask him about all the possibilities. So when you walk in, you’ve already covered all your bases, even if you want to throw it all out and do something different.”

Twist a Cliche and Find Gold

Clearly there was more to the success of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, but Val Kilmer’s Gay Perry was a big part of its overall cleverness. In twisting the stereotype, Black proved that he 1) understood the standard but 2) was ahead of the curve.

“Having a character be gay in a movie just isn’t shocking anymore. Will and Grace and My Best Friend’s Wedding have softened us up with regards to the funny gay character. We still haven’t seen the heroic gay character that, when the chips are down, kicks down the door, shoots everybody and saves your butt.”

Movies Aren’t Climax, Climax, Climax

As a new freelancer, your cash flow is everything. You can produce stellar work, on time and under budget, but if you run out of money then the game is over. Here are a few tips for minimising the risks.

A comment from Michael on my Going Freelance: First Impressions post raised a great (and common) question, and one that I reckon most freelancers ask themselves when starting out: what if somebody doesn't pay, or pays late?

What is Cash Flow?

Your business, like any other (and even if you are a freelancer without an official limited company) takes money in in return for work, and spends money out in expenses, wages and so on. The money that comes in is based on the work you have completed, but more often than not there is a delay between finishing the work and being paid for it.

If the money isn't in the business to pay expenses and wages, you may find yourself out of business - even if you have taken on as much work as you could handle. You can be profitable on paper, but out of cash and out of business, just because cash wasn't coming in quickly enough. Having enough cash to pay your bills is referred to as being "liquid".

Woohoo! You Got a Gig!

Well done! Convincing somebody that you are the right person to take on a paid job is the first step on the road to successful freelancing. Now, what does that mean in terms of cash flow?

Most people will look at a project, and will base their forecasts on something like this. We'll assume this job is estimated to take one month - a good sized job, and starts on January 1st. The job finishes on time on February 1st, and the invoice is sent immediately. The client pays in good time, and the money is received on March 1st. Based on this, a freelancer just starting out will only need to cope for two months with no income - achievable with minimal savings.

This would be lovely, but it's often not how things work in practice. Let's look at how cash flow can go wrong. To begin with, we'll assume this project runs long for some reason - although the bulk of the work was complete in one month, the client finishes their copy after two months, and once the copy is in they request a few changes. The job is eventually signed off in mid-March. With 30 day terms, the invoice is due in mid-April. And the client pays late - initially because they didn't receive the invoice, and then because they were just slow to pay. After a few weeks of chasing, money arrives in late May.

Four, nearly five, months, from the project being agreed to money being received. That means, assuming this was your first gig, and you had two months of income saved up at the start, you'd be looking at surviving over two extra months with no income. For most people, surviving with no income isn't an option. So you're left with two choices - take out a loan, or give up and take a salary at a company. Neither is a great start to your freelancing career!

How Many People Pay Late

I've been asked several times how many invoices are paid late, or how many clients pay late. Unfortunately, there's no right answer. Some people go for years with no late payments. Some have a particularly bad period where everybody pays late.

In my experience so far, around:

• 25% of clients pay invoices a week or more early (deposits especially)
• 50% pay in the few days before the invoice due date
• 20% pay within a couple of weeks after the due date
• 5% pay later than a couple of weeks after the due date

My latest payment was three months overdue when paid. The fastest payment was under an hour.

How to Keep Your Cash Flowing

There are three ways (other than reducing your business expenses) to keeping your cash flow from being a problem:

1. Make It Easy to Pay On Time
2. Chase Late Payments
3. Reducing the Impact of Late or Non Payers

Make It Easy to Pay On Time

Paying other people money is not something people look forward to. There is a financial incentive to delaying payment as long as possible (interest earned), and it might be sensible to keep money within your company as long as possible, in case a more important bill suddenly needs paying. With that in mind, it makes sense to make it as easy as possible for people to pay on time.

Bill in stages for large projects so you're not left with a single large payment outstanding at the end. Billing at the end of each month for work completed during the month is a good way to manage long projects. And it gives smaller invoices for your client to cope with. Paying a set of small invoices over time is easier on their cash flow than paying one large invoice.

Once an invoice is sent, chase it up within a few days to make sure it has been received. It is not unknown for unscrupulous people to claim to have never received an invoice to avoid paying for another few weeks. Confirming receipt of the invoice gives one less excuse for a payment to be late.

Many people incentivise or reward quick payment. Some people give a percentage discount if payment is received within a set number of days, for example. People's experiences with this are varied, but this post by Astrid, a freelance translator matches what I have heard from other freelancers - it may work for you and your clients, but there are risks.

Make sure you accept as many payment options as is practical. If your client finds it easiest to pay by cheque, that's fine. It might not be your preferred method, but if it means they pay on time, then let them do it. By the same token, if someone offers to pay early, always accept. There's nothing stopping you charging more later if needed, or refunding money if the project is under budget, but always opt to take the money when it's offered.

Chase Late Payments

This video, from Mike Monteiro and San Francisco Creative Mornings, offers one (NSFW, language) perspective:

Chasing overdue payments can be time-consuming and stressful, but it is inevitable. Everybody handles it differently, and there is a lot to consider.

First, establish whether this is a client you want to do business with in future. Some businesses have cash flow problems themselves, but that doesn't mean they can't be a valuable client later. On the other hand, if the project has not been great for either party, you might not want to work with them again.

Some people advocate contact every day once a payment is late, ideally by phone. I tend to adopt a slightly less aggressive approach - I send a chasing email once a payment goes late, and then chase regularly every few days from there by email and phone. If I don't hear back, I will continue to keep contacting until I do. If I do hear back, then the next stages are dependent upon the client response. If not, and it's been a few weeks, I'll send recorded delivery post, and if necessary begin the paperwork for small claims court.

If the client is in contact, that's a good sign. You need to start worrying when they're avoiding you - the fact they're speaking to you indicates that they are likely to be willing to pay. Try to work out why the payment is late, if possible. If the client is having cash flow problems, you are probably not the only person chasing them, and you may find that offering a payment schedule is the best way to get the bill resolved. This kind of friendly approach may win you loyalty from your customer, and you might find that, once they are over this particular tough patch, they are a great client.

Some companies will tell you they have "45 day payment terms" or "60 day payment terms". You should have your payment terms clearly outlined in your proposals, your contracts and your invoices - and the terms they would like to pay on are irrelevant - the terms agreed in proposals and invoices are what matters. If they pay late, by the terms agreed, you can chase payment and, if appropriate, invoke penalty charges or clauses. If you didn't agree payment terms before starting, you're pretty much stuck with their standard policy.

If the client is refusing to pay, and you have delivered what was agreed, your position is tougher. At this point, you first need to establish whether it is worth chasing payment at all. There is no sense wasting days of time if there is only a small amount owed.

If you have tried to resolve the issue and got nowhere, look at your legal options. In the UK, for amounts under £10k, you can use the small claims court, which is a great, cheap option (no lawyer required) (there's a great guide to using the small claims court here). As long as you can demonstrate you have delivered what was agreed, and that you have tried to resolve the issue without resorting to court, you will likely find the court siding with you.

Unfortunately, that isn't the end of the story. The judge may not award you the full amount you have asked for. The client may still be unable to pay. And the client may still refuse to pay, at which point you will need to obtain a warrant of execution to recover goods to the value of the money owed. Between this, the initial court fees, and the time involved in chasing, you can easily end up out of pocket even if you win.

Reducing the Impact of Late or Non Payers

Some people won't pay. Some people will pay late. Some will delay for months over trivial amounts of money. Some will attempt to find excuses not to pay. These are unavoidable, but there is plenty you can do to ensure that any damage caused by late payments is kept to a minimum.

Consider getting a credit report on clients before starting work. Many people do this as standard, and pay a flat fee for the ability to do so. It's not something I've done so far, but I would do it for a client where a failed payment meant the end of my business.

Make sure you have enough cash reserves to cope with a few months of waiting. Expect people to pay late and prepare for it. If you only have enough cash reserves to cope with one payment being a week or two late, you don't have enough cash reserves. Make it a priority to build up enough of a cushion to cope with as much as you are comfortable with. Enough money to cope with at least three months with no income would be sensible.

Always ask for a deposit before starting work. I usually ask for 30%-50% in advance, except for small projects or overseas projects, where I ask for full payment in advance. This weeds out the time-wasters pretty quickly. You will find that sometimes there is a lot of pressure to start a job before the deposit is paid, and it is up to you to decide whether to do so. I have done, for time-sensitive projects, but try not to unless unavoidable. If the deposit invoice goes overdue, you may have a serious problem - I won't continue a project until that deposit is paid, and would happily insist on a further deposit also being paid in that situation. And if the client ultimately doesn't pay their final invoice on time, or at all, then you are not left having earned nothing for the work.

Add a provision for penalty charges for late payments to your estimates, contracts and invoices. Even if you never actually charge it, it is a good bargaining tool once a payment is late. The penalty charge should include a percentage fee charged on a regular basis, so that the longer the money is owed, the more the penalty. Charging a single, fixed-price penalty is only of limited use, as once it is applied there is nothing to stop the payment being delayed even further.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, you can spread your risk by taking smaller jobs with more clients. If you have just one client, you're at much greater risk if they have trouble. If you have several, you should be able to cope better with one or two paying late (or not at all).

My approach to this last point is to differentiate between projects (work which is more than 2 days) from small jobs and maintenance work. I book in project work based on a three day week (so a 15 day project is delivered over 5 weeks). The other two days I can spend on the smaller pieces of work or my own projects. This means that even with a larger project I am still billing smaller jobs frequently. As a result of this I can also cope better with projects taking longer than expected, as I can have two projects on the go at the same time - something I couldn't do if I based projects on a five day week.

Back to Michael

Michael's comment was pretty typical of the fears most freelancers have about getting started. The beginning is stressful, and with no guarantees of rewards. But with some decent planning, a bit of hard work and some careful money management, it's all quite manageable. And while I can't speak for everyone, for me it's been worth it in every meaningful way - six months in I am happier, financially better off, working with interesting clients on interesting projects, and able to spend more time with my family, all at the same time.

Okay, the time has come… My birthday is coming up soon, and that means it’s time for our Annual Bad Poetry Contest! Yes, try not to wet your pants in excitement as you think about coming up with some deep and meaningful tripe. For those of you not in the know, there is a longstanding tradition with British novelists for turning out truly bad poetry, and the cool kids in publishing take a few minutes each year to participate in my annual contest. (Don’t be left out.) So this is your chance to create something truly bad and get away with it. I want you to send it in — your rotten rhymes, your horrible haiku, your crappy couplets. This isn’t just a chance for you to churn out some doggerel that will make others nod politely while thinking, “geez — was he drinking heavily when he wrote this?” No, this is your chance to give us something truly awful — a piece of crud that make others run screaming from the room. A bit o’ deep thinking that will show the world just how deep and sensitive you really aren’t. A chance to create a poem that will stick like a stone in the kidney of your mind.

We do this every year, and if you go to the categories (over there –>) you can check out all the bad poetry others have sent in over the years. They include bad imagery, faux depth, and LOTS of terrible word choices. Just consider some sample bad poems…

The bad opening lines from Ben Erlichman’s A Fruit Soliloquy:

Alas, the moose, she has taken my bananas

And I can hear the sound of the wailing wind no longer.

The bad comparisons, such as this from Damian Farnworth: “I’m spicy like taco meat”

The bad imagery, including Kay Day’s thoughtful, “Someday I will once again walk in the brightness

Two of my very first Rulebook posts were on the topic of over-motivation (1,2), which has always been a big pet peeve for me.  Unfortunately, as a result, I’ve always been afraid to maximize the motivation for my heroes and they often wind up under-motivated, which is far worse.  In fact, in a later post, I talked about the need to have a huge motivation, and I never really resolved the contradiction.

So how on earth do you provide a huge motivation without over-motivating?  The answer lies in a comment on one of those original posts: “Infallible rule: Whenever someone gives you a lot of reasons, none of them is the real reason.”

In retrospect, in all of those over-motivated movies (Batman, Lethal Weapon 1 and 2, Training Day, etc), the problem isn’t the qualityof motivation, it’s the quantity. In each movie, the original motivation fell short halfway through, so the second half piled on a new motivation to see the hero through.

I now realize that I shouldn’t be afraid to strengthen my motivation all the way to the stratosphere.  If my hero gets to page 70 and says “Ugh, I’m done, this problem isn’t worth dealing with anymore”, I should definitely listen to that…but I shouldn’t have a new motivation walk in the door at that late date, as all of the above movies do…I should go back and strengthen the originalmotivation. 

Those movies did it exactly wrong: they multiplied the motivation when they should have simplified it.  As that commenter pointed out, giving too many reasons invalidates them all.  It feels desperate and unfocussed, and it makes the hero seem weak and vacillating, jerked this way and that by outside events.

Give your hero a strong simple reason that he or she has to solve the problem right now.

There’s nothing I hate more than those movies where a cop takes a special interest in a disappearance case because the victim reminds him of another kid he failed to save years ago.  Ugh.  No.  Don’t do that. That’s not how the human mind works. 

And whatever you do, don’t say, “You see, John Carter’s fighting to protect the princess of Mars because he wants redemption for failing to protect his own family on Earth ten years ago!”  We will punch you in the face if you tell us that.

But it’s tricky.  It’s tempting to simply advise: “We’re animals.  We only want what we want.  We act out of self-interest.  Start with a simple, profound motivation: self-preservation, love, sex, family, revenge, etc... or if it’s merely justice, make it a quest to make right a specific injustice of which the hero (and the audience) has felt the pain, either through personal experience or through intense empathy.”  And that’s certainly the simplest safest recommendation for selling a screenplay to Hollywood... but as a viewer I get really sick of the results: these days, every movie is a revenge movie.

So it looks like I’ve backed myself into another corner: how do you simplify the motivation without lowering everything to the level of revenge?  Looks like this is going to spill over to tomorrow...

James Scott Bell
@jamesscottbell