When I first entered the Writing Arts major, my only future plan was to be a writer. What kind of writer? At the time, I didn't really understand that there were kinds of writers, or that there were more jobs out there beyond journalism and crafting novels. Even through the years of discovering editing or freelancing, I still didn't quite get the whole "how to enter the workforce" concept. 

1. So, what are you “war stories” What has kept you from writing that novel? What has killed momentum, what are your excuses? Or, if you’ve never attempted a novel, what’s stopping you? Do you think you ever will try it?

My first attempt at novel writing began and failed my freshman year of high school. I sat down one day with a story idea in my head and just started typing. I worked on it for weeks, reaching over a hundred pages, until I started focusing more on school. I put the book down, not looking at it again for months, before flipping through it again when the summer started. I planned to finish it. That is, until I read through and hated (strong word, but needed) the story line, the lack of plot, the unrealistic dialogue, and the inanity of the conflict. 

Intellectual influences: 
Who were your favorite professors (and why)? 

My favorite professors were the ones that taught me something practical, something that I find myself using either in daily life or in a more professional setting. In that way, my writing professors have been invaluable. Professor Harrison, my American English Grammar instructor, taught in such a way that the information and practice stuck with me and allowed me not only to know, but to understand. Professor Nussbaum was a wealth of information and was always amiable and approachable. In reality, while these two professors were the first to come to mind, I view favorite professors not in who they were as people or how personally I knew them, but with how well they have prepared me for my future. It's about who has given me the tools and confidence to achieve my dreams.

Identify the best paper you ever wrote, the most influential book you have read, and the 
single most important concept you have learned. 

Best Paper: "Childhood Should Not Equal Limitation" 
Influential Book: Jack London's "Call of the Wild"
Concept: Everyone fails, makes a fool of themselves, and trips over air, you just have to keep smiling and keep moving. 


b. Encouragement: Recall and write out the actual words of a professor, teacher, or 
someone else in your life who encouraged you to go in this direction. 

My Mother: You write like a book, like the books we read and the stories we try to tell. That's the feel that your writing has, and that is a skill you should build up, because that is what you have enough building blocks for to be great at. People want to read what you write.

c. Turning points: Where were you and what were you doing when you first 
thought of going in this particular direction?  How have your interests evolved? 

I always wanted to write a book, to add my own spin to the stories that I imagined myself into. I wanted to create a character and a world that I could shape and twist in all the ways I could find, so that it felt satisfactory to me in ways that other novels were lacking. Today, I still have that dream of my own novel, but I've added to it. I also have more job-related goals, such as becoming a copy editor or editor, working in publishing, or trying my hand at freelance writing. 

d. Experiences: List volunteer, travel, family, and life experiences that have 
inspired you to go in this career direction. 

My family has been behind my discussion to pursue writing 100%. Liberal, artsy, with more than a dash of practical, as soon as I found  a way to make it a solid career they offered me their support in any way they could. I volunteered at my University's writing center, where I helped my peers with essays, dissertations, and the basics of grammar. THis was what really sparked my desire to go into editing, to help others build their work into something polished and complete, to help them achieve their own writing dreams with the best work possible.

e. Academics: How have you prepared yourself to succeed? 

I am a Writing Arts major at Rowan University, with a Creative Writing concentration, and an Honors concentration. I have worked with writing clubs and strived to learn about every aspect of the writing world, be it creative, non-fiction, journalistic, film writing, technical writing, using technology, or looking into the psychology behind language, I try to expand my horizons more and more. 

f. Skills: What skills have you honed through the experiential and educational 
choices you have made? 

The mechanics of my writing have vastly improved, my understanding of the writing industry and the different options out there, my understand of what makes good writing and what makes great writing, and the different techniques to crafting work.

g. Personal attributes: What personal attributes make you particularly likely to 
succeed?

I am organized, take pride in being prompt and on time, believe in quality work, and have been raised with the value that work should be something close to your heart or it's not worth doing. Writing is what matters to me, so any job I find within writing will be my top priority all my life. 

Writer's Bloq offers an apparently successful new way to market yourself to publishers. What ways do you think you can make yourself stand out? Do you think social media is a way to do this? Do you think there are any drawbacks?

            To be honest, the question of ‘standing out’ has been one I’ve been thinking about for some time now. I have been looking to social media to do this, because that is my only link to any persons in the professional writing world, and it’s a tentative link right now. I have a LinkedIn page where I have slowly been gathering more connections and updating my resume, and I use Twitter to talk about how I’m writing and to connect with other writers, published authors, and successful editors. The other site I use regularly, and I find I have the most success in putting my writing out there with, is Tumblr. Even though it is a more private way to market, it is the best place I’ve found for feedback and a safe haven for writing thoughts or works in progress. I think there are plenty of drawbacks with putting my name, life goals, and personal information out there for everyone with a computer to see, but the risk is not really a choice. Without an online presence, I have less to offer employers. It would put everyone with a Twitter a step up on me, so even though I don’t really have a problem and do enjoy using social media, I also feel that it is a forced choice for my desired line of work.

Do you think that searching for your name on Google would make you look professional or like any other social media user (try Googling yourself and see what comes up)? How would you feel if an employer saw these results? Are you going to use BrandYourself to try to improve your Googled name?

I haven’t Googled myself in a long time, so I was pleasantly surprised that my LinkedIn page was the first link to pop up (the first one that was me, anyway, and not another Jessica O’Shea). I would be completely fine with an employer finding that and clicking through, since that’s why I have the page in the first place. My Facebook, which would be something I would be more hesitant to show a boss, doesn’t come up because I don’t go by my last name on that site, choosing to go with my middle name as a last name on there to throw people off the trail.

            The next link that pops up is my Twitter, which is also good for an employer to find. Those were the only two links that directly connected with my pages. I checked Google images to see if any of my Facebook or other photos were up there, and my profile picture for Twitter was, but that is good, compared to what some of the other “Jessica O’Shea” were doing. Since my best professional links and photos are what comes up on Google, I don’t think I will use BrandYourself at this time. I guess my biggest fear is that an employer will click on a link that is not me and get us confused.

Copyright changes with each contract. How much do you know about your rights as an author - how much is asking for too much? What are the pros and cons of signing into a contract with someone else (a publisher, agent, etc.)?

            I don’t know much about copyrights, which is a scary thought. After reading Allen Moria’s article, I’m a little afraid of all the pitfalls and loopholes that some editors and companies might try to use to take advantage of my inexperience. I have a tendency to trust people, especially people with similar interests or in places of authority, but slowly I am coming to the realization that most in business don’t watch out for the young, small fries. While that’s depressing, I see this as simply one more aspect of writing that I need to learn. I want to know what rights I should always check for, like having the right to resell my work later or get payment if the market uses my work after it’s sold. I think that there are plenty of pros to signing a contract, part self-satisfaction, part honor, part simply being an aspect of business, but there are plenty of cons I see, too. In the age of what seems like free information, with personal facts and daily lives pasted up on websites for the world to see, signing a binding contract is a terrifying proposition. I can’t log off or cancel my membership, its signed and I am bound to follow it, whatever it says.

Do you think you'll have the ability to turn down an offer if the questions you ask are unsatisfactory to you or will you stick with the job because you want to be published regardless?

It would be extremely difficult to turn down what is such a dream of mine, but if I’m going to get published, I’m going to make sure I’m doing it the right way. I want to be proud of my work and where it ends up, not upset and frustrated after being taken through the wringer. To actually say “no” though, there would have to be some serious issues, like I’m not getting paid or all of my rights to the work are being stripped. That said, I think to say no would take a lot of thought and consideration, but I would do it if I have to.

If an employer requested access to your Facebook account or other social profile, would you grant it to them? Why or why not?

When my Facebook was created, I have maintained it with the knowledge that how I presented myself would be easily accessed by my school, my parents, my family, and possibly future employers, so I have been careful to keep any negative or possibly damaging criteria from my page. That said, I would be happy to grant a boss LIMITED access to my account. I am a firm believer that one should never be Facebook friends with the nosy relatives, the ex-boyfriends, or the boss. It just leads to trouble down the line no matter how squeaky-clean anyone tries to be. When I think about my Twitter accounts or my Tumblr blog, that is where I become extremely hesitant to allow full or even limited access to an employer, because I have been using these sites almost exclusively for personal use. That said, I think that I would be willing to create a more professional account for these sites and maintain them with the same thoughtful awareness that I have my Facebook, so that I would not have reason to fear for my reputation or future employment. 

The more I think about it, the more I believe that it is necessary for my generation to have separate identities on social networking sites, the personal one and the professional one, because they can be very different in tone and content, especially if we have had our personal account since we were teenagers. I know that when I created my twitter, I was not thinking about bosses or the possibility of it affecting my job prospects, mostly because that warning was so specifically for Facebook. No one used to tell stories of people being fired because of Twitter, but now the Twitter warning stories are prevalent in the news and culture. I think that having the separation of the worlds is the best solution, otherwise the fun of social networks is diminished and the possible uses reduced. 
 
 Do you have your résumé available online?

Yes, I do. I have it posted on two different sites, my LinkedIn page and my account on Internships.com, a site new to me and that I am still exploring. While it makes me a little nervous to put so much of my personal information on the internet, those two sites are well respected and I know LinkedIn can be trusted. Neither site has resulted in a job or internship offer yet, but it feels like I have taken steps to have a professional presence on the web. 

A lot of students have had Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, and personal blogs for several years, meaning most of the earlier (or current) content may not be what we want future employers or job prospects seeing. Should we create new accounts that are more professional or is it acceptable to move forward with our own accounts but in a more professional tone?


It seems like most of the authors use social media in the business end of their writing, as a way to turn a profit and market themselves and their work after the work has been completed or published. Is this the best route for us to take? Is there any way to use Twitter and Facebook for something like finding freelance jobs or discovering new topics for articles?


Mandy of the authors say that they use social media to develop friendships or more casual business relationships with editors, publishers, and others. Does anyone have any experience doing this? How do you get the ball rolling with such professionals? 


What if you don't have any work that has been published, is it still expected that you have your own website or should that come later?

After reading "The Buzz on Social Media" I'm thinking I am. The problem I was running into when reading the articles and considering how the authors were using sites like Facebook and Twitter, I realized that they were speaking from the position of creating the accounts knowing they would use them professionally. If a future employer looked at my Twitter and history of tweets, well...I just doubt I'd get the job. The problem is that I've had my accounts for several years know, meaning all those important swears and rude jokes and funny/strange conversations with my friends are all on the internet. I didn't go into this thinking, "Hopefully my new boss doesn't check my Twitter to see if I'm writing because I just mentioned eating Doritos instead of working on that article." 

I understand the need for a writer to have social presence, I'm just worried about how I can adjust my current presence to better show the kind of attitude and tone I want editor or publisher prospects to get. 

In the WA MA program here, which classes did you feel helped the most and were there any you would recommend to try to take?

What's the best way to describe yourself on a resume or in an interview when looking for freelance work?