04 Dec 09 Are You a Freelance Writer, Do You Know How to Fight Distraction?

For a freelance writer, it is quite easy to get distracted because he works from home. For the large part of the day, people in our home keep either talking or watching television, which never fails to distract us. This is frustrating, which further sucks away our productivity.

How to avoid it?

Fortunately, there is a way out of it, which anyone of you can use to avoid distraction, regardless of your situation.

Assign yourself a place of work

This is the must-take action for any freelance writer. It is not good to carry your laptop and sit anywhere in your home to work, well occasional working-in-kitchen will not hurt but do not make it a routine. I know it sounds against the spirit of freelance writing—you can work from anywhere and anytime—but this is worth a deviation. Find a lonely corner in your house and turn it into a workplace.

Fix your work hours

I may sound like talking against the freedom of freelance writing, but my intention is not to drag you back into the 9-5 job that you left in the past, it is only to help you produce more. And as it is you can anytime pull the string and call it off.

Work, no matter what

Once you fix your work hour, you should stick to it, no matter what. Well, you can deviate from “no matter what” principle without any guilt feeling when you know you need to. Occasion deviation never hurts, at least not in our profession.

Talk to your family

At times, getting things write just need a word from us. Talk to your family and tell them that you are working around here, so not to create distraction. Well this might not work with a disgruntled spouse, but in most of the cases, this will be enough. Believe it or not, they understand the value of the work you are doing.

As you can see, fighting off distraction does not take so much of muscle power as much it takes discipline and tactics. What are your tactics to fight this monster off? Use the comment box and tell me your strategies.

Tags: Discipline, Distraction, Freedom, Freelance Work, Freelance Writer, Freelance Writing, Guilt, Intention, Job, Laptop, Lonely Corner, Monster, Muscle Power, Occasion, Principle, Productivity, Profession, Sounds, Spirit, Watching Television

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19 Oct 09 How To Handle An Illegal Question At An Interview

Interviewers frequently ask illegal questions during interviews. Whether this is intentional or not, your answers could impact how you are received, which in turn can impact whether or not you get the job. How you handle these scenarios is just as important as how you answer the legitimate interview questions. Knowing what to do is of vital importance in any interview.

The first thing you should do is figure out the nature of the question. An illegal question does not refer to a question that is criminally liable, but rather just a question that an interviewer is not allowed to ask. Questions like these are from topics that cannot legally have a bearing on whether or not you get a job. Such as questions about race, sex, age, health, disabilities, and religion. Any of these could be mentioned unintentionally in the forming of a question, but all are illegal for an interviewer to ask you.

It’s necessary for you to understand that in most cases an illegal question comes up as a mistake from the interviewer. Oftentimes these are asked with no intention to discriminate against you. But rather these are attempts by the interviewer to be friendly, or to relate to you. This way the can get a better feel for how you would fit in with the company. But usually through inexperience, instead of doing that through legal means, they accidentally slip into an illegal pitfall by asking you a personal question.

In this case you have two polite options for answering the question and moving the interview forward. The first option is that you could answer the question. But in answering, make sure that it’s a question you feel completely comfortable answering, and preferably answering n brief. Then try to move on to a different topic. The second option is to essentially ignore the question and move the interview forward by focusing on a different work related topic of yours.

Either option works well, and will keep an interview’s flow without making for an uncomfortable situation on either side. Try to stay professional and courteous, with a positive disposition, as you always should during any interview. If you can follow that model, and not flinch under the pressure of an illegal question, you’ll be just fine.

Tags: Age Health, Answering The Question, Attempts, Bearing, First Option, Health Disabilities, Illegal Question, Illegal Questions, Inexperience, Intention, Interview Questions, Interviewer, Interviewers, Job, Mistake, Personal Question, Pitfall, Religion, Scenarios, Sex Age

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24 May 09 Anatomy of a Persuasive Letter

As the name suggest, a persuasive letter is written with an intention to move the recipient in the certain direction. Writing and winning the reader can be both easy and difficult depending upon the nature of the letter, and the mood of the recipient. If the recipient is in positive frame of mind, and is likely to accept the proposal then even a weak logic and not-so-strong persuasive letter will be effective, but if the recipient is not likely to accept your proposal then it will need some convincing before the recipient agrees to the proposal. Writing this kind of persuasive letter takes some research and effort.

There is a certain structure you need to follow in order to build a strong argument that in turn will win over the recipient. Before discussing the structure of a persuasive letter, let’s first talk about the research objective. The following list will tell you what all you need to know before you can begin writing a persuasive letter.

Define the target audience
Purpose of writing a persuasive letter.
Make a list of information you want to include in the letter
Make a list of supportive arguments. The arguments will show the reader what is in there for him.
Make a list of possible objections, or mental block that might be pushing the reader to decide against your proposal.
Is there something peculiar about the problem you are going to address? Make a list of it.

Anatomy of a persuasive letter

Introduction: Introduce your product, services and request in this first paragraph. Outline the important changes in this new version.

Outline the benefits: The introduction paragraph should be followed by the paragraph that will talk about the benefit of the product, services and request you are making. In this paragraph write statements that will build case for you.

Call for action: Once the recipient knows about the benefit he will have by accepting your proposal, you need to tell him what you want from him, and what action he should take to help you.

Thanks: Thank your reader for the time he has devoted in reading the letter. Also include a conclusion in this final paragraph. The conclusion should be as forward thinking as it can be.

Tags: Address List, Anatomy, Benefit, Frame Of Mind, Intention, Introduction Paragraph, Logic, Nature, Objections, Paragraph Outline, Proposal, Recipient, Research Objective, Target Audience, Version Outline, Writing A Persuasive Letter

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04 Dec 09 Are You a Freelance Writer, Do You Know How to Fight Distraction?

Assign yourself a place of work

Fix your work hours

Work, no matter what

Talk to your family

19 Oct 09 How To Handle An Illegal Question At An Interview

24 May 09 Anatomy of a Persuasive Letter

Anatomy of a persuasive letter

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