Croissants, berries, and writing a new book!

In June 2022, two friends, former work colleagues, and budding writers had a fateful breakfast.

In June 2024, two friends, former work colleagues, and authors of A Career Carol: Professional Nightmares and How to Navigate Them met for breakfast.

“So, do you feel different? Has the experience of writing our first book changed us?”

“Well, I do feel I understand the publishing world much better; I certainly think my confidence has grown as a writer, but mainly I am more convinced than ever that there is a need for practical, relevant, accessible career advice aimed at a much more modern audience.”

“I agree, Ja. It feels like the right time to take the next step. The world needed A Career Carol, but I think it needs A Groundhog Career more.”

The two writers allowed a moment of silence to pass between them. Then, with the grace of synchronized swimmers and the deceptive power of superhero alter egos, they reached for the last croissant. They held it between them in the tradition of a Christmas Cracker.

“By the power of the Ghostly Society of Commencement Speakers, and begging the blessing of St. Francis de Sales, as we break this croissant, let it give life to a second book!”

…KAPOW…

A brilliant light engulfed the restaurant. This was unfortunate because the RAC Club takes a dim view of flash photography, most forms of fun, and any vestiges of the 21st century.

Three things followed….

The first was the magical materialization of a fully formed, completely edited and illustrated second manuscript. This emerged from the middle of the croissant along with a limerick, a cheesy joke, and a miniature card game.

The second was Drs. Schuster and Oxley finding themselves covered in croissant debris.

The third was the restaurant manager approaching.

“Drs. Schuster & Oxley… no more croissants for you two. I told you both last time… croissants are not to be used as magical book writing metaphors!”

After the delicate flaky pastry had settled and the manager had retreated:

“You know, Dr. Schuster… this book writing business is fun and nothing like what I imagined it would be. I don’t think I’ll look at a book or another author the same way ever again.”

“Ja… surprising, isn’t it… I certainly never guessed that the creative process would be quite so… explosive.”

Writing book(s) is simultaneously incredibly rewarding, frustrating, painstaking, tedious, and revelatory. We’ve talked before about why we write. It starts with purpose, with a mission (if that’s not too grand). The starting point is a desire to tackle a problem, convey something important to an audience.

But it is also about self-discovery. The process of writing seems to connect neurons and synapses in our brains in marvellous and sometimes surprising ways. Perhaps this is simply what invention and creativity feel like. We would probably debate that though, as the experience of writing feels different than the creative process experienced in other domains.

We mentioned in last month’s newsletter that we had inked the publishing contract with Practical Inspiration to publish our second book. We had outlined the book and discussed it many times over the last 12 months. We had even written sections of the book in between promoting A Career Carol… however, it wasn’t finished.

This past 6 weeks, we have been busy putting the book together. Some of it has come really quickly… like the proverbial flow of consciousness. Other aspects have caused little roadblocks.

We think our superpower (beyond furtive imaginations about breakfast meetings) is that we are a writing partnership. We share every aspect of the concept, outline, intended approach, and writing style. Based on what we’ve heard, this seems quite unusual. However, for us, when we hit a snag, we can often unlock a new idea, a way around the problem, by simply debating it.

Our little story about the croissant Christmas Cracker materializing a manuscript doesn’t do justice to all the really hard work that you need to invest in writing a book. However, on a couple of levels, we think it does. There is something truly magical and mysterious about how the finished manuscript emerges. It has also been a source of entertainment and shared joy. Humor is central to our lives and our style of writing. Despite what some people may think, this is something that bonds us… our shared sense of humor and fun.

Anyhow… enough musing on how these things happen… time to do some editing. After that… more editing. Then tomorrow… editing. Next week… editing.

A Career Carol – In Audio Book!

Delighted to share that A Career Carol is now an audiobook!

We worked with Matthew Fuller, a talented London-based voice artist to put the audiobook together. It went live June 20 and is available via Amazon and Austin Macauley.

8 Facts About Audiobooks:

1 – Audiobooks were originally developed for the sight impaired.
2 – The first audiobook dates back to 1932 and was a Shakespeare reading.
3 – Audiobooks are on the rise… growing at over 14% per year.
4 – They are environmentally friendly.
5 – There is some evidence that listening to a book helps you retain the information better.
6 – There is tremendous versatility in the format… allowing multitasking or dialing up a book from your iPhone.
7 – While we hope this isn’t true of our book… they can be a great way to help you sleep!
8 – They can help broaden your vocabulary and sharpen your pronunciation.

Choices… Curse or Blessing?

The Dr. Schuster Column

David and I are probably 80% of our way through writing the sequel of our debut book A Career Carol, which was about the struggles of angst-plagued Shey, a college student trying to find his future career and himself along the way.

Those of you who have written a book, created a piece of art, or just entered a new job, are probably aware that starting something new always leads to a heightened awareness of yourself and your environment. Every smell, every flavor, sound or emotion can trigger a tsunami of ideas to create and build something unique.

The sequel and second book in our Shey Sinope Saga is mostly about choices and the consequence of our choices. As a result, I am probably hyperaware when people talk about choices or lack thereof.

I ended up sitting next to a well-known French/Mexican Executive Coach over a private dinner in Brussels, and we were in the middle of pleasant introductory conversation trying to share our life stories over the time it takes to finish a starter. You can probably imagine my surprise when she told me that she is planning to write a book about choices and shared a summary of a TED Talk she recently gave. From that minute on, our conversation took on a very different level of intensity.

We wholeheartedly agreed on the issue that most people, even people in power and positions of privilege, could benefit from a deeper distinction of the meaning and consequences of choices. We all make many decisions every day, most of them unconscious, some of them conscious.

In several countries, we have elections coming up. Elections that might shape the future for the better or the worse. I personally can take part in two of these elections, in the UK and Austria. Neither are probably as consequential as the French or the US elections.

However—and this is the crux of the point I am attempting to make—at election time, we all make choices. The choice could be not to vote, or vote invalidly, or pick one of the main options. The key question here is, as with all choices: are we making informed choices?

Making informed choices means to have data, means preparation time, but also means to understand the short-, mid- and long-term consequences of these choices. And that’s when it becomes difficult. It requires some effort, some investment. It can be an unwelcome or inconvenient additional chore.

Thus, many people simply opt out. Choose to drift and not take part in their future, choose to become passengers or even victims. It is strange how many will blame others for the system or the context in which we live and yet… they take no active part in voting. That’s also a choice, maybe one that eases any heavy conscience or allows them to feel better that their circumstances are not, to at least some extent, a result of their own choices.

Back to my original question—Choice: curse or blessing? It might feel like a curse but ultimately, it’s a blessing. Thus, voting per se, irrespective of what we vote for, is definitely a good choice. After all, we are privileged to live in democracies.

As Leonard Cohen’s famous song goes…

I’ve had choices
Since the day I was born I heard voices
That told me right from wrong
If I had listened, I wouldn’t be here today
Living and dying with choices I made…

May Highlights

May was slightly quieter for us in terms of media coverage. We’ve dialed back some of our media work to focus on finishing our second book manuscript. Nonetheless, we did see some interesting pieces published in May:

Our series of articles for SecEd were completed in May. We shared the details in last month’s newsletter, but we think they bear repeating here. We loved the opportunity to go beyond advice to really practical exercises designed to help address some of the important gaps that make transitioning from school to work so difficult. You can see the entire series via our website or SecEd’s.

Our friend Dr. Sunil Singh asked us to write an article for his extraordinarily successful journal HR Today. We wrote this piece about how the $24 billion spent on employee engagement initiatives appears to have been wasted.