-
What are your 2024 writing goals?
In preparation for tomorrow’s Premium Member goal-setting event, I’m popping this thread here so that we can declare our goals for 2024 publicly and hold ourselves accountable. All you need to do is pop your goal in a comment. We’ll check in on a monthly basis to see how you’re doing!
Top tip: Wait to declare your goal until the goal-setting event tomorrow evening. We’re going to chat about how to set achievable goals and how to avoid common pitfalls, so come back to this thread once you’ve attended the event. Not going to make it? We’ll be uploading it as a Masterclass later in the week. Not a Premium Member yet? Join us here – Join Us – Jericho Writers
-
10 Replies
-
I published my first novel in 2023. Goal 1 is to publish a French language version (story is set in France)
Goal 2 is to finish book 2 in the series.
-
Great Goal-Setting Webinar 🙂
My SMART Goal for my 5th MS:
Specific = Finish 1st draft by end of Feb ’24
Measurement = 25k new words to write (500 words p/day x5 days p/week)
Accountable = Keeping a log words completed and dates in a spreadsheet.
Relevant = Tick off the scenes-to-be-written in my flat-plan-plotting spreadsheet.
Time Bound = 28th Feb 2024.
Fingers crossed 🙂
-
Finish second draft with focus on structure and plot. Focus on a chapter a week. Finish by end August.
Will plan out a schedule….
-
I want to create a daily writing habit, by writing at least one hour a day to fit in around my busy schedule, focusing less on word count more on getting something on the ruddy page (even if poor quality), and do this for at least a month (as new habits normally take three weeks to stick).
-
My SMART – sort of:
Specific – Finish the damn novel by 3489 A.D. or by end of February 2025
Measurable – Attend every possible The Writing Room session in existence, also 42.
Achievable – Plan a general ending for book 1.
Relevant – Fail miserably on the Achievable portion as I’m a punter.
Time bound – 56 weeks to get there.
Also due to a full time job it’s not so easy now to become committed to writing as much as I want, but hopefully The Writing Room & Write With Jericho sessions will alleviate this a bit. Also a peace deal between the non-equatorial Guinea pigs with the Equatorial ones might help end years of work not getting done and layers and CPAs getting paid for…:)
-
Goal 1
Specific: Get manuscript and submission ready for pitching to agent
Measureable: Progress measured in a spreadsheet of documents to be edited/prepared
Achievable: Approx 3 chapters per week
Relevant: First stage towards getting my book published
Time bound: 22 chapters @ 3 chapters per week, I aim to be ready to picth by March 11
[FOLLOW UP NOTE: have set up my spreadsheet now!]
-
This reply was modified 1 year, 1 month ago by Julie Hargreaves.
-
This reply was modified 1 year, 1 month ago by
-
I really enjoyed your webinar Becca and I hope you’re feeling better very soon. I’ve also asked to connect with you on Townhouse.
Specific : Re-edit novel using Emily from Jericho Writer’s idea of mixing both 1st person diaries (my first drafts) with 3rd person drafts (my recent draft).
Measurable: Divide the novel into 1-2k chapters to be able to do manageable chunks and keep track of progress.
Achievable: 1-2k per day is achievable. Making 10,000 per week.
Relevant: The novel will have a structure that can be further edited and offered to Beta readers or whatever is the next stage. (I hope someone will tell me!).
Time bound: Based on the above I aim to finish the edit by mid-April 2024
Any advice or comments happily received!
-
Thanks so much for attending the workshop yesterday everyone! If you want to catch up on the replay and grab the download, you can do so here: https://jerichowriters.com/masterclasses/goal-setting-with-becca-day/
Here are my SMART goals for this year. As mentioned, I like to focus on my year is quarters, so I have a goal for the first quarter and a goal for the 2nd quarter. I’ll revisit these later on in the year.
Goal for quarter 1:
Specific: Finish my fourth book, totalling 80k words.
Measurable: I’ll be tracking my wordcount in Scrivener and ticking off chapters as I write them in my outline
Achievable: 1,000 words need to be written per day. This allows me to have a few days off when the need calls.
Relevant: I need to finish up this contract before I can move onto my quarter 2 goal.
Time bound: My deadline is 1 April
Goal for quarter 2:
Specific: Get a new book deal, either with my current publisher or with a different publisher
Measurable: I’ll be checking in with my agent regularly over the coming months to see where we are
Achievable: Based on past sales, I should be able to get another deal. In order to achieve this goal I’ll need to come up with some pitches, discuss them with my agent, and find something that publishers will want.
Relevant: If I don’t get another book deal, my career will stall
Time bound: Ideally I’ll have another deal in the bag by the middle of the year
-
Thanks Becca. Hope you’re feeling better.
I wasn’t 100% certain re. publishing, but after your workshop, I feel inspired to try to get at least 1 of my novels ready for leaving my little writing nest!
Specific: to complete and polish 1 novel i.e. make a final decision on the ending (without changing my mind again…) and join it all up together neatly.
Measurable: by mapping against plot outlines/ ticking off lists
Achievable: by writing/editing at least 3-4 hours per day (1 day off)
Relevant: have novel finished and shiny ready for beta reading/final edits
Timebound: June 2024
-
I just caught up with the goal setting event. Thank you I found it gave me a much needed injection of motivation. It’s also helpful to know that my obstacles are universal obstacles! will definitely be utilising many of the tools suggested.
My Goal for the start of 2024:
To take what I learnt from my agent 1-2-1 session, tweak my MS and Submission package accordingly and resubmit to agents by the end of February.
Then from March 1st it’s time to move on to a new project!
Thanks for the much needed inspiration!
