Planning Ahead (Even When You Kinda Suck At It)

Okay, so I am the worst planner-aheader ever.  I don't like making doctor's appointments more than a few days out (but I do ever since I missed making an important one).  I don't like making hair appointments at all (which is part of the reason I cut my own hair).  I want to do stuff when I get the notion to do stuff.  And not before.

However, being a self-published author means planning ahead, even when you kinda suck at it. 

There's planning a publication schedule so you know when you're going to need to have things done so you can, you know, get a book in an editor's hands.  And so you know what the hell you're going to do so you can fit yourself into a cover artist's schedule. 

Ran into that one again this week.  Ack.  It's taken care of, but it meant planning ahead when I wasn't ready to even start thinking about the next book and the next.  (Yes, I am now on my artist's schedule for October AND February. :panics a little:  So, not ready.)

There's planning a marketing campaign.  Umm, yeah, so not good at thinking ahead far enough to do that, but I'm trying.  I'm trying to think about next month's release and have marketing around that to draw people in.  We'll see if I get it right.

Planning anything is so outside my comfort zone.  But I have to step outside my comfort zone if I want to make this self-publishing thing work.  And I really do want to. 

Heh, maybe I should've called the blog Outside the Comfort Zone instead of Outside the Box.  Yeah, no. 

Anyway, I've made some good inroads into being a planner.  I have a date book!  And a calendar!  And I even remember - most of the time - to write stuff on them.  (I'm better than I used to be.)  But I'm still kind of sucky at it. 

Hell, if I wasn't, I wouldn't have needed to panic when my artist said she was almost booked through the end of the year.  I would've already had space in her calendar because I would've been planning.  And if I was really planning, she'd be working on the next cover in December or January instead of February (which will push a release date back to March instead of a Feb release like I would've had planned, if I was, you know, a planner.)

It's all good.  And I'm working on it.

How are you at planning?