Ask the Author: Steven Fies
Answered Questions (6)
Steven Fies
My wife would tell you that I love to express myself (haha). This is certainly part of it, but I think the deepest inspiration comes from a desire to help others make sense of concepts that I've struggled with myself at some point in the past.
For instance, when I wrote my book regarding making extra money with craigslist, I was very excited to share all of the inner workings of finding steals on craigslist and reselling for a small profit. My next book was the 24 Hour Business Plan Template, which I was inspired to write after I personally planned my own business and left my job to pursue it full-time.
These are both things that anyone can do (make a few bucks reselling merchandise on craigslist, or start a business), but I think most people hold back out of fear. They are afraid they will fail, or are not confident in their ability to succeed - so they don't take action. Or maybe they want to set and reach a goal, but they procrastinate it because they want to wait for the "perfect" time.
As an author I hope that people are enabled and inspired by my own success stories. I hope they can realize that if an average guy like me can do these things and succeed, that they can do them too.
I definitely don't have all the answers, and that's certainly not how I want people to view me. I'm still learning every day, working on overcoming my own challenges and discovering the truths of the world. But I've achieved certain victories along the way, and to the extent that it's been a pleasure to share them with others.
For instance, when I wrote my book regarding making extra money with craigslist, I was very excited to share all of the inner workings of finding steals on craigslist and reselling for a small profit. My next book was the 24 Hour Business Plan Template, which I was inspired to write after I personally planned my own business and left my job to pursue it full-time.
These are both things that anyone can do (make a few bucks reselling merchandise on craigslist, or start a business), but I think most people hold back out of fear. They are afraid they will fail, or are not confident in their ability to succeed - so they don't take action. Or maybe they want to set and reach a goal, but they procrastinate it because they want to wait for the "perfect" time.
As an author I hope that people are enabled and inspired by my own success stories. I hope they can realize that if an average guy like me can do these things and succeed, that they can do them too.
I definitely don't have all the answers, and that's certainly not how I want people to view me. I'm still learning every day, working on overcoming my own challenges and discovering the truths of the world. But I've achieved certain victories along the way, and to the extent that it's been a pleasure to share them with others.
Steven Fies
Currently I am working on a book regarding workplace communications, which is related to the business I opened this past summer. Understanding effective, objective methods of communicating with people in the workplace is more necessary than ever, yet so many people have never received any formal training in this area. I am writing this book to empower the workforce at all levels of employment, management, and leadership.
Steven Fies
My most recent book (as of the time I'm answering this question) was the 24-Hour Business Plan Template.
The idea came from my own struggles to learn how to start a business and become an entrepreneur. For many years I've contemplated going into business for myself, but had basically no idea what I was doing.
After getting some good general planning and organizational advice from my wife, reading a number of books on startups (Lean Startup, Traction, and a few others), and learning the basics of composing a business plan, I finally gained the confidence to develop my own plan to launch a FT business in 2015. And true to form, I opened my consulting firm ThinkPlanLaunch (www.thinkplanlaunch.com) in July 2015.
To memorialize the most important things I learned about starting a business, I wrote the 24-Hour Business Plan Template. In the beginning, I discuss the importance of validation - that is, getting some customer feedback regarding the viability of your business. You might think everyone in the world will just love pink vacuum cleaners with a built-in laser light show... but will anybody actually buy them?! If not, it's probably not worth investing a lot of time and money developing. Yet this is exactly what so many people do when they have a "great idea" - they launch into it before understanding the market.
The rest of the book is a guide on building your business plan - and importantly, lays out a method for doing so rather quickly. While you do need to put a lot of thought into your plan (both your business plan and your life plan for executing it), it's critical that you don't get hung up on fine tuning it forever without actually executing. Included with the book online is an actual pre-formatted business plan template (MS Word and Google Docs versions available) and cash flow spreadsheet to help you get started.
It's my hope that this book, along with my others, will help readers save time in achieving their goals by learning from my experience.
The idea came from my own struggles to learn how to start a business and become an entrepreneur. For many years I've contemplated going into business for myself, but had basically no idea what I was doing.
After getting some good general planning and organizational advice from my wife, reading a number of books on startups (Lean Startup, Traction, and a few others), and learning the basics of composing a business plan, I finally gained the confidence to develop my own plan to launch a FT business in 2015. And true to form, I opened my consulting firm ThinkPlanLaunch (www.thinkplanlaunch.com) in July 2015.
To memorialize the most important things I learned about starting a business, I wrote the 24-Hour Business Plan Template. In the beginning, I discuss the importance of validation - that is, getting some customer feedback regarding the viability of your business. You might think everyone in the world will just love pink vacuum cleaners with a built-in laser light show... but will anybody actually buy them?! If not, it's probably not worth investing a lot of time and money developing. Yet this is exactly what so many people do when they have a "great idea" - they launch into it before understanding the market.
The rest of the book is a guide on building your business plan - and importantly, lays out a method for doing so rather quickly. While you do need to put a lot of thought into your plan (both your business plan and your life plan for executing it), it's critical that you don't get hung up on fine tuning it forever without actually executing. Included with the book online is an actual pre-formatted business plan template (MS Word and Google Docs versions available) and cash flow spreadsheet to help you get started.
It's my hope that this book, along with my others, will help readers save time in achieving their goals by learning from my experience.
Steven Fies
My advice for aspiring writers is two-fold:
1) Start thinking about marketing, audience-building, and promotion before you ever write the first word of your book. Why? Because building a fan-base is not easy and requires more time, effort, and money than most of us would like to admit. If you focus on getting some buzz built during a pre-launch, for example, getting as many people on board as possible before you release your book, you'll have a better shot of getting some good reviews after your launch and making sales. (Of course, if you don't care about the sales aspect, none of this really matters - but I think 95% of writers do secretly hope they can make some money doing what they love, which is writing - and in that case it's necessary to think about business from the beginning.)
2) Organize your ideas from a bird's eye, 20,000 ft perspective first - create an outline for your book, for instance. But then let your natural "stream of consciousness" fill the pages for each section so your voice and words aren't forced. So long as you have a clear idea of what you're writing about, this should be relatively simple, albeit it does require some practice.
1) Start thinking about marketing, audience-building, and promotion before you ever write the first word of your book. Why? Because building a fan-base is not easy and requires more time, effort, and money than most of us would like to admit. If you focus on getting some buzz built during a pre-launch, for example, getting as many people on board as possible before you release your book, you'll have a better shot of getting some good reviews after your launch and making sales. (Of course, if you don't care about the sales aspect, none of this really matters - but I think 95% of writers do secretly hope they can make some money doing what they love, which is writing - and in that case it's necessary to think about business from the beginning.)
2) Organize your ideas from a bird's eye, 20,000 ft perspective first - create an outline for your book, for instance. But then let your natural "stream of consciousness" fill the pages for each section so your voice and words aren't forced. So long as you have a clear idea of what you're writing about, this should be relatively simple, albeit it does require some practice.
Steven Fies
The best thing about being a writer is connecting with other people.
Interestingly, as a writer you almost never connect with someone on a thought or idea in real time. Instead, you'll have a thought while writing... and then days, weeks, months, or even years later - that thought will come back to life again when a given reader gets to that part in your book. In essence, they connect with you in the future.
To me, this is really cool - the idea that multiple readers are connecting with me on ideas for an unlimited amount of time after an idea is born. In a way, this makes the creative expression of a writer timeless, which is very cool to think about.
Interestingly, as a writer you almost never connect with someone on a thought or idea in real time. Instead, you'll have a thought while writing... and then days, weeks, months, or even years later - that thought will come back to life again when a given reader gets to that part in your book. In essence, they connect with you in the future.
To me, this is really cool - the idea that multiple readers are connecting with me on ideas for an unlimited amount of time after an idea is born. In a way, this makes the creative expression of a writer timeless, which is very cool to think about.
Steven Fies
Funny enough, writer's block is something I haven't struggled with often. I think the reason why is because I always try to "lean in" to what my inner voice wants to say - and then write from that place inside - rather than attempting to write about something that isn't organically happening in my mind and heart already.
The best way I can describe it is that I'm going "with the grain" instead of against it, in terms of what my natural expression wants to be. Instead of aiming for a particular type of tone or making a goal for a certain paragraph, section, or chapter, I try to let it remain a natural flow of consciousness the whole time.
Obviously at some point there are boundaries in the sense of keeping things organized, and not completely trailing off on irrelevant tangents. But even the higher-level categories and organization can be initially created based on a natural flow of consciousness, making it easier to fill in the gaps when sitting down to write.
Bottom line, it shouldn't ever be something that is forced. By letting words come out that naturally want to come out, I've been able to mostly avoid writer's block for much of my life.
The best way I can describe it is that I'm going "with the grain" instead of against it, in terms of what my natural expression wants to be. Instead of aiming for a particular type of tone or making a goal for a certain paragraph, section, or chapter, I try to let it remain a natural flow of consciousness the whole time.
Obviously at some point there are boundaries in the sense of keeping things organized, and not completely trailing off on irrelevant tangents. But even the higher-level categories and organization can be initially created based on a natural flow of consciousness, making it easier to fill in the gaps when sitting down to write.
Bottom line, it shouldn't ever be something that is forced. By letting words come out that naturally want to come out, I've been able to mostly avoid writer's block for much of my life.
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