In preparing my Writing Portfolio, I wondered how far back in my career I would pull material. When sharing your work with potential employers, it seems smart to share your best work. But that approach comes from a time when you’d have to stuff photocopied clips into an envelope or worry about your’s and your recipient’s e-mail attachment limit (as you attach two or three heavy .PDF files to it). When you’re hosting your own files and can point an employer to them at their own disposal (like this site), why not share everything?
1) It shows the growth you’ve made as a writer. This is important for employers to see and it helps you realize the progress that you’ve made.
2) A clip that you aren’t fond of might stand out to an employer. What if the person perusing your portfolio happened to have written about the same subject and was impressed by your work? Just hope they’re not jealous.
3) You can still make your favorites stand out. No matter what, you’re still in control of the content you share. People are naturally driven to items that you highlight, so chose carefully.
With this in mind, I’d like to go ahead and do just that—highlight selections from my archive, provide a little background for each selection and give the content fresh appeal. As these selections build, I’ll cross-link From the Archive selections with my portfolio, helping to create a “living” portfolio that has detailed explanations and behind-the-scenes stories that drives traffic to my portfolio. Score. Look out for From the Archive every Monday.
And uhm, why not peruse the Writing Portfolio now, if you just can’t wait?
Comments 5
I’ve always been told that employers don’t want to see clips more than 2 years old.
In fact, I’ve always been told it’s best not to send anything more than a year old.
Posted 06 Jul 2008 at 10:54 pm ¶Dirty secret, gents: We don’t actually read the clips. We might glance at the first graf or two. It’s pretty much whom you’ve written for, not what you’ve written. And, of course, whom you’ve gotten friendly with.
Posted 07 Jul 2008 at 8:52 pm ¶Ouch, y’all don’t read them! Ah, I suppose that figures, but it stings a little bit, no? So am I accumulating multiple clips from the same outlet for my health…?
Posted 11 Jul 2008 at 11:41 pm ¶No, you’re doing it for experience and (one hopes) pay. By all means, write every chance you get — but don’t agonize unduly over what’s in your clip package.
See, we assume that anything you send has had the crap edited out of it — but the fact that Publication X thought enough of you to make that effort says something to us.
Just use common sense. If you’re sending clips, consider topic relevance first, prestige of publication second, and age of clip third. If you’re creating an online archive, I’d organize by prestige rather than chronology. Once you’re full time somewhere or develop a solid freelance track record, you can revert to chronology.
Ultimately, taking every opportunity to improve your skills while also ingratiating yourself with people who already work at the places you want to work is the surest strategy.
Posted 12 Jul 2008 at 8:13 pm ¶Update you bum
Posted 30 Jul 2008 at 8:20 pm ¶Post a Comment