How to Deal with Writing Deadlines

How to Deal with Writing Deadlines
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Dawn_Arkin]Dawn Arkin

If you write for fun, you may never have to worry about deadlines. You can write for the joy it gives you. But if you want to write for publication, deadlines will be a major part of your writing career.

Anywhere you look in the writing world you will find a deadline. Contests have them, magazines have them and even fellow writers have them. Learning to deal with deadlines will help you use your time better.

Contest Deadlines

All writing contests will have some deadline for submissions to be in. Whether it is a month, or a year, there is a cutoff for entries to be received by the contest host. When you decide to enter a contest, you need to make sure when the contest ends. Allow yourself amply time to get your submission written and edited. Do not decide to enter a contest when you only have a few days before the deadline. You will only set yourself you up for disappointment.

Publication Deadlines

Some publications have reading periods when they will accept submissions. Usually editors will return a manuscript unread if received before or after. They have enough to do without keeping track of a submission sent during the wrong time period. Always check the publications web page or submission guidelines to be sure you are sending your work at the right time. You will also want to see if they have a theme for each issue when you check.

Work for Hire

This section is the largest because you will have more issues with a work you have been asked to write.

Editors who have accepted your query for a non-fiction piece will give you a deadline for the finished product to be on their desk. Before you accept the assignment, be sure you can finish it on time. If you cannot, do not accept the assignment. It is that simple.

If you accept the assignment, then be sure you meet it. Nothing annoys an editor more than a missed deadline, especially one they are not told about of ahead of time. They have deadlines of their own, and every one you miss destroys their faith in your abilities to handle an assignment. The more you keep your deadlines, the better your reputation in the industry will be.

If you are going to miss a deadline, let the editor know as soon as possible. Give him a date when you can get the job done, and make sure you keep your promise. The quicker he knows, the better your chance for keeping the assignment.

Learning to Schedule Your Time

Buy a calendar and use it. Keep all of your assignments, with the important dates associated with them written within those pages. Do not accept an assignment without first checking to see if you have anything that might interfere with you completing that task.

Here is a simple trick you can use when scheduling your assignments and submissions. Once you have your final deadline, the date it has to be on your editor's desk, you need to figure out when you have to finish the draft and edits, and when you have to put it in the mail. Then push each of those dates back by a few days. Give yourself enough of a buffer so you have extra time in case of unforeseeable problems.

Deadlines are a way of life for writers. Learning to keep them will go a long way to making your life run simpler and smoother.

Dawn Arkin is an author on http://www.Writing.Com/
which is a site for Fiction Writing. Her portfolio can be found at http://www.Writing.Com/authors/darkin so stop by and read for a while.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Dawn_Arkin http://EzineArticles.com/?How-to-Deal-with-Writing-Deadlines&id=435545

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