No matter how you look at it, if you are heading down the road towards publication, then you are running a writing business. Most of us don't start out thinking of it that way. We just want to write. But with publication comes money, taxes, marketing, and sometimes hiring others.

I have written on this topic before, highlighting how this whole running-a-business thing tends to just creep up on us. But for today's post, instead of focusing on how we are all little business owners, I want to delve into the different hats that we all need to wear.

A writer has at least three hats to wear.

Any writer on the publication track, be they self-published or traditionally published, will eventually need to wear three different hats, hopefully not at the same time.

The Creator

The creator is the one responsible for generating the intellectual property. As a writer, this needs to be your priority—especially in the early years. Let's face it, without content you have nothing to sell. Your manuscripts are your product.

The Investor

To make money, you need to be willing to invest money. This might be to pay editors or cover designers. Or maybe, it's to pay for printing services. Maybe it's the cost of courses or conferences. Or perhaps, it's just to pay for the computer you use to write your manuscripts. Whatever the reason for the cost, there will be a cost that you will need to pay for somewhere. You need to be willing to invest in your own career.

In the beginning, the return on your investment will be low—most likely nonexistent. But many startup businesses run at a loss for some time. A writing business is no different.

The CEO

The cool thing about running your own business is being the boss. The CEO is the one responsible for the day-to-day operations of the business and making all the decisions. But the CEO is also responsible for turning the content generated by the creator into a sellable product, hopefully getting a return on the investor's money.

Separation of Business and Creation

So, every writer is a creator, an investor, and a CEO, but keeping the three separate is not easy. It's common for writers to get bogged down in the sales and business side of things (the CEO), allowing all their precious writing time to be sucked away by social media and marketing things, and forgetting to be the creator. In some ways, the realization that we're running businesses can be a little daunting, but there is a common strategy for dealing with the business overwhelm.

Designate one day a week as a business day.

I have heard multiple writers talk about this one, including Brandon Sanderson. It turns out that Brandon Sanderson leaves all his business stuff, including answering emails with something more detailed, to Thursdays. The rest of the time, he's got that creator hat on.

It seems so simple, but it is not easy to implement. The temptation to do other things besides the creating is so strong. The CEO tasks are mind numbing and easy. They're just time consuming. And the investor tasks are almost trivial, as it calls for the investor to just pay the bills that the CEO decides need to be paid. But turning off the CEO long enough for the creator to actually do their job…

Yeah, I struggle with that myself almost every day.

But the key seems to be to have a business plan, even a simple one. And to do this, you need to understand exactly what it is you are hoping to achieve with your writing career.

Define Your Own Success

If you're a regular follower of my blog, you probably saw this one coming a mile away, because I've only been going on about it for months on end now.

Every writer needs to define for themselves what success looks like. No one can tell you what you should be striving for, because only you understand you. But if you don't have a clue where you ultimately want to be, then you are wandering through this journey of writing aimlessly. That's not necessarily a bad thing. But every successful business venture has had a clear direction of where they're heading.

With that clear direction in mind, then one is able to work out the steps needed to get to the ultimate destination. And from there you can prioritize your tasks, allowing you to focus on the creation better, and giving your creator self a chance to separate properly from the CEO self.

But it's not just a matter of saying that you want to publish X number of books. Geez, if it was that easy, I'm sure all of us would have a mountain of books published by now. No, our ultimate dream needs to reflect our internal drive, or our subconscious works against us. To properly work out a direction to head as a writer, you need to understand who you are as a writer.

And cue the shameless promotion…