We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Michael Solender. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Michael below.

Michael, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Alright, let’s jump into one of the most exciting parts of starting a new venture – how did you get your first client who was not a friend or family?

My transition from a corporate human resources and employee communications professional to freelance feature writer was an evolution.

After 25 years in the corporate arena, I tired of writing for others and wanted to share my own perspective and voice telling stories that mattered to me and my community. I began writing for a local nonprofit arts and civic online publication about arts organizations, artist profiles, and visual and the performing arts scene in Charlotte.

The nonprofit had a content sharing program with our local newspaper, the Charlotte Observer, to increase their visibility. My work was often selected for publication, and I decided to pitch the editors directly. It wasn’t long before I became a regular contributor and even landed a community contributor weekly column. The opportunity became a huge confidence builder, provided broad exposure and set me on course that I could not have imagined.

Fourteen years later, I have more than 1000 paid features in nearly 100 different publications including the New York Times, Smithsonian Magazine, the Miami Herald, and many others. I’m so grateful to the editors I worked with early on who took me under their wing and helped me develop a style and voice for their publications.

Michael , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I’m a life-long word nerd. Mostly this means I love to write and have fun with the written word.

I graduated from the University of Minnesota (a long time ago) with a BA in Communications and a MA in Industrial Relations/ Human Resources Management. Throughout much of my corporate career, I held roles in employee communications, organizational development, and executive communications. I learned how to write effectively and represent various constituencies, using their voice on various platforms to reach both internal and external audiences.

I left corporate America in 2008 to launch a freelance writing career. I retain some corporate clients and write mostly external communications for them, but my primary work is feature writing – with a focus on business, arts, and travel. My clients are local, regional, and national publications. I work directly with publishers and editorial teams to craft stories for their respective audiences, engage their readers and build their circulation. The highest form of compliment for me is when I hear from a source after they’ve read a piece I’ve written where they were quoted and tell me they “couldn’t have expressed themselves better” and appreciate that I really understood and “got the ideas and message” they wanted to communicate.

Good writers are good listeners first and take pains to express not only the word of those they source, but their meaning and context for readers.

There is so much more to the role than putting words on a page – I often tell people 75% of my time is spent sourcing, conducting research, managing administrative aspects of independent work and pitching – always pitching. There is no guidebook for what freelancers do and I’m ever appreciative to the many clients I’ve collaborated with over the years – I’ve learned lessons from each of them.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

Early in my freelance feature writing career I felt I had to tell my readers EVERYTHING I learned about a particular subject.

Learning that less is more, and how to engage a reader with a minimal amount of words is an art form developed over time. Effective writing is concise. It is much more difficult to write short vs. long and perfecting this element of craft is where skilled writers truly shine.

So often when I filed my stories in the early days I’d get back “red-lined” edits from my editors and suggestions on how to economize, where to cut and what would make my stories pop. I also learned to be a critical reader and editor of my own work, and evaluate it as a reader with no prior knowledge would.

I’ve come to see editors as collaborators and partners who (for the most part) simply want to make my work better. This is very valuable and once I became less paternalistic about my words – an entire world of craftsmanship opened up to me.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

I think like an editor and take pains to not only deliver on time (or before needed) but also understand their audience, bring great story ideas to them, make referrals for resources and personnel for projects and provide secondary support like images for them to use in publication. I am responsive, anticipate needs and am easy to work with. I want them to see me as providing a complete – turn key – package. I’ve received many referrals where an editor notes they’ve reached out to me because they know I understand what’s required to be successful.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://michaeljwrites.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michaeljsolender/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/michael.solender/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaeljsolender/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/mjsolender

Image Credits
Head shot by Jim McGuire All other images courtesy Michael J. Solender