In late 2014, I realized one of the problems hindering my writing production was a lack of established goals, so I wrote a post last December outlining some goals for 2015. The important part of goal-setting, aside from making them realistic, is reviewing them, to measure your progress and see if you need to change anything. So let’s see how I did.

1. Publish The Sad Girl Sequel. Goal: 1^st draft completed by 31 January 2015. Published by 30 May 2015.
   The writing is done. That was a pretty aggressive production schedule though, and didn’t account for the original story getting picked up by a publisher. Now that that’s happened, Gravity is going to drive the release of the sequel, and the sequel to the sequel.
2. Release Don’t Stop Believin to Wattpad. Goal: Start weekly chapter release in April 2015.
   I held off on this for a couple of reasons. One was being able to afford a cover. Then, just as I was ready to approve the final cover, Gravity came knocking. While DSB has a little too much of a Christian emphasis for Gravity, I suspect it’ll be fine for Booktrope, Gravity’s parent. So I’ve submitted it there, and I’m waiting to hear back from them.
3. Finish the first draft of the first book in my Red Dirt Justice or Paratus Group series. Goal: 30 September 2015.
   I’ve decided not to pursue a Paratus Group series, at least for now. I started the first draft for Blown Away, the first story in Red Dirt Justice. But at the same time, I felt a real pull to write a 3d story in The Sad Girl universe, so I’ve started that.
4. Write a supporting short story for the book in #3. Figure about 7.5 – 10k and publish to Wattpad or Kindle. Fall 2015.
   Didn’t happen. Just didn’t write it. Still not sure about using Wattpad. The TSG excerpt I posted nine months ago has had 17 views, no votes, and no comments. I’m not sure if that’s a reflection on the writing, the audience, or the total lack of promotion I’ve done there.
5. Plot/outline the second book in whichever series I start in #3. Fall 2015.
   Several stories “idead” out. In Plain Sight, the 3d story in The Sad Girl universe, is plotted and being written.
6. Write two substantial blog posts per month. Book and product reviews count. Administrative posts don’t.
   I did pretty well at this. I’ve had 38 posts this year, counting this one. That includes hosting one guest post last month and writing one in October. That works out to an average of 3 per month, which is actually not the highest average I’ve had. In 2008 when I was trying to blog regularly about the funeral industry, I hit almost 70 posts for the year, which averaged out to 6 per month. I’d like to approach that again.
7. Revisit/report on these goals monthly.
   Didn’t do so well here. Only two real update posts, in January and July.

2016 Goals

Based on the results above, what’s on the agenda for next year?

1. Finish In Plain Sight. It currently sits at about 6,500 words. This one will certainly be longer than Finding Angie, probably into the 85k range. Current goal is the end of April.
2. Get Finding Angie and Don’t Stop Believing published. Both are submitted to Booktrope. There’s been little action on them so far, because the push has been to get TSG completed and re-released. Now that that’s done, I expect some movement on the other two fairly soon.
3. Resume work on Blown Away, and complete it by the end of the year.
4. I still like the idea of supporting short stories for my books, so I’m going to work on that as a general concept. I’ll probably hold off on anything for the Red Dirt Justice universe until after Blown Away is done. But there’s no reason not to get one or two stories done in the Sad Girl universe. I can easily come up with three or four story ideas out of the first book. Goal: two shorts by the end of the year.
5. Up my blog post average to 4 posts/month or better. That works out to at least 48 posts next year. That should be achievable, in part because I’m focusing on certain topics in the blog now. I want some of those posts to be interviews, and I want to do more guest posts, both as a host and a writer. Goal: 48 original posts in 2016. Host 6 guest posts. Write 4.
6. Include some journalistic posts on the blog. I started back to school this year at Tulsa Community College in their Journalism and Mass Communications program with a focus on Strategic Communications. My original goal there was a public relations/public information position with a public safety agency. As I mentioned though in my Voice post though, I’ve had a change of focus. I want to tell the stories about people affected by the things I’m passionate about. Goal: 4 journalistic posts.
7. Continue public accountability. While I failed to meet my standards last year, I started reporting my weekly word count there on the left sidebar. I’ll break 100k words this year, but only just. I didn’t start tracking it until the end of June though, so the actual count is probably much higher. Based on the current averages, it’s probably about 154,000 words. I’ll post the totals and averages after the first of the year. Since I don’t really know how much I can do in a full year, I’m a little limited on goal-setting, and there’s going to be a lot of writing for me next semester at school. Goal: Increase total output by 25%.

So how did you do this year? What’s on your schedule for next year? Tell us in the comments!