Wednesday, February 5, 2014

What Do Productive Writers Do To Meet Deadlines?


I’m always hesitant to use myself as an example of productivity. Sure, I’ve written books under some pretty extreme conditions. But then again, I’ve gone months without writing anything worth publishing in a book.

But a website called RescueTime featuring a program to help increase productivity conducted a study of writers who participated in NaNoWriMo. And they found several interesting characteristics shared by those who were most productive.

First, they found that over 30% of the top word-churners stopped to eat dinner.

Secondly, the most productive ones wrote most between nine p.m. and midnight.

Some wrote in marathon stretches of five hours – or more. (The longest one of their survey participants wrote was 10.48 hours. I say, “wimp.” I’ve written for 12 hours many times.)

And they limited social media when writing.

And most important to our NovelMatters community—they had a support group of other writers.

See why we love you so much? 

7 comments:

Megan Sayer said...

That is a cool chart, and some cool website links at the bottom too (I like the one where you get a picture of a kitten every 100 words). I'm knuckling down and looking at my habits and productivity at the moment (good timing there!) now that school is back in. I'm good with dinners, good with marathons (when I can get them), but not at all good with 9pm-midnight. Heck I can barely hold a conversation after 10pm, let alone write a novel! I did, however, manage to write my last book in three months between the hours of 5-7am, so I'm not doing too badly I guess. Novel writing takes all kinds.

Patti Hill said...

I'm definitely a wimp and, like Megan, my storytelling between the hours of 9pm and midnight is non-existent. I actually do my best writing between 10 and 3. And I stop for lunch. I may not be the most productive writing, but the important thing is to keep writing.

Kathleen Popa said...

Imagine if you got a real kitten for every 100 words.

Lori Benton said...

I sleep during those hours, but I do write best between 9am and 12noon. My creative clock is 12 hours off is all.

Latayne C Scott said...

And a shout-out to RescueTime for the graphic and permission to post it,

Suzy Parish said...

I'm a five am to noon person. Can I have a puppy instead of a kitten?

Latayne C Scott said...

Haha!