I used to write for an ed-tech company. We produced these magic schoolbus-like simulations where students in a computer lab used their curriculum to solve various crises and dilemmas. From time to time, organizations would commission us to create custom experiences. I got to write for 4H, Hill Air Force Base, US Synthetic, and a couple others.

The one I remember best was for Colorado State’s Veterinary College. We called the mission ‘Do No Harm’. It started with a sick sheep. The crew would shrink down, fly in, and over the course of a thirty minute adventure, cure the sheep of its ills.

But it was one particular meeting that still sticks with me. My team had finished the product and we were demoing it to the head of the program. We walked him through the whole experience. When it was over, he had an odd look in his eye. He scratched his chin, leaned into the camera, then asked how it was I had managed to read his mind. We laughed, but he was serious. He had no notes on the simulation, no items to change, it was ready to ship.

I didn’t tell him, but I had read his mind. It happened on our very first call. He didn’t spell it out or anything, but the program director told me everything I needed to know.

The Strategy Interview

When I jumped into that first ‘get to know you’ call, my primary concern wasn’t the story I’d tell, it was understanding my client’s goals and strategy. He regaled me with his vision of a thrilling adventure fighting off parasites with spaceship weapons. When he was finished, I asked him a couple big questions.

Where will this experience take place?
Who is the audience?
What are your goals?

Every question was open-ended by design. The more the client gave, the better the result.

His early responses told me the tone of the project. It was meant for middle-grade students, so I tuned the dialog to be a little more mature. It would be flown in a single computer lab as a part of a tour, so I book-ended the experience with tour shoutouts. His goal was for students to be excited about the work of veterinary medicine, so I made sure the experience was loving towards animals and ended on an upbeat note.

The most important element of the strategy interview was that I didn’t try to project my own idea onto the project until I understood the client’s goals. His answer shaped the foundation of the project. If I came in with my own pitch, prepackaged and ready-to-go, the idea wouldn’t fit. The age-range would be wrong or the tone would be too dark or the story wouldn’t emphasize the medical aspects.

The big-picture answers set the frame of the project.

The Personal Interview

Once I had an understanding of the shape and texture of the story, I shifted to more personal questions.

What made my client love veterinary medicine?
What moments were they most excited to see in the program?
Which animal did they want to treat?
What kind of challenges did my client encounter in the day-to-day of veterinary medicine?

These were the answers that gave the story authenticity. My client’s focus was farmwork, so putting an elephant or a giraffe onto the operating table would have been a big miss. 

As they told me more about their own experiences and their love of their work, I pivoted my plans. My client didn’t know it, but they wanted to see their lived experiences reflected back at them in the art. When they told me about curing a horse’s case of colic, I made sure to include it. When their eyes lit up telling me about the four compartments of a sheep’s stomach, you better believe those four compartments had to be scanned during the mission.

By the time we were done, the story wasn’t just a story, it was an interpretation of the client’s passion for his work. The personal interview gave the simulation those moments of delight and specificity that connected the client to the product.

Writing as a Product

We writers like to look at our works as art, and art alone. When we imagine ten million people reading our masterpiece, it’s all about the message being conveyed, or the emotions being evoked, or the characters that sweep them away.

This is the biggest difference between clients and writers. A client asks for a story in service of a purpose. The story, with all its themes, characters, twists-and-turns, is at the end of the day, a product. If you talk to the big executives at Amazon and Netflix, they don’t even call tv shows stories, they call them ‘content’. And if content fails to further a client’s goals, then it’s a bad product.

If your goal is to read your client’s mind and pluck an image from their brain, start by seeing the story from their point of view. Look at it like a product. What is that product doing? How will it serve the client’s goals? Starting with the right restrictions and expectations will save weeks down the road.

Once the restrictions are set, you can bring in the artist to turn the story into delight and wonder.

Learning From The Business Side

I used to see my books exclusively through the lens of the artist. Then I self-published. A week in and I found myself neck-deep in entrepreneurism.

My first misstep was the title. Everyone said the title wasn’t good enough. I didn’t understand why. I was the artist, and it was an interesting title, Mind’s Bane.

It was only when I looked at the title through the lens of a businessman that I realized my mistake. Mind’s Bane was a very interesting title for a dark fantasy book. Unfortunately, I was trying to sell a dystopian sci-fi. It was a title that failed to connect my book to its audience, a fundamentally commercial problem.

So I kicked the artist out of the room and found a more appropriate name. One that captured the concepts of sci-fi, dystopia, strategy, and ai. The Human Countermove.

Every conference I go to has a bunch of presentations on ‘how to make a good protagonist’ or ‘how to keep up the pacing of the story’. I used to think limiting your art that way was a mistake. I wanted the story to tell itself.

As I write my third and fourth books, I’ve come to understand the wisdom of those presentations. For an audience to enjoy a story, they have to like the protagonist. For them to stay engaged, the story needs good pacing. It’s good business, and it makes better art.

When we as writers and artists speak to our clients, it’s easy to see ourselves as the expert in the room. But everyone has their own set of skills to bring to the table. The client understands their goals and strategy. We understand how to produce the art.

There’s no telepathy in commissions. It’s all about understanding. When my client saw the simulation we had created, he loved it because it was the product he had been looking for. From the business side, it served his goals. From the art side, it resonated with his life experiences. All I needed was a couple conversations.