Do You Always Have Your Business Hat On?

By Dan Smith

If you follow me on Twitter (or simply realised due to my lack of comments), you’ll be aware that I’ve been away for the past week.

We — my girlfriend and I — have a lot of family in and around London and try to get down there as often as we can.

Just like every other time, I worked longer days the week before we set off so that I could take the time off without having to think about any aspect of my business and could enjoy the time away fully.

This time, though, things were slightly different.

Whereas I usually don’t think about work at all or consider my actions in a business sense (I don’t mean I act wild or recklessly, I just mean that I’m not thinking about what might happen to my work if I do one thing or if I don’t impress a person), I found that I was looking at ways to develop my business and speak to people in a way that could be considered networking.

I thought back to the last time I was down. It was for a family wedding in May and although some of it is now a bit hazy (after the church there was a garden party with free alcohol, ahem…), I remember being introduced to people and rather than brushing over the fact I was someone who ‘does a lot of different things’, I focused on the fact I was a writer.

The time before that, however (February 2010), I can’t think of a time where I had my business hat on.

And thinking about it, this fits almost perfectly with how my writing career has developed since the start of 2010. I ended 2009 being a writer who was plodding along quite contently and I don’t really know what happened over Christmas and New Year, but I got a massive kick up the ass and decided 2010 would be the year that I pushed my writing career forward.

I found that this time in London — the city which is supposedly paved with gold — I was looking at everything as a business opportunity.

For some of the break we stayed in a hotel that was heavily business orientated and I couldn’t help but think what would happen if I spent the time striking up a conversation with some people in the lobby or bar and then handing over my business card.

Yes, I guess it’s cold calling, but surely the few minutes it would take saying a quick hello, mentioning a generic topic and working my writing business into the conversation would be worth it eventually?

Even now I’m back home, I’ve realised that I’ve still got my business hat on most of the time. Not to the extent where I’m constantly working, but that I’m looking at everything as an opportunity and a way to develop my career.

This has been a kind of light bulb moment for me. Over the past 8 months things have slowly clicked into place with my writing career and this seems like another piece of the puzzle falling into the right slot — I’m no longer having to think of ideas and ways to develop; they seem to be coming naturally.

The reason I posted this was because I’m interested in hearing from other writers who find — or don’t find — that they’ve always got their business hat on.

Are you constantly looking for opportunities? Is it a bit of a strain or do they flow naturally? Do you like having your business hat on or would you rather you could take it off?