Have you ever wondered what the next steps are after writing a book?

In this solo episode of the Happier at Work podcast, host Aoife O’Brien dives deep into the realities of the book writing and publishing process, sharing personal challenges, victories, and lessons learned while creating "Thriving Talent." If you’ve ever doubted your ability to write a book or are simply curious about what it takes, this episode uncovers the structure, self-doubt, editing hurdles, and feedback loops essential to bringing a book to life. Aoife also sheds light on the ongoing journey of editing, proofreading, and preparing to get the book into readers’ hands, with a sneak peek into the marketing efforts still to come.

In This Episode, You’ll Discover:

• The importance of having a clear book structure and breaking content into subsections for clarity and direction.
• Understanding the value of slowing down and considering your audience’s perspective, ensuring your message is clear to readers who may be new to the topic.
• How to market your book: It is practically a full-time job, but is an essential next phase for getting your message out.

Related Topics Covered:

Writing a book, Idea development, Personal Goals

Connect with Aoife O’Brien | Host of Happier at Work®:

• Website
• LinkedIn
• YouTube

Related Episodes You’ll Love:

Episode 297: Creating Space for Talent to Thrive

Episode 293: Recognising and Understanding your Drivers at Work

About Happier at Work®

Happier at Work® is the podcast for business leaders who want to create meaningful, human-centric workplaces. Hosted by Aoife O’Brien, the show explores leadership, career clarity, imposter syndrome, workplace culture, and employee engagement — helping you and your team thrive.

If you enjoy podcasts like WorkLife with Adam Grant, The Happiness Lab, or Squiggly Careers, you’ll love Happier at Work®.

Editing by Amanda Fitzgerald.

Website: https://happieratwork.ie LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aoifemobrien/ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@HappierAtWorkHQ

Mentioned in this episode:

Thriving Talent book - out now

Book

Welcome back to the Happier at Work podcast. I'm your host, Aoife o' Brien. And if you're nosy and curious like I am, I, I like to say curious, but sometimes it borders into nosiness. This is the second part in a three part series all about behind the scenes in the publishing industry and what it really took to publish my book, Thriving Talent. If you haven't checked out the book yet, go to thrivingtalentbook.com definitely go and check that out. The endorsements, the pre readers like the feedback has blown me away to be honest. I'm so thrilled with how the book has been received so far. So definitely go and check out the book thrivingtalentbook.com now in the first episode in this series, I was kind of looking more at the publishing industry.

I touched a little bit on the writing and kind of what it takes to write the book. I want to expand a little bit more on that because sometimes we think, or maybe this is something that gets in your head that you couldn't possibly write a book. Now I mentioned in the previous episode what really helped me with the writing was to have a really clear structure in place. And once you have that structure, once you have the structure, then you can kind of break it down into sub chapters or subheadings as well to really get to grips. What is it I'm actually saying here and what is it that I'm trying to get across? What is the point I'm trying to make here? Having that structure makes things so much easier. And as I mentioned, it's not to say that the little subsections won't move around because they probably will in terms of like developing the argument. Another thing to bear in mind, and this again is probably not something I really thought about or considered. I thought that I knew everything about my topic.

I thought I was really well versed in it. But when you're trying to write about something, it really forces you to clarify your thinking and what art arguments and what positions you take on each of those different areas. And it's, it's something that it kind of makes you call into question what you believe and where the evidence is. So you need to seek out, well, who's, who else is saying this? Or is there evidence, is there research to actually back this up? The book is very evidence based. That's, that was one of the key pieces of feedback that I got that it's clear and it's evidence based. But it's also very practical for leaders if they want to put this stuff into Action. It's taken from my own experience, experience from the work that I do with organizations as well. So it's, it's written from a very personal perspective.

Like I have a reason that I want to share this is because I've experienced those kind of toxic workplaces firsthand. So it really helps you or forces you to clarify your thinking around very specific areas. So that's a good thing. But it also means that you call into question, like, what do I know? Who wants to listen to me? What do I even have to say about this topic? And I, and I think those moments of doubt, they're completely normal. And I was warned about this before I started writing, by the way, that it's perfectly normal to, to call into question, to really doubt your abilities, to really start thinking, who actually wants to read this? Who, who cares that I'm writing this? Or what do I have to say? Little old me, what do I have to say about this topic? And so when it happened, that helped to diminish the effect a little bit. It's, it didn't make it go away completely. But the knowledge that that is a perfectly normal part of the writing process definitely helped me to realize that's it's just part of the process that you have to at some stage get to a place where you're wondering who is actually going to read what I have to write. And you know, those moments of self doubt.

I talk about imposter syndrome an awful lot and I do have a framework for identifying it and managing it, and that really helped me as well. So looking at acknowledging the fact that it is, is a normal part of the process, how to build up belief. So, you know, surrounding yourself with people who believe in you, I think is a really strong way to do that. So other writers, people who are familiar with my work, and then courageous action. So that's all about consistency and just keeping on going. Even if you feel the fear, you just keep going, just keep going. And I think that was probably a key mantra for me. I wanted to dive a little bit more into that.

So there were those moments of doubt, of course, and the writing, you know, it's so easy for me to look back now and think that the writing was, it was actually kind of easy. But once you have that structure in place, the writing can flow out of you. What I found more difficult was the editing. You do need to actually read over the words that you've written. And that's the hard part because you're like, what was I trying to say here? Or Is that clear? And then, of course, having someone else read it now, I. Again, moments of doubt. I put off and put off and put off having beta readers to read the unfinished bit, like, you know, the kind of scrappy bit that you've just put together to see do people buy into the argument or what gaps are there. So I missed out on that part because I, I left it too late.

I kept saying, oh, it, it. That comes later, that comes later. And then by the time it. It, I thought it was ready to share with people, it was kind of too late to, to go through that process. And it went to my editors to. To get feedback, to get development feedback. And that was really, that was really helpful as well. But then when someone else reads your words, that's also really difficult.

It's. It's really exposing. It's, you know, oh, are they going to get it? Are they going to agree with it? What are they going to say? So some things that really stood out to me in terms of the feedback that I got. And I mean the developmental feedback, I don't mean that they said, wow, this is amazing. But it's things like slowing down and expanding on points. So I get it because it's in my head. I know what it is I'm trying to say, and I've been talking about this stuff for so long, but for someone who's not familiar with the topic, it's about slowing down that pace, bringing them on the journey to really help them understand. And not to get too cliche about it, but we do do this stuff in leadership all the time, where we assume that other people know what we're talking about, that other people know what the priority is, that other people communicate well, or we assume that we communicate well.

And when someone else looks at your work and offers you advice or offers you feedback on how to do it better, then I think, you know, it's really beneficial for the writing process. But it's really difficult to hear that as an individual. It's, like I said, it's very exposing when you share your work with someone else. And so that's part of the writing process. And so I was working very closely with one editor, and this is over a number of months, by the way, as well. It's kind of back and forth. And how can we expand this? And is this the right example? And can we change that? And then after that process, it went to someone fresh who hadn't been working with me through the process to really take a bird's eye view on the overall argument that I'm trying to make and does the book live up to the promise? And also then that fine tooth comb of like, have you thought about this or can we change this? I mean, it's such a, such a long process and after writing you're kind of thinking, oh, I'm done now. And it's going to be smooth sailing from here.

It's, it's definitely not smooth sailing from there. And so, yeah, just to give you a flavor of, that's what actually goes on behind the scenes. And, and then when the manuscript is done. And how do you know when the manuscript is done? That's the other thing. They did warn me, as I say they, I mean, my publishers did warn me that I'm going to keep wanting to add more or change something or. I'm so inspired by everything around me. By reading books, by listening to audiobooks, by listening to podcast. I'm always learning and there's always stuff to be added in.

And if you have bought the book, then there is an entire section on the resources, so I will continue to add to that, you know, from the learning that I do. And if you've bought the book on pre order, then there's also the behind the scenes. There's the stuff that didn't make the final cut, there's the stuff that was left out for one reason or another. But you do get to a stage where you just have to say it's done now. And now we're ready for the other bits of the process, which are things like proofreading. So someone actually has to go through, make sure there's no grammatical errors and typos and all of that kind of thing, which you think because you've been writing for so long that it, it should actually be okay. And you're writing using a software that picks up those kinds of things. But that's not always the case.

So there's the proofreading. I touched on the typesetting in the last episode as well. So there's all these additional bits that need to be done when you finish the writing and the editing process in next week's episode, I'm going to do a bit more of a behind the scenes on the marketing side of the book writing, book publishing process. So a little bit more about what I did around that, what I will say is that the marketing side of writing a book, if you think you've written the book and that's the job done, the marketing is most definitely a second full time job on top of the book writing process. So getting it out into the world, getting the book into the hands of the people who need it, of the people who will read it, of the people who will benefit most from it, that in itself is a full time job. And part of that marketing is what you're listening to today. So do go and check out the book thrivingtalentbook.com and let me know what you think.