I started my writing career as a gun for hire. I was paid to write news stories and newsletters, proposals and presentations, even employee benefits manuals.

At first, I was terrified, worried that my style--my writing voice--would be ridiculed. After all, I wasn’t being paid to write like F. Scott Fitzgerald. I was supposed to persuade a prospect to buy a product or help an employee choose a health plan. it soon became clear that this type of writing was a collaborative process and I began to enjoy being the one to put that first draft together, to shape its structure. I also enjoyed that I was usually the last person to edit the piece, putting a final sheen on the words. It was a challenge, but one that became easier the more I wrote.

The lightbulb really went on for me years later when I began to study fiction and realized that while I was writing marketing materials for corporations, I was also telling a story, providing a “narrative” and a “call to action” for the reader.

When StoryStudio came along, it seemed natural that we would help business writers tell their stories better too. Some of the same techniques that we use to teach fiction and creative non-fiction help our business writing students be more confident and creative with the words they have to write for work.

In our upcoming one-day class, Business Writing Fundamentals, we start the day with some creative writing to loosen up our muscles. Then we work on strategies for efficiency and tools to make us more persuasive in our writing.

It’s a pretty fun class and it does a great job of slaying the demons that haunt us when we write at work.

Business Writing Fundamentals is on Monday, February 22. Oh, and did I mention we do lunch!