Fail to prepare, prepare to fail. If you don’t know your mistakes you’re going to repeat them. Here’s my best mistakes.

Before we start.

Mistakes are things you could have changed. Nothing to do with stuff beyond your control.

So, where did I go wrong?

1. Ignored India. 18% of the traffic comes from Indian technical writes. I need to wake up to this before they head off elsewhere.
2. Stopped learning Chinese. Was doing very well at the start and then slid backwards. Time to restart.
3. Focused on technical writing tools and not on people/community. The top traffic to this site is all related to people. Humanoids are curious.
4. Lack of focus. My “eyes were bigger than my belly” and I got pulled into 100 different directions. Result. Lots of half finished articles, tutorials, courses etc.
5. Ignored Health. Burnout in spring. Got the flu 3 times.
6. Loss leading contracts. Should have revised daily rates earlier. Didn’t due to recession and (perceived) lack of funds. Time to increase daily rates. How much? Dunno!
7. Kept old PC for too long. Had custom PC built (not that expensive) and got huge monitor. What a difference! This one small change made a huge difference re productivity.
8. Podcasts – recorded 12 and never published any. Why? Laziness more than anything, even though I did the hard work. Another example of a stop/start project.
9. Didn’t participate enough in community events (offline/online). Once I started, the benefits were obvious.
10. Wasted time on Facebook, Twitter et al. Re-assess where and how these are of use. Otherwise quit and focus on other areas.

Those are 10 I’ll admit to making. Others make me cringe.

Time is the one thing you don’t get back.

What mistakes did you make this year?

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