Internship Insider: Versatility gets the job(s)

Each semester, numerous interns ask me for keys to succeeding at Bleacher Report and in their careers. Nearly everyone tells me, “I really love sports and writing. I want to take what I do here and turn it into a full-time writing career.”

Wouldn’t we all?

Most emerging writers have the necessary self-confidence to expect they’ll make it big within the first year or so of unveiling their work.

After all, the Twains, Hemingways and Simmonses of the world made a living off their writing, and they were pretty talented. Right? (Yes, I did just put them together in the same sentence. Facetiously. Please put down your pitchforks.)

Their writing careers turned out well. Why not yours?

As Gordon Lish reminded us earlier in the week, reality quickly sets in that it’s not really all about talent.

It’s no secret, but is suprisingly unrealized, that there are very few full-time writing gigs out there. Anywhere.

So how will you overcome those odds and realize your dream?

Untold is the middle part of the story: how many jobs the literary paragons took and failed, (often at the same time), just to be able to write.

If you want to write for a living, then also become good at anything and everything distantly connected to writing.

Try your hand at copy editing. Become familiar with showcasing your work via video and radio appearances, and everything having to do with their production. Take unpaid internships and hone your craft.

Use social media.

Experiment with every writing format you can: Slideshows, blogs, standard columns, etc.  Write about sports and topics outside your comfort zone.  When you’re faced with something you haven’t done before, figure out how to do it.

Never, ever utter the words, “I don’t write about that.”

No medium or experience, no matter how diversionary, is meaningless or demeaning if it makes you more versatile.

Eventually, as you prove yourself valuable in multiple aspects, you may be able to piecemeal numerous part-time opportunities into a “hovering around the poverty line” lifestyle.

The more dependable you are and the more initiative you take, the more your talent will get put to good use.

If you want to make a full-time living from your writing, eventually becoming an icon of the literary world, then throw those happy-ending final chapters of your professional career out the window for now.

Concentrate on writing the chapter at hand.

After all, nobody reads your life story until you’re dead.

Joel C. Cordes is Bleacher Report’s Sportswriting Internship Program Feedback Editor. Along with fellow editor Greg Pearl, he develops B/R interns by providing feedback and mentoring, the highlights of which are shared with the B/R Blog.