5 Author Business Habits for Success

Five sentences, written in 1947, that separate the writers who finish from the writers who talk about finishing. They look almost too simple to matter. That's exactly why so few people follow them.

Meet Robert Heinlein — or at least his rules for author success. They're what I've followed for a decade as I've written and published 50+ books.

The Business Side Nobody Prepares You For

Most of what I share is on the motivation side, the mindset side — how we should think about and consider our approach to writing and the creative endeavor, especially from a biblical standpoint. This one goes a different direction: the business side of being an author, especially an author entrepreneur.

I don't mean taxes and revenue and sales. I mean getting into the mindset of treating this beyond just a hobby, and instead as an entrepreneurial endeavor — whether an incorporated business or a "doing business as" under your own sole proprietorship, which is sort of what I do with my own limited liability corporation.

Because frankly, that is where the modern publishing world is heading. Beyond the gatekeeper-y corporate publishing structure, and instead empowering independent creators like you. Average people, pastors, other professionals, creative people who have stories to tell, devotionals to write, resources and studies that need to be connected to the world.

And in seeking to empower people like you, there's part of the author journey that needs to be dealt with at the front end. That's the business side — treating your writing as something more intentional and more deliberate than something you do on the weekends or at night.

My Model: Dean Wesley Smith

One of the best models I've looked to when it comes to this modern publishing world is a guy named Dean Wesley Smith.

Not as well-known as a Stephen King or Nora Roberts or James Patterson or Clive Cussler, but Dean is one of the more prolific modern publishing authors around. He has his own independent publishing company, but for decades he wrote for the big publishers — mostly media books, as one of the primary writers for the Star Trek novels, Men in Black novels, and Star Wars novels, along with his wife Kristine Kathryn Rusch.

I'll be honest: they're not Christians or believers, and both would say that themselves. So I'm not betraying anything there. I say it at the front end because as a model, there are certain parts I set aside and instead follow their more practical business advice — which I've taken to heart over the past decade or so, sitting under them as mentors and teachers in workshops and courses, and working alongside Dean on a few projects I've had the privilege of being part of.

One of the big insights he's given independent creators is a set of business rules he's followed himself for 40 or 50 years — rules that have allowed him to write so many books and become a successful author entrepreneur with more than 100 books to his name.

Where the Rules Came From

They're rules from another generation ago that still apply directly to this modern publishing world. Dean calls them Heinlein's Rules, named after Robert Heinlein — one of the premier science fiction pulp writers back in the day. Some called him the dean of hard science fiction. You may have seen the movie Starship Troopers, which came from one of his better-known books. Until Dean shared these rules, I'd never heard of Heinlein.

The rules first appeared in a 1947 volume of writing advice called Of Worlds Beyond: The Science of Science Fiction Writing — an edited collection featuring some of the heavy hitters of the pulp era, including Ray Bradbury, E.E. "Doc" Smith, and L. Sprague de Camp. Heinlein contributed an essay, and most of it isn't especially relevant to what I want to talk about here.

But the last few paragraphs are. Heinlein wraps up by admitting the essay may have been more fun for him to write than it was useful to read — so, he says, he'll throw in a bonus: a short set of practical, tested rules that will reward any writer who follows them meticulously.

The Five Rules

Here are those five habits — five business rules for any writer, especially independent writers in this modern publishing world.

Five simple rules — air quotes on "rules," because when it comes to writing there are very few hard and fast ones. But these are in a different stratosphere. Any writer would benefit from keeping them in mind when they approach the business side of writing.

Why They're So Hard to Follow

Heinlein closes his essay by pointing out that these rules are amazingly hard to follow — which is why there are so few professional writers and so many aspirants, and why he isn't afraid to "give away the racket."

I love that. And I think that's exactly what happened to Dean Wesley Smith when he first encountered these rules. They totally revolutionized his approach to writing and publishing. At the time he was a poet who wanted to get into short story and novel writing. It took him seven years of trying and failing to become a full-time professional writer — until he found these rules. On January 1, 1982, he made a resolution with himself to write a story per week and to execute every one of Heinlein's rules.

These are the rules that really separate the professionals from the aspirants.

Lots of people want to write that Great American Novel. Lots of people want to write stories, want to write books. But at the end of the day, it's these five rules that separate the pros from the people talking about it — the ones who jump on the writer pony and follow it down the road to the end. The completed story. The completed resource. And then putting it on the market to connect that story, that study, that devotional, to people who need it.

Where Are You Falling Down?

I want you to think about these rules and your own relationship to them. Where are you succeeding, and where are you falling down?

You must write. You must finish what you write. You must not rewrite, unless to editorial demand. You must put it on the market — publish it. And you must leave it on the market, so readers can find it and connect to it.

And in the Christian sense, which is my passion with CROSS + PEN: so that people's faith is ignited by encountering your story, your study, your resource.

If you want these unpacked into a working system rather than a list to admire, that's what I built Practical Habits for Author Success for. They're not so much rules as habits for a long-term author career — the ones that have kept me writing full-time-ish for the past decade.

Now go create in Christ.