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What skills will I/We need five years from now?

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Eoin Purcell

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It struck me yesterday that I have been ignoring one critical element of the issues facing publishing. That issue is the personal responsibility of editors and authors.

What do editors and authors have to learn, or do and understand, to fit into the increasingly complex pattern of modern and future publishing. Are they lessons already earned or do I need to learn new ones? Will I find myself outpaced by newer arrivals into my field (Not, I stress, that I have been here long)?

I am slightly confounded that I have somehow never considered the whole equation from this perspective before. It seems so obvious now that I have been thinking about it for a while.

So I have decided to throw the question out to readers and hopefully they will respond with interesting comments and suggestions.

Simply put what set of skills will be the ones best suited to the new publishing age and the challenges it presents?
Are there skills we can leave behind?
What new ones do we need to learn?

Please comment below or e-mail me. I will round up suggestions either later in the week or early next week! And if I have missed a question don’t hesitate to ask it for me.

5 responses to “What skills will I/We need five years from now?”

  1. Paddy Purcell Avatar
    Paddy Purcell

    Eoin surely everything changes just as everything stays the same so in answer to question one re skills who knows.
    But I did talk to my “Best Man” who is very involved with all the I.T. changes in the Irish Times at present and his answer to 1,2 and 3 was “I don’t know …but it’s bloody exciting” what he was able to do with that Somme Insert there recently he couldn’t have done 2 yeas ago at least not the way he produced it.
    So yes the lessons have already been learnt but have to be constantly looked at.
    Sorry to repeat myself but everything changes while everything stays the same but never think you’ve reached the final station they are all just stops along the way [just don’t get off]

    Paddy P.

    Reply
  2. litlove Avatar
    litlove

    I’ve noticed that as an author I now need far more computer literacy than ever before. I wonder how long it will be before all that desk top publishing stuff is handed over to the authors. I would guess that marketing and market research is going to change a lot for publishers, given the push towards new formats. One thing no one seems sure of any more is correct English punctuation! Who is responsible for that these days?

    Reply
  3. Paul Browne - Technology in Plain English Avatar
    Paul Browne – Technology in Plain English

    I’m not sure if there is an equivalent in the publishing world, but for those in the business-tech world, keeping an eye on JobServe lists some of the current upcoming skills.

    Looking 18 months out, the O’Reilly Tech Buzz site (Link to Blogpost) is a good indicator

    Reply
  4. Eoin Purcell’s Blog » Round Up – Monday 17th July 2006

    […] The Round Up I had intended to simply comment on the What skills will I/We need five years from now? post and I will be the Ottakars post also got a number of comments so I thought I would add something on those too. […]

    Reply
  5. Colm Avatar
    Colm

    http://www.skillnets.com/

    Reply

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Hello,

I’m Eoin,

Co-founder and publisher @fullsetbooks 📚. Expect books and 🍰.

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