Announcements

Bidding on an index? Be like the Spiderman of Paris

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screen capture of video
from the video

Mamoudou Gassama, the Malian man now called the “Spiderman of Paris,” climbed four levels up the side of a building and rescued a four-year-old boy dangling from a balcony. As a bonus, he was honoured with a medal for bravery, the promise of citizenship, and a job with the fire brigade. That success will come—if you are prepared and courageous—was demonstrated again.

How was Gassama prepared? Well, he is athletic and fit. He may even have rock-climbing experience. Anyway, he seemed to know what he was doing.

His skills and his courage made the rescue not only successful, but awesome.

How does this apply to indexing, you wonder?

Preparation and a little courage can help you win more indexing business. At the conference in Winnipeg June 8-9, I’m revealing selling secrets that will help you write compelling responses to authors’ and editors’ queries…those emails that ask “Would you be interested in indexing my book?”

By the way, if you are still on the fence about attending, be aware that the deadline for the banquet numbers is Thursday, May 31.

See you at the conference!

A precious resource

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clockTime is a non-renewable resource. Thus we were reminded by Christine LeBlanc when she led a recent Editors Canada webinar on starting a freelance career. She strongly encouraged word workers to feel confident in what we charge because of the time we put into doing our work well.

Her statement also reminds us—freelance or not—of occasions when that precious resource feels badly spent. An hour embroiled in solving a tech problem when you’re on an indexing deadline feels so different from an hour spent catching up with a dear friend, playing with a child, or reading a good book!

Wouldn’t it be nice to spend an hour with an indexing tech expert in a non-stressful—even pleasantly collegial—environment to save some stress and time down the road?

Bring your questions to the ISC/SCI 2018 conference in Winnipeg and spend some time with indexing software experts Kamm Schreiner (SKY), Gale Rhoades (MACREX), and Frances Lennie (CINDEX) who know these powerful programs better than anyone. They’ll be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Speaking of time, the conference is June 8-9—less than a month away. We hope you can make it.

Exploring usability

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Index written by a technical indexer
Fig 2: Technical indexer
Index written by a scholarly index
Fig 1: Scholarly indexer

Two questions:

1. Has becoming an indexer changed the way you use indexes?

2. Assume you mostly indexed technical books. Would that influence the way you index scholarly books?

These are just two questions you might ponder if you read “Testing usability: ‘Experience an index usability test’ at the ASI Conference (Portland, 2009)” by Cheryl Landes. This article appeared in the December 2009 issue of The Indexer.

At the ASI conference, Cheryl led a session in which 14 attendees reviewed and looked up entries in two indexes that were written for a single book of essays. One of the indexes was written by a scholarly indexer, the other by a technical indexer. The usability test results were interesting, but even more so were the reviewers’ comments.

Cheryl received a regional Award of Excellence from the Society for Technical Communications for this article.

You will enjoy hearing about Cheryl’s latest insights on index usability when you come to the conference in Winnipeg on June 8-9.

Patterns of indexing careers

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Indexers cwheel of fortuneome into their careers from many directions. For some, it’s a natural progression from a job in a publishing house. Others discover the calling accidentally. There are indexers who started out by volunteering to write an index for a friend or a local society.

Once the decision is made to become an indexer, the career launch is more or less predictable: training, followed by practice, then marketing and building up a list of active clients.

Throughout your career, it’s all on you. You will become so good at your work that your clients won’t want you to stop.

So how does an indexer move into retirement gently? Join us for the ISC/SCI conference in Winnipeg June 8-9 as Heather Ebbs shares her thoughts and wisdom on what it means to glide away from a successful career.

The scent of information

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Have you heard of a rule in web design called the three-click rule? It states that users will leave your web page or app if they can’t find what they want in three clicks. However, the rule has been challenged by numerous studies. It turns out that users don’t actually stop searching after three clicks, as long as the navigation is easy and there is a constant “scent of information.”

Users of on-line Hansard databases have no choice but to keep clicking when they’re searching for something that was said in parliament. They can’t just throw up their arms in frustration and look somewhere else—because there is no other source of information.

Hansard team members Julie McClung and Michael Sinclair will show us how they keep users happy at the BC Government when they present “Digital Innovation and Parliamentary Indexing” at the ISC/SCI conference in Winnipeg June 8-9.

If you still haven’t registered, you can still get the Early Bird Pricing until end of day Friday.