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ExpatWomen's Interview with Jo
Jo Parfitt is a successful journalist and author. She has written more than 20 books on subjects ranging from careers, through computers to cookery, helps others to achieve their publishing dreams, is founder of , speaks at conferences about life on the , owns her own publishing company (Summertime Publishing) and is in charge of publishing for the in The Hague, Netherlands. She learned early on that she would have to create her own “portable” career () as she followed her husband from country to country.
ExpatWomen: Jo, can you please tell our Expat Women a little about your background and your expat experience?
Jo: I am British, studied French and was bitten by the travel bug very early on. I married Ian, who works in the oil industry almost 20 years ago and since the day after our wedding have been on the move, to Dubai, Oman, Norway, England and now The Netherlands. Along the way we have produced two children, who are now teenage boys. Lucky me! |
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ExpatWomen: When did you realize that you could make a career out of writing books? What sorts of books have you had published? |
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Jo: My first book idea was for a cookery book called French Tarts, which grew out of the year I spent abroad at university. I did not cook one single recipe and had never been published before yet it was accepted by the first publisher I approached. Since then, I had no doubt that I could do it. My lucky break came before the debilitating self-doubt arrived that seems to seep into we women, the older we get.
Since then, I had another lucky break, which resulted in my writing about 15 word processing handbooks for Macmillan, McGraw Hill, Paradigm and Pitman. 12 years ago, when in Oman, together with Sue Valentine, I published my first book, another cookbook, called Dates, which is actually being relaunched this month in Dubai by Zodiac Publishing. Back in the UK 1997-2004 I continued with Summertime and produced , Forced to Fly, Grow Your Own Networks and . Since 2006 I have had , and a second edition of published by Bookshaker, who are now working on the third edition of . I love producing books, but find it all rather solitary, so working with a publisher again, suits me better now. I am now working on a novel and a second book on networking. |
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ExpatWomen: Jo, what inspired you to help others find “the book within” with your website ? Have any of the people who you have helped, now had their books published?
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Jo: I really have no idea! I just love to teach and, just as I can’t stop coming up with ideas for books, I can’t stop inventing workshops either. This particular workshop just happened and I first ran it in 2003. Oddly enough, Debbie Jenkins, who is now my publisher at , attended that workshop. I got great feedback and so the format stayed. I did not want to teach people how to write the book. I believe that if you have passion for your subject and can string a sentence together you can create a book. You just might need some help with the editing. I thought that people had the most trouble deciding what to write and how to write it. How to plan it, plot it, decide what to put in and what to leave out. Books need a wow factor, they need focus. My workshop teaches how to find the book (or books) inside you, to select the ingredients that are the right fit and then create the recipe, or pattern, you will then stick to. It empowers and inspires students to get on with it. Many students have published books, yes. Debbie herself has produced many of her own and more than 30 for other authors. |
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ExpatWomen: What does your job entail at the ? |
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Jo: The archive collects primary source social historical material from expats. We have letters, diaries, memoires, photos, videos, clippings, programs, even shopping lists in our collection. My job, and I only do 10 hours a week, is to create and run workshops to inspire others to contribute to our collection and to publish material that shows the world what we are doing. Right now, I am working on a book called Shell Lives Unshelved, that demonstrates the 1000s of items we have collected from Shell employees and their families. This will be out early Spring and available online. I do the marketing and networking too. Oh, and the website. It’s a tall order on 10 hours a week, but we are a charity and only open 15 hours a week. |
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ExpatWomen: What is your definition of a successful career and have you reached success? And your goals for the future? |
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Jo: Ha ha! We only had to work on this at my local networking group, Connecting Women. So that is easy. For me, success is to do with making a difference to others, growing as a person, developing my skills and being wholly authentic in all I do.
Well, in this mobile world, my goals sometimes have to shift to accommodate yet another posting, so take my goals with a pinch of salt. In the short term, to promote my new brand (see I keep changing and growing) , which I think encompasses all the aspects of my work – writing, speaking, teaching, offering one-to-ones and, of course, bookcooking. I want to make at least 4 overseas trips in 2008 to offer my workshops. In fact I already have Houston, Calgary and Vancouver lined up for March, possibly Singapore and Dubai in the autumn and plan to go to Paris. I want to complete my novel and my networking book too, along the way. In three years I want my novel to be in the bestseller list! That’s about as far ahead as I ever like to plan. Oh, and my goals are always considered achievable! |
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ExpatWomen: What would be your Top 5 tips for women just looking to start their “portable” careers? |
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Jo:
- Base whatever you do on your passions. So start by defining what you love to do.
- Ensure you know what you want to achieve in your work and what would make you feel successful – it may not be money.
- Believe in networking, learn about it, join networks and be a nice, generous, friendly person – not the kind of person who thrusts business cards at strangers.
- Recognise that you have a unique lifestyle, that involves upheaval, new locations and new challenges as well as lots of visitors. Create a career that really does fit in with all the other things you want to do and need to do.
- Assess your skills and produce a clear inventory of all the many things you can do. And do whatever you can, hypnotherapy, coaching, career counselling, voluntary work, to start developing your self-belief and confidence.
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Jo Parfitt
Executive Chef – The Book Cooks
A complete menu of services from brainwave to bookshelf
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| November 2007 |
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