Executive Writing Track

Ascent Can Help You
Reach Excellence
in Writing Your Book

Our executive clients have come to us from the fields of international business, education, entertainment and the arts, the media, charitable organizations, foundations, and a wide range of non-profits.

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At the Top, Challenges Are Great and Demand Your Focus

From decades of experience, we know that as an executive you need

  • personalized attention and service
  • fast convenient access to a writing and publishing coach
  • solid training in the art and skill of writing
  • a final product with top quality that represents you personally and professionally in the marketplace.

Ascent’s executive coaching services are tailored to the needs of men and women who need more, and more specialized attention than our everyday clientele.

Call 1.540.454.4495 (between 8am-8pm EST) or email ascent@itsyourlifebethere.com.

How We Work

Introductory Phase

An introductory conversation helps us assess the scope of your project and your needs as a writer. Allow approximately 1 -2 hours.

We evaluate writings you have already completed. Allow up to 1 week.

We reconvene to discuss our evaluation. This includes an assessment of potential audiences and publishers, and also how to develop your ideas and concepts into a highly successful product. Allow approximately 1- 2 hours.

This evaluation phase involves no cost to you, and it allows us to determine a fee structure should you decide to engage in our Executive Coaching Track. Our retainer is due and payable before our first session.

Coaching Phase

full schedule

A coaching strategy that maximizes your time

Now we develop a program for book development, one that maximizes your time and allows us to help you bring a highly publishable product to completion.

The elements of this phase include:

  • We start with a coaching intensive. In this session we create a book outline that is audience/ publisher focused. We also begin to coach you in writing skills needed to develop your book. We agree on objectives to be completed before our next session. Allow for one 6-hour, or two 3-hour sessions.

  • Within one month we reconvene. We evaluate the progress of the outline and initial writings, also to sharpen the audience focus and benefits. Together we set a monthly, or bi-monthly, or weekly coaching schedule, depending the schedule you set. The pace of manuscript development will include: periods for you to write; writing due-dates on which you submit material to your coach; and follow-up coaching sessions. Allow 3 hours.

  • Regular coaching sessions begin. With the writing objectives and deadlines we’ve identified, we start the pace of writing/submissions/coaching sessions. In between scheduled coaching sessions your coach is fully available to you via Skype or phone.

As a signature aspect of our program, we coach you in simple meditation practices that sharpen mental energies and open the creative deep mind — adding power to your writing.

Achieving Digital Trust: The New Rules for Business at the Speed of Light (c) Jeffrey Ritter David works like a master, leaving no fingerprints, but extraordinary in his impact. He was invaluable in helping me visualize how to engage the reader, coaching me through the chasms of uncertainty that confront any author, and visualizing the look and feel of the cover and the interior. My work is better because of him.

— Jeffrey Ritter, author of Achieving Digital Trust

 

 

Grooming for the Publishers Phase:

Our coaches are trained to view your book as a product in development for a major publishing company. This factors into manuscript development from our first meeting. We may target specific companies and/or literary agents to approach upon completion of your manuscript.

During the writing phase, we will also begin to develop the elements of a professional publishing proposal.

The goal is to have a sharp, professionally developed manuscript, paired with an audience- and publisher-focused proposal ready for presentation at the conclusion of our work.

The elements of this service include:

  • Surveying competitive products.
  • Studying publishers and agents in order to create a target list.
  • Drafting and refinement of the proposal including: your author platform statement, pitch letter, book summary, comparable products list.
  • Working with you to create your strategy for approaching publishers or agents, as you choose.

Conclusion of Services:

At the conclusion of the above listed services our product development work is complete.

Sometimes it occurs that more time and further services are needed or requested, in which case we assess the scope of those services and determine additional costs. Typically, this results in a month-to-month agreement, until such time as additional work is completed.

Potential Additional Costs:

A pristine manuscript is necessary to make a successful presentation. If necessary we may need to engage the services of a professional line editor. We work in association with professionals, who will offer bids for their services. This is separate from Ascent’s charges, as we cannot assess at the outset whether these services will be needed, or the scope of the work a line editor may need to do.

If you need your book designed and available fast or need grooming for media events you may want to consider Ascent's Author Launch Services.

Travis Wood Parker -  President and CEO of TASC

David has been extremely helpful in keeping me focused on the manuscript, ensuring steady and good progress. He provides a light touch with his editing suggestions, allowing me to keep my voice — while offering great suggestions that deepen my original concept. His writing skill and story-telling ability are stellar and have helped me improve my own abilities tremendously.
— Travis Wood Parker, President and CEO, TASC Inc.


FPO I deeply appreciate David’s patient coaching style, his focus on developing a consistent theme and voice, and his publishing savvy. His confident belief in my ability to tell a great story has helped me — at last — to believe it, as well. — Susan Wharton Gates, former Vice President, Policy, Freddie Mac


Gerry Starsia, The Darden School, Sr. Associate Dean and COOI worked with David's careful guidance to convert an academic work into a more broadly accessible book. The ideas are new and leading-edge, and our challenge was to express complex concepts in a clear and applied way. David has helped me organize my work, think through the relationships between chapters, direct the writing, and create a product that — I hope — executives and senior managers will find useful in our increasingly complex business climate.
— Gerry Starsia, The Darden School, Sr. Associate Dean and COO



» Meet our lead writing coach, David Hazard.
» Get started. Call 1.540.454.4495 (between 8am-8pm EST) or
   email ascent@itsyourlifebethere.com.