ASI News
—Register now for two-day "Getting Better!" special event
—"What's in a Name?" available until Dec. 4
—Presenter shares peek at international conference
To Your Health
—Explore health insurance options
Chapter/SIG News
—Chicago Chapter program to focus on indexing contest and winner
Associated Industry News
—Hinds-Bond wins Purple Pen contest
Business and Marketing
—Make an impact in your client contact
Spotlight on Amron Lehte
ASI News
Register now for two-day "Getting Better!" special event
"Getting Better! Improving the indexing mind, body and business"—a year-end ASI program—will be held virtually in December.
A live indexing demonstration with Max McMaster will kick off the two-day event, on Thursday, December 1, 2022. McMaster is an award-winning freelance book indexer who has compiled over 2,700 indexes in a range of disciplines, including the sciences, business, cooking, and government reporting. He has also been an instructor for the UC Berkeley Extension indexing course.
McMaster is based in Australia, so this session will start at 4 p.m. PST/7 p.m. EST to accommodate the time difference.
The session lineup for Friday, December 2, 2022, which starts at 10 a.m. PST/1 p.m. EST includes:
Best Practices and Rookie Mistakes, with ASI's Pilar Wyman. As an indexer, questions of how to handle specific challenges can often be answered by referencing the Best Practices guidelines. But how do you move through the day-to-day choices without making rookie mistakes? Pilar will guide you through some of the most common errors and offer insight on how to watch for them. Having judged and reviewed countless indexes in her ongoing career as an index educator and trainer, Pilar will review typical mistakes and trends, how to prevent them, and how to align your index work with indexing best practices.
Indexing Repackaged: Expanding Your Business in New Directions, with Stephen Ullstrom, a Canadian-based indexer and writer, and author of the upcoming publication Book Indexing: A Step-by-Step Guide. His presentation looks at the ways to package your indexing skills into new services and products, creating new possibilities for business growth.
Soft Wear. Yoga instructor and indexer Anna-Marie Larsen will teach simple ways for indexers to support their wrists, hands, back, and hips while spending so much time at the computer. There will also be stress-relieving breathwork.
Crafting Your Online Professional Profile: Marketing Made Easy will be led by ASI's Connie Binder. The session will offer specific tips for crafting each component of your online professional profile to attract the clients you want. Detailed handouts will be provided.
The early rate for this special online event is just $75 for members—through Nov. 26. After Nov. 26, the regular rate is $99 for members. The early rate is $105 for nonmembers and after Nov. 26, $129.
Full details and registration information are available here.
”What's in a Name?” available until Dec. 4
A reminder that replays of ASI's 2021 winter program are available until December 4, 2022. Replays of the four sessions in "What's in a Name? Invert Your Thorns into Roses" have been available to those who registered for the original event last December. However, the one-year period for replays ends on December 4. You can watch the videos and download the handouts online here.
Presenter shares peek at international conference
L to R: Pilar Wyman, speaker; Devon Thomas, ASI International Representative; Gwen Henson, ASI executive director
As a hybrid event, the conference included a mix of online and in-person presentations and was live-streamed and recorded for online participants. The program offered insight into the state of indexing in a variety of contexts as well as how the publishing industry continues to evolve in its handling of information access points, including indexing.
There will be more coverage in the winter issue of Key Words.
—Devon Thomas
To Your Health
Explore health insurance options
One of the benefits of ASI membership is access to LIG Solutions, a service that offers help evaluating health insurance options to find the most affordable and best coverage for you. The open enrollment period for some insurance programs is underway:
- Medicare Annual Enrollment: Started October 15, 2022, and ends on December 7, 2022.
- Under 65 Open Enrollment: Starts on November 1, 2022, and ends on December 15, 2022.
- Employer Coverage: Can be done at any time of the year, depending on your current situation.
Reach out to LIG now or at any time your health insurance needs change. For more information, click here and access the ASI member page.
Chapter/SIG News
Chicago Chapter program to focus on indexing contest and winner
The Chicago-Great Lakes Chapter will host a virtual event on December 7. "The Purple Pen Award Winner 2022 and the Judging of the Competition" will feature Jessica Hinds-Bond, an ASI Chicago Chapter member, and the 2022 winner of the Award, and Enid L. Zafran, one of the judges for the award.
Zafran will talk about the international contest and what trends the judges have discerned from their review of the indexes submitted. Hinds-Bond will describe her process for indexing Discovering Mars, a scholarly work that presented many challenges: it was an area outside her usual subject matter, the authors were still writing while she was indexing, and the index had a line limit. Experienced indexers face similar problems, and attendees will be invited to suggest how they would handle these situations.
The 90-minute Zoom presentation starts at 6 p.m. CST; 7 p.m. EST. Registration is open to all ASI members and free for CGL chapter members. Register here by December 5; chapter members register by email. Registrants will receive a Zoom link on December 6.
Associated Industry News
Hinds-Bond wins Purple Pen contest
The Institute of Certified Indexers (ICI) has awarded Jessica Hinds-Bond the 2022 Purple Pen Award for New Indexers for her index for Discovering Mars: A History of Observation and Exploration of the Red Planet, by William Sheehan and Jim Bell (University of Arizona Press). Hinds-Bond, who is an ASI member, works primarily on scholarly texts in the humanities.
The index presented an exciting challenge for her as a new indexer, she said, as the authors continued to update the text for NASA's Perseverance mission as she was in the process of indexing. One of the book's authors, according to ICI, praised Hinds-Bond, saying "her intelligence, care, and diligence produced an outstanding index.”
Purple Pen entrants must have completed indexing training within the previous five years. Visit their website for more information about the annual contest.
Business and Marketing
Make an impact in your client contact
With the turn of the calendar, holidays spread out before us, leading to a new year. It's a typical time to connect with clients (publishers, authors and the like) to thank them for their business, but it's not the only time to do so.
What's important, says marketing expert John Coe, is to stand out in your communications and to be sincere. The holidays are a busy time for everyone, so making your contact in January, or even later, will make you unique.
"Be by yourself and break through the clutter, and you will make the impact," said Coe, president of B2B Marketing, based in Scottsdale, Arizona.
In January, you could offer a short New Year's wish for success and perhaps mention a plan you have for your business in 2023.
Coe offers guidelines on making effective and novel client contact, at whatever time you choose:
- Relevancy and specificity of the relationship is important in communications. Mention how many jobs you did for the client during the year, for example. At the holidays, you can also be a little more personal with your message. "The overarching feeling at this time of year is family and friends," Coe said.
- Use regular mail, not email, which is less memorable. Handwritten notes are best, and will be read, research shows. The personal touch makes a difference, Coe said.
- Consumables and usables make an impact, as do 3D mailings. Consider mail-order cookies or brownies that can be personalized with a message. An online search yields an array of choices, including Coe's favorite. Or have to-do pads or sticky notes with your logo printed and sent.
- Make a phone call in combination with something you send to let a client know it's on the way. "The more media (mail, phone, email) you use, the more the message will break through the clutter and the more it will be remembered," Coe said.
In general, Coe said, random acts of kindness will make a difference to your clients, and to your business.
Spotlight on Amron Lehte
This month's Spotlight is on Amron Lehte (formerly Gravett). She is the owner of Wild Clover Book Services.
If you would like to be in the Spotlight, or would like to nominate someone for it, please contact Laurie Hlavaty.
Where do you live now? Where are you originally from? Do you share your home with pets or family?
I live in the Sonoran Desert in Tucson, Arizona. I was born and raised in Tacoma, Washington. I share my home with my kind-hearted and creative teenager and two wonderful dogs, and I live across the street from my aging parents.
What is your educational background?
My undergraduate degree was in cultural anthropology with minors in Hawaiian Studies and Women's Studies. Then, I earned my master's degree in Library Science. Some years later, I took both of the University of California, Berkeley, indexing courses and also took two indexing courses through the Simmons Graduate School of Library Science. Recently, I took a few continuing education courses through the Association for Library Collections & Technical Services.
Do you have any hobbies, travels, volunteer work, or other interesting things to share?
I sew handmade books as a creative side hustle. I love to hike and to travel. I also really love the water, so I do all sorts of water sports: swimming, standup paddle boarding, river rafting, and I am going on my first surfing trip this winter! I have volunteered my entire life, recently running my son's middle school library for the past 2 1/2 years. For years, I volunteered at the food bank, with refugee and immigrant women and children, and have also done quite a few long-term book- and library-related volunteer projects.
What kind of work did you do before you studied indexing? Are you still doing that or other work in addition to indexing?
Before indexing, I worked as a librarian for 13 years in various libraries (special collections, public, and academic).
What is a favorite strategy to help motivate or inspire when you are feeling stuck during a work project?
I meditate every day and have found this helps me maintain a calm and clear head for my work. If I get stuck in the middle of a project, I like to take a walk, listen to music, or eat something!
When did you start indexing? When did you join ASI?
I started indexing in 2011 after taking the first UC Berkeley course. I joined ASI at the conclusion of my course because it was spoken about highly by my UCB instructor, and I could tell it would be a valuable resource as a new indexer.
For you, what is the best advantage of ASI membership?
I have always appreciated the Indexer Locator. I garner quite a bit of work from my listing. I also use the locator a lot when I'm looking for another indexer to refer someone to, if I don't have time to take their job. I tend to do this rather than post a general call-out to the indexing community. I also really valued the conferences and courses in the beginning of my career.
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