Book Sprints are not something that should involve a lot of pre- or post- production. In an earlier post, I have listed some reasons why too much pre-production is potentially harmful. Post-production is not really harmful, in fact, it’s most usually a good thing, however, it’s never a guaranteed thing and that’s the problem. If you want to finish a book in 2-5 days then you must bring the focus to the people ‘in the Sprint’ – the book will be whatever they make it. That includes the text, images, formatting, credits, chapter titles, section titles, cover etc etc etc. In a Sprint, you should never leave a task ‘to be done in post-production’. It both removes the emphasis that everything must be done now by ‘us,’ and post-production, despite goodwill, seldom ever happens. As soon as everyone walks out the door to go home, you have lost 99% of the energy and commitment from the people involved. That’s just how it is.
So do not rely on pre- or post-production. Put the emphasis on ‘here-and-now’ production. If you cannot do it here-and-now with the people in this Sprint then it’s not part of the book… You will be amazed at how good a book can be and how many good decisions get necessarily made because of these circumstances.
