I never had an ambition to be an author or a publisher. It just happened – it was an evolutionary process,

         I have written 26 titles, all non-fiction how-to -do-it books.

                  It all started when I was working for the Department of Agriculture in Taranaki and I was conscripted to a job in Head Office in Wellington, New Zealand.

         My new job was to run training programmes for the field staff and to support them with information.

         One of the first things I did was to read up everything I could find on readability – how to write in a readable way.

         Next I produced some very cheap how-to-do-booklets – called Advisory Aids. About 50 topics were covered on subjects like, How to: ‘Chair a Meeting’, ‘Give a Talk’ ‘Organise a Discussion Group’ etc.

         These booklets were highly sort after. I even found a set at the U.S Department of Agriculture in Washington D.C. when I was in the United States.

         The next step was when the New Zealand Government Printer asked me to turn them into a book for them to sell – it was called “Ways with Words”. It was well illustrated by David Henshaw and made up to a large 73 page handbook for those who would like to better their speaking, writing, organizing….

         I made a major mistake in this first book. The Advisory Aid booklets were written for Farm Advisers, all men. It became a textbook for student journalists on how not to write a sexist book.

         When Harry Mills, a Wellington author, and publisher,  was taking some books to the Frankfurt Book Fair he asked me if I had any titles he could take for the New Zealand stall.

          I gave him a few titles to take and these were picked up by an English publisher, Kogan Page who asked for the World rights.

         Another significant event was when I was teaching management skills at the University of the South Pacific at the Alafua Campus. My final-year degree students asked me to recommend a management textbook and I couldn’t do that. I said I would put my notes together and write one for them. It was called “Survival Skills for New Managers”.

          “Survival Skills for New Managers” ran into  13 editions and was published in three languages. Copies are now held in over 156 libraries. One edition was published by the Singapore Institute of Management University.

         They asked me to turn it into a 3-day training program for Asian managers. I did that and I flew up to Singapore 31 times to run these workshops.  I also ran them in Sri Lanka and in Indonesia.

         I learned a lot from these workshops as some very experienced and high-powered participants attended.

         Our books achieved success for a number of reasons. They were written in simple English and were easy to translate.

         They were well edited by my wife – a ruthless editor.

         The content was in demand and they were well designed by Milton Andrews in Australia.

         I find it amazing, fancy having  over 86 editions published in 18 countries by 31 publishers and in 11 languages – 6 in Chinese languages.

         One book is a textbook in Hungary. Cengage Learning in Singapore sells one of our paperback editions “Secrets for Career Change” for S $132.95

         When I gave up writing and publishing books two young Granddaughters, Alice and  Sarah Lilly, taught me how to write and post blogs.

         They recommended I keep them brief and they even designed a logo for my ‘Handful of Tips’ series.

         So far I have written and posted 798 blogs. Over 9,871 of them have been viewed by 2,696 people. This response has encouraged me to keep writing.

         The majority of subjects were selected from our books but as soon as I started to duplicate topics the family said I should change direction to share some of my stories. I suspected they just wanted to learn some of my secrets.

         Everyone has a story to tell and every one is unique. I strongly recommend your record your adventures and experiences, for the good of your family, before it’s too late to do so. They can’t ask about your history after you are dead.

Geoffrey Moss(mossassociates.co.nz)

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