Let's have a conversation about wisdom. Wisdom, patience, experience. These are things that don't come naturally or quickly...

Relationships can be tricky to establish, nurture, and maintain. The really tough part is how to determine when some relationships must end.

Last week, my wife and I went to see the Shakespeare in the Park production of 'Merry Wives'. We've never been and it was amazing!

Ethics in the voiceover industry is something that everyone needs to get on the same page about. How can you be an ethical voice actor?

Is disruption in the voiceover industry a good thing, a bad thing, or just a thing? What can you do to avoid disruption?

Welcome to the new VO Strategist Blog! Well, it's not exactly new. The content is exactly the same now it's parked at VOStrategist.com/blog.

Bottlenecks in your voiceover business are a common and often addressable challenge. Let’s define the term first, shall we…? Bottleneck – 1a: a narrow route b: a point of traffic congestion 2a: someone or something that retards or halts free movement and progress b: IMPASSE https://www.merriam-webster.com/ What kind of bottlenecks could you have in your voiceover business? Cash Flow: you don’t have the money to run your voiceover business effectively Tools: you don’t have the

There is a new healthcare option just for voice actors. It’s called Healthcare For Voice Actors, the brainchild of In Both Ears voiceover agent and industry advocate Stacey Stahl. I won’t go into detail about what they offer since it’s easier for you to check them out yourselves. You can do that at the Healthcare For Voice Actors website. Stacey put in a ton of hard work to provide another healthcare option for voice actors and I sincerely applaud her effort. Well done, Stac

I often think about what it means to have courage as a voice actor. Specifically, the courage to start your voiceover journey. Here’s what I mean by that… I used to be a café manager at a certain major bookstore chain. Someone who worked under me wanted my job so she put up one of the employees to claim I harassed her. Upper management bought it and I was fired. It was humiliating and I felt powerless. I got a great lawyer who saw right through their BS. After a few phone cal

Do you ever run diagnostics on your voiceover business? A few times a year I lead a workshop called “Cost/Benefit Analysis”. We talk about how your voiceover business is a machine. You design it, build it, fuel it, and run it. But how often do you analyze it? Maintain it? Make adjustments? Diagnostics help you figure out how your voiceover business works, why it works, and often most importantly, why it isn’t working. Are you happy with how you built your voiceover business?

The Extraordinary Power of Leader Humility is out! A few weeks ago I blogged about the power of dignity in reference to this book. Today let’s talk about humility. Humility: a modest or low view of one’s own importance; humbleness. I’m not crazy about that particular definition. Like author Marilyn Gist writes, humility is not meekness and it’s not an absence of arrogance, either. Her definition is: a tendency to feel and display a deep regard for others’ dignity. She’s refer

Speculation is running rampant about the recently announced changes to the SAG-AFTRA Health and Pension plans. There are a lot of very nervous narrators out there right now and understandably so. Here is a link to the 2021 Benefit Changes Overview: https://www.sagaftraplans.org/health/2021-changes/overview. I won’t go into detail about any of it because nothing is set in stone and there are many, many unanswered questions. Online Q&A sessions are scheduled so if you have que

Over the years I’ve heard the term “transactional relationship” but wasn’t exactly sure what it meant. It hit home last week while I was narrating the audio book “The Long-Distance Teammate“. The book referred to it briefly but profoundly so it spurred me to do some research. There is no official definition of the term “transactional relationship”, but it reminded me of when I had a part-time job at a store I had been a regular at for many years. I worked there for about 2-3

Complaining is something we all do from time to time. Some more than others… Why do humans seem to enjoy complaining so much? Some are complaining to express dissatisfaction or a loss of control. Others are complaining just to vent. We see people on various social media groups complaining about all sorts of subjects from rates to poorly written scripts, but mostly about Pay-to-Play sites. Either they hate them or they aren’t getting enough work to suit them. Here’s the realit

I love quotes. Like, I really love them. I’ve put a Quote of the Week in every blog entry since its inception in 2008. I find it fascinating that a concept can be crystallized into a couple of words that could potentially change your life. Here’s the quote that changed mine… I couldn’t wait for success so I went ahead without it. Jonathan Winters It’s the foundation of my entire voiceover career. Anyway, recently I read the book Hemingway Didn’t Say That: The Truth Behind

I’m proud to announce the release of the seventieth audio book I’ve narrated: Leveraging the Impact of 360-Degree Feedback, Second Edition by John W. Fleenor, Sylvester Taylor, and Craig Chappelow. Here’s the blurb: This is a hands-on guide for implementing effective 360-degree feedback systems as part of leadership development initiatives in organizations. Written for professionals who work inside organizations and external consultants working with clients, the book draws on

In the film ‘Apollo 13’ Ed Harris said, “Failure is not an option”. I’m pretty sure he didn’t have voiceovers in mind. Failure is absolutely an option in voiceovers and it’s the path that most aspiring talents take. Are they making a conscious choice to fail? Of course not. But their choices often lead to failure. Why? Lack of talent: choosing to enter a business that they have no business entering Lack of training: choosing to have minimal or no coaching Lack of resources:

Strategy Rules releases today! This was yet another fascinating audio book I had the pleasure of narrating. Strategy Rules is a series of business strategy lessons learned by the three giants of the computing industry: Bill Gates of Microsoft, Steve Jobs of Apple, and Andy Grove of Intel. These guys were geniuses and visionaries, but they weren’t perfect. They didn’t come out of the gate running perfect businesses with flawless strategies. They had to learn as they go. Their

Over the past few weeks, it’s been really interesting to see how the voiceover industry is adapting to the coronavirus pandemic. Many voice actors are scrambling to book & record projects from home. The voiceover industry has been heading in this direction for a long time and COVID-19 has catalyzed the process. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately, depending on who you ask), some will be left behind. One way that voice seekers are adapting are by adding new voice actors to the

A few years ago, I wrote a blog entry about being prepared so things like a blown tire or a crashing computer don’t make a bad situation worse. The coronoavirus pandemic has shone a bright light on every aspect of our lives and highlighted in glaring detail how we handle things financially, logistically, and emotionally. As a voice actor, how prepared are you for this? Don’t get me wrong. Unless you’re an epidemiologist or VERY paranoid, there’s no way in heck you prepared fo

Goodwill saved my ass last week. Last week was one of those weeks that new voice talent hope for and veteran voice talent have come to love/loathe; I got buried in last-minute voiceover bookings and advance sessions that kept getting rescheduled. That created a ripple-effect where I had to move other sessions around, sometimes more than once. This effected the audio book I’m currently recording (see last week’s blog entry) as well as many of the VO Strategist students I’m wo

Have you set your 2020 goals yet? Well, it is 2020 now so you may wanna get on that. Shockingly, I have already set my 2020 goals. I’ll share some of them with you broken down by the five categories of your voiceover business. As if I’d do it any other way… Cash Flow – Improve my financial portfolio/revenue allocation system. I’m looking at new ways to manage my money month-to-month as well as further diversify my retirement portfolio. Tools – Add an eLearning page to TomDhe

2020 is almost here! Are you ready for it? To plan for 2020, let’s look back at 2019. Did you achieve all the goals you set for the year? Specifically: Did you hit your Cash Flow goals by making/spending the money you hoped you would? Did you book more clients/gigs than in 2018? Did you acquire the Tools you needed to improve your business? Did you improve your Technique by taking more classes or getting more coaching? Did your Marketing campaigns work? Did you maintain or i

Vocal health is critical for all voice actors. Here’s why I bring it up…