Tabitha Pollardson

I think my upbringing and my parents always encouraging me to do the thing that I loved and that I was good at really made me as successful as I have been. My parents always encouraged me to find the thing that I was passionate about and that I could excel in, and they really pushed me to explore all kinds of different fields, all kinds of different school subjects and activities. I think that really helped me find this thing that I love, and this thing that I'm also good at. I knew that publishing was my passion, and that's what I wanted to do, and I was able to stick with it. I'm really grateful that I did, because now I'm doing what I love.

The best career advice that I have received is to stick with it. If there's something that you love, that you have studied and worked for, and just poured hours and hours into, stick with it, and if it is meant to be for you, it will be for you. Publishing is such a notoriously difficult industry to get into - I mean, there are creators who make a living giving people advice on how to get into the industry. I was sort of able to find my way around that by going with an independent press, and sort of helping to build this business from the ground up, along with the really, really wonderful founder and co-owners of this business. I knew that it was my passion, and that's what I wanted to do, and I was able to stick with it, and I'm really grateful that I did, because now I'm doing what I love.

If you don't like the room that you're in, go and make your own room. You don't have to stay where you don't want to be. I wasn't able to break into the traditional industry at this point in my career, and I didn't really want to - I didn't love the culture of those big publishing houses, personally. So I just kind of found my own room. I found my own niche, and dug my heels in, and here I am working with a wonderful team, a woman-owned business, just working with wonderful other women who also found their own room, and found that place to make our voices heard.

The challenges in our industry right now are obviously the rise of AI, the rise of AI writing, and authors feeling like hard work is not good, I guess - like, feeling like if I can get someone else or some other program to do this hard work of writing for me, then why wouldn't I? That's something that we're really fighting against and encouraging human creativity. On the flip side, the opportunities are that there are so many people looking for independent presses now. People want to support the little guy, the independent booksellers, the independent publishers, the independent authors. So there's a real opening there for people who want to write or edit or get those stories out. Marketing is a huge opportunity right now with social media marketing - that's kind of the biggest area for growth in the industry right now, in my opinion.

I think respect is one of the most important things for me. I am a very relational person, both in my personal life and in my work, and I think that's why I love working with authors, because I love building those relationships. In my personal life, I have a young family that I'm caring for, and those relationships are the most important thing in the world to me. My friendships, my family relationships, my coworkers, my neighbors - that's the most important thing in my life to me. Just being able to balance those two things - my top value is being relational.