The member of our team you hear the least about is Angie. That’s not because she’s the least important. Far from it. It’s because her role with our marketing content division is very much behind the scenes as our copy editor.
Dan and Michelle handle most of the client interactions, the video interviews and so forth. Angie just quietly combs through our copy and makes sure we don’t sound like fools.
But there is another role Angie plays, and this month it’s been six years for her. We think you should know what an amazing job she’s done in it.
Back in 2015, Angie launched her own company called Angie Calabrese Editing. She started out mainly just receiving documents from corporate clients that needed to be proofread. She still does a lot of this, and if you’d like her to do it for you, here’s her web site.
But six years ago she was approached at a Royal Oak Chamber of Commerce meeting by Community Publishing and Marketing. They publish 14 quarterly community magazines, including Royal Oak Today. And they were looking for a new editor.
At first Angie was given the impression it would be seven or eight hours a week, just proofing stories. It turned out to be a lot more than that. Assigning stories. Mentoring writers. Managing photo assignments. Building relationships with elected officials and chamber of commerce leaders in 14 Metro Detroit communities.
Each of the 14 magazines is a quarterly, but they’re on a rolling schedule that requires Angie to put out one, sometimes two, each week. This is a full-time job and then some, and she does it in addition to handling her other clients and proofing all our client work.
The coolest thing is that Angie has learned much of this on the job. The proofing was up her alley, but all the management stuff – she had to learn. And she’s not only learned it. She’s mastered it. The publishing director is constantly telling her she’s absolutely indispensable to the operation, which she proves every day.
This month Angie marks six years as editor of the Today Magazines. We are in awe of what she’s accomplished there. And we hope others will take inspiration from her. Just because something seems outside your wheelhouse at first doesn’t mean you can’t do it. Better yet, it doesn’t mean you can’t become a complete boss at it.
Congratulations, Angie!