How to Study Content Strategy & Still Stay Sane

With the final semester of my Master’s Degree course in “Content Strategy” on the horizon, I think it’s time for a recap. So, here it is.

In September 2016 I started studying in a Master’s degree, next to working in a full-time job. The course: Content Strategy. The location: University of Applied Sciences, FH JOANNEUM in Graz, Austria.

Since then, I’ve been attending numerous online lectures in my pajamas (comfy), spending attendance phases that lasted up to a week at uni (insightful, yet exhausting) and learning more and more about how to better communicate in this weird invention called the World Wide Web (handy). know that that’s probably no liable definition of what my course is about, so I’ll let Rahel Anne Bailie do the work:

Content strategy deals with the planning aspects of managing content throughout its lifecycle, and includes aligning content to business goals, analysis, and modeling, and influences the development, production, presentation, evaluation, measurement, and sunsetting of content, including governance. What content strategy is not is the implementation side. The actual content development, management, and delivery is the tactical outcomes of the strategy that need to be carried out for the strategy to be effective.

So now that’s out of the way. Don’t worry, this is not a rundown of all the lectures I’ve attended or a seminal article about what Content Strategy is. Others can, and already did do that better than me a long time ago.

Rather, consider this a small guide on how you can get the most out of this fairly new program (or any program, to be honest).

Insight #1: Read, Write & Exchange Thoughts

One question I was asked when applying for admission into the Content Strategy course was: “What do you think you can add to the mix in this course?” I thought being asked that question was a bit. After all, I was here to learn and be taught, right?

Focus. Confidence! You can cry when you get home.

Now I understand why my answer to this question mattered. Upon getting to know the people in my class, I quickly noticed how diverse their backgrounds were. There were graphic designers, marketing people, journalists, SEO-experts, people working in politics, web designers, PR-folk, people working in charity organizations, global organizations or local companies, some new to their job, others having lots of experience already. And everyone brought in unique inputs.

Talk to people, you might actually learn something

Exchanging thoughts on the topic of Content Strategy with my peers is what made this course so valuable. And it doesn’t stop there. With all the external lecturers coming in, the course put me in a great position to connect to people in the industry as well.

So, I guess my advice would be:

• Listen to what industry professionals share. Connect to them through e.g.Twitter.
• Invest some time and money in books. Continuously. Now that sounds like a grind advice (I love reading), but it’ll make working on the countless assignments way easier if you don’t have to start your research from scratch all the time. I learned the hard way.
• Read your colleague’s blogs, engage with your peers. Learn from them.
• Document your journey, create content. Yes, it is mandatory to create your so-called portfolio in the course, and yes, sometimes it’s a pain. But in the end, the value that you get out of it depends on one person: YOU. Use that opportunity, get yourself out there.

Insight #2: Deadlines Suck. Try Sticking to Them Anyway

• Full disclosure I: I hate deadlines.
• Full disclosure II: In the course, I almost never delivered assignments on the first deadline, I’d usually aim for the second one. Yes, second deadlines exist (if you’re lucky).
• Full disclosure III: I wouldn’t get anything done without them.

And that’s basically all there is to say about that. Balancing all the assignments with your daily job’s (or life’s) tasks is hard. It will throw you off sometimes. It will stress you out, it will make you furious at times, sometimes you might hold off on starting a paper until you absolutely have to (or is that just me?). You might even run late on handing something in sometimes. I sure did. And that’s not great.

Calendar Hell.

But here’s some elementary school advice: The more you let your tasks pile up, the harder it gets doing them. Especially when you’ve got ten of them and you can’t see anything else but uni-related stuff in your phone’s calendar anymore. And that whole calendar issue is bad enough on its own already. Don’t make matters worse by missing deadlines. There’s countless of students in part-time degrees managing the workload. You can too. Just go and kick that assignment in the butt.

Insight #3: Listen, Challenge & Improve or Suck It Up & Move On

I can be a horribly impatient person. I hate it when I feel like my time is spent on trivial things. But here’s the catch: While I might personally not have seen the point in certain discussions, presentations in lectures or processes that make up uni life, the person standing in front of me might have invested time, thought and passion in exactly these things.

So rather than being mad about something …

• … engage and ask questions. Show interest and give your feedback.
• … challenge people when you feel they’re not prepared well or when you disagree with what they’re saying. I know that’s easier when it’s peers giving a presentation, but also professors value feedback, even if it’s negative. (At least I would. And I don’t shy away from doing so.)
• … indicate broken processes and offer better solutions if you have any.
• … be respectful.

I at least don’t remember a single lecture that got better through background chatter, rolling eyes and scowling from the back row of the room. I might have tried. Didn’t work. Even if your feedback is ignored, at least you got it off your chest. And if all else fails, tell yourself: “Uni is temporary, I’m gonna become a kick ass content specialist one day. I’ll get a degree. Also, there’s a huge bar of chocolate waiting for me at home.”

Ok, in some cases that might be harder?

Insight #4: Don’t Obsess Over Grades. No One Cares.

In a few years from now, no one will look at the grades you’ve received in semester 1,2,3 or 8956. No one. By contrast the knowledge, the broadened skillset and the network you built through your studies will help you get the job that you like and simply make you good at doing what you’re doing. In my case, having studied Content Strategy in Graz might have also wrecked my nerves at times, but I’m convinced I’ll profit from it for all the reasons stated above. And that beats any straight A.

Having said that, I gotta go now. After all, the paper doesn’t finish itself.