If you’re the public face of something, think about what you can do to make sure the people who aren’t the public face still get some recognition and publicity.  Being the public face is easy in a lot of ways; you’re standing where the spotlight already is.  The trick, then, is to learn how to reflect that light in other places.

I say this as I think about how often I get conflated with Evil Hat, even though Evil Hat — especially with the Dresden Files RPG — is a team effort, a collaboration.  I flinch a lot whenever I see someone credit me for a thing that I only did the “packaging” on.  I’m loud, and a lot of the work I do has to do with the delivery, the last mile of connection between the publisher and the customer.

Heck, it might be baked right into my psychology to take on those jobs that put me in that position. Customer service, layout, spokesperson, amateur marketeer, what have you — all of those are about putting polish on something and getting it straight into the hands of someone who will express some gratitude for it being done.  That’s intensely gratifying. So it’s almost certainly the case that I’m into that sort of stuff because of the sweet, sweet hit of recognition and respect it gets me.

I can’t, and shouldn’t, deny that it’s part of the equation. But if I let it be all of the equation, I’m a jerk. From where I stand, it’s the artists, the writers, the editors who are doing the heavy lifting.    And these days, those roles are not mine (except in bits & pieces, always a minority portion). They’re the people who deserve celebrating, respect, recognition.  So in the twitter tradition of “follow friday” — which, yes, is about getting people followers but is really about heaping more recognition on folks you feel deserve it — I’m going to talk quickly about the Dresden Files RPG team.

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