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Meet the Team: Gayle

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Gayle Hyden
Operations Manager/Human Resources

Job Duties:
Making sure every department meets its goals and key milestones
Formulating company policies and ensuring compliance
Performing quality control and assurance on production
Examine financial data and analyze it to improve profits

When I decided to start my professional editing business back in 2012, then named Hyde ‘n’ Seek Editing, my mother was my biggest fan. She did everything she could to encourage me to venture out from working for a publishing company (though one of the big fives) and instead create my own company, where I could work for the “regular” authors, the ones who preferred to self-publish their work.

A couple of years ago, when I decided to rebrand my business and book blog, she stood by my side, full of ideas, ready to help me take it to the next level. She was the one that told me I could do this, that reminded me why I started this business in the first place, and motivated me to make this more than, at the time, I thought it could be.

We joked about how she needed a “fancy title,” and I did my research, figuring out the best one for the things that she did each day. She was the one that kept me focused, who worked behind the scenes to make sure I stayed on schedule and met my goals. She was the one that worked with me to create company policies (whether you are a company of 1 or a company of 1 million, you should always have policies and procedures). She was the one that made sure I was being consistent in the quality of work I was putting out there. She was the one who looked at the time I was putting in compared to the amount I was asking, and though she wanted me to charge more, she understood why I chose to keep my prices low (not because I don’t have faith in my work and what I can do, but because I knew who I was working for and wanted to help them reach their goals).

Unfortunately, COVID happened. Which brought me back into the retail management field, unable to make it on editing alone. I lost site of my business, taking on more contract work from now two big five publishing companies, unable to find time for those “regular” authors that I loved working with so much.

At the beginning of this year, Gayle passed away unexpectedly. I lost my best friend, my roommate, my business partner, and my Disney-trip buddy all at once. I lost my purpose. I lost my reason to continue.

While going through her file cabinets over the weekend, something I have been putting off for some time, and something I was now using to put off other things, I found a scratch piece of paper full of notes on MeghanH Editing. Included was a list of goals we had talked about during a business meeting at the end of last year, the main goal being to put MeghanH Editing on the map, to venture out from the genre I had called “home” for so long and put myself out there for everyone. (Even beyond this world she is reminding me of why I started out doing this in the first place.)

Even though she has passed on, she will always have this “fancy title,” will always be considered a part of this company. Without her, I would have not even tried for this dream of mine, something I have wanted to do since I was in pre-K, something I went to school for (and continue my education for every year), something that I am extremely passionate about. Without her, Hyde ‘n’ Seek Editing, and now MeghanH Editing, would not be a thing. And I will never be able to thank her enough for what she did for me.

MeghanH Editing Company Update

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For those who have not already heard, after both of us suffered with the flu for over a month through January and February, Gayle Hyden, Operations Manager here at MeghanH Editing, passed away.

The completely unexpected passing of my best friend, my business partner, my roommate, and most importantly, my mom, took a real hit on me, as I’m sure you can imagine. She was such an influential part of this business, from conception, and my life as a whole. To say she is truly missed every single day is an understatement.

Though I did a few contract projects for two of the big fives and quietly took on a few editing projects here through MeghanH Editing, I haven’t said anything about the business publicly since the beginning of the year and had considered shutting the doors, no matter how much I love this and what I do. She would not have wanted that. (In fact, she’d be irate that I even thought about it.) It was always our dream that this business would become more than what it is, become more than just word of mouth, and moving forward, that is exactly what it is going to be.

Starting today, MeghanH Editing is officially BACK open for business. And, until the end of the year (there will be a post written about this shortly), every project (contract signed, amount paid, but CAN be scheduled for a later date) will qualify for 5% off (in her memory). This discount CAN be stacked with the other discounts that MeghanH Editing offers.

Hug your loved ones, make sure that they know how much you love them, because you never know when your time on earth runs out and the heartache that will be left behind.

Take a look around. If you have any questions, you can reach out to me via email or through messenger on my business page. I look forward to helping you with your next project!

A Little Bit of History + a Renewed Vigor

megHan

Hi. Welcome to MeghanH Editing. For those of y’all who don’t know me, I am Meghan. You can read a bit about me in other places on the website, and on my book blog page, but I just wanted to take a moment to introduce myself before I started my first blog post here on MeghanH Editing. (We’ll talk about that in a minute.)

I have been professionally editing since April 2012. Since that time – the day I began Hyde ‘n’ Seek Editing, which I then rebranded a few years ago to the current MeghanH Editing – I have had the pleasure and honor of working with lots of authors through my company and also as an editor for two of the major publishing companies. All wonderful and beautiful, and great to brag about, but this here has been a culmination of a lifelong dream. See, I read a book when I was very young that didn’t quite “sound” right, and that day I told my mom I was going to get paid to read (and fix the issues I found in books). And here I am… getting paid to read (and fix the issues I find in books).

Now, there was editing before the beginning of Hyde ‘n’ Seek Editing (which feels like forever ago) – high school newspaper and literary magazine, college newspaper, editing for my mom when she went back to college (and then her classmates, and mine, while I was in both high school and college), and even editing for two professors I had while I was in school – but this was the big dream. THIS was what I wanted to do. And with this, I could focus on the smaller names, the people who self-edited or who went through smaller publishing companies, the new writers who wanted to learn and grow in their craft.

As the company grew, so did the interest from elsewhere…

In 2015, I began my first stint working with a Big 5 publisher. I learned a lot working there, while still running Hyde ‘n’ Seek Editing, and now have even more experience under my belt. It was definitely something I loved, and a Bucket List fulfillment, but it bothered me that I couldn’t focus as much on the people that I wanted to focus on… the indie authors.

In 2017, I worked for a year with a now defunct smaller publishing company behind the scenes as the last set of eyes before an anthology or collection came out.

Also in 2017, I began working for another Big 5 publisher, and with this one I chose to be more focused on the editing aspect rather than being focused on the project management side of things.

In 2019, I had the chance to go back and work further with the first Big 5, but this time working on a contract by contract basis. This allowed me to give more time towards the authors who were choosing Hyde ‘n’ Seek Editing, and to be more one-on-one with the authors who I was working with at the Big 5. (The difference between my company and working with the bigger companies was that I like to be very hands on, phone conversations and texts, emails, etc. with my authors, while with the Big 5s, I don’t often get the chance to have a one-on-one conversation where we can discuss the book, etc.)

In 2020, the second Big 5 decided they wanted me to work on further projects with them after I edited for one of their romance authors. (And anyone who knows me well will laugh at that because they KNOW how much I am not a fan of the romance genre.) The author was someone who I had spoken to several times before, who was actually a follower of my book blog, and because of this, decided that she wanted me and only me. Her and I worked on a project she was doing away from that Big 5, and she adored working with me so much that she told the Big 5 she would work with no one else. After several of her romance author friends asked that I edit for their books also, I began contract working for them as well.

Over the last couple of years, I have taken on a few authors here at MeghanH Editing, but have focused mainly on that contract work. I’ll be honest – I had grown slightly frustrated with being a small-time editor. The well of authors needing an editor had dried up, either because of the current mindset that editors are not needed (I don’t know who started that rumor, but they are wrong, and I can give you book after book as evidence that we are a very necessary aspect of publishing) or because of the fact that people are choosing authors to be their editor (ranting and raving about how well their books were edited, after they hired an editor) instead of editors that have worked through school to be educated on the subject. And I can see why people want to be an editor – it’s a FUN job and you get to meet a lot of authors and read a lot of books – but it is not as “easy” as some decide it is. It takes a lot of work, and you can tell the difference between a book that has been edited professionally and one that has just been edited. My job is to edit it professionally, and I continue my education monthly to make sure that I know the very latest in how things are done because I am a professional and I want to do the best job I can for my authors.

Today I sat down at my desk and sort of glanced the big white board I have out of the corner of my eye. I sit at my desk every day, and usually just avoid the white board, but something today made me look at it, something told me that today was the day I needed to sit down and write this – my FIRST blog post on MeghanH Editing. I can’t even tell you how I’ve had this site for two years and not written even one blog post. It’s not that I don’t have ideas – my white board is COVERED in blog post ideas – and I have lots of half-written blog posts in my “Drafts” section. I just haven’t felt… ready. (If that is even the correct word.) Today I feel ready to tackle all of those blog post ideas that just sit collecting dust on my white board (on the side of my bookshelf, on the front of my file cabinets, on the framed picture of penguins that is hung next to my desk, on my closet door – there are a LOT of ideas between my three blogs that don’t get touched). The doors of MeghanH Editing have been unofficially closed long enough…

TODAY, MeghanH Editing is open for business!!

If you are looking for an editor, or know someone who is, click on the Contact Me tab and let’s talk about your project.