Agent in Your Pocket: Measuring Your Success Against the Highlight Reel Will Get You Nowhere
Literary agent Jessica Berg offers advice on how to measure writerly success with milestones that actually matter.
What are the milestones that matter in an author’s career?
Is it success that comes in the form of a book deal that earns out, which lands you on a list? That list placement then sails you into a career of celebrity book club picks and author stardom?
Or is it dedicating yourself to your craft so you can finally understand what “show, don’t tell” means? Maybe it’s building a vibrant author community both online and in-person. Or it’s learning the exquisite nuance of dialogue and being so thrilled when your character’s exchanges practically leap off the page.
Of course, we never see any of the “dull” successes on social media, in articles, interviews, and on panels. Instead, we see the highlights because it’s easier to measure success when it’s quantifiable. So we stack the idea of success up against Publishers Marketplace deals. Bestseller lists. The number of Goodreads reviews and presales.
We also do this because it feels safer than telling the truth about those long, hard years in the middle. When you’re still learning craft. When you’ve come to narrative with a brilliant concept and struggle to get it just right on the page. When you’ve been on round after round of querying agents with no response.
Sharing the wins feels far more accessible and engaging than the “failures.” Like the author who didn’t earn out. Or the one whose sophomore book tanked. Or even, the one who spent a decade querying, only to land an agent, and then have two books die on sub (hi, that’s me).
Invisible Milestones
So what are the milestones that actually matter? The ones that might not make the highlight reel, but are, in fact, far more important?
I’d argue that these “invisible” successes are all the ones that bring you closer to your goals.
- Showing up consistently, even when there’s nothing outward to celebrate.
- Learning to call yourself a writer without apologizing or flinching or deflecting.
- Pressing send on a submission even though you’re terrified.
- Deciding to keep going even after a round of rejections.
- Writing scenes that make you (or your beta readers) laugh or cry.
- Learning to trust your intuition while you’re revising.
- Finally finding that one critique partner who gets your work and doesn’t try to change it.
- Having a reader tell you that your story changed their life.
- Knowing what kind of career you want and working toward it at a pace that is suitable for you, in your life, right now.
It’s unlikely many of these invisible successes will ever make a highlight reel. You probably won’t mention these in interviews. But these are the successes that will build your career because you’re proving yourself capable in an industry that often remains cloaked in mystery. They’re also repeatable, which means you won’t be at the mercy of an industry where so much is out of your control. These are also all of your successes, independent of everything else. Sure, a bestseller list placement sounds amazing, but that often depends on marketing budgets, retailers, timing, and a hundred other things. But learning to write a scene that lands? No one can take that from you.
Finally, these invisible successes far outweigh the highlight reel because they survive the hard outcomes. They tell you who you are as a writer and they’re the only ones you can actually work toward. So the next time you see a highlight reel and wish desperately that could be your career, I want you to pause. Remember the years of work that you didn’t see for that author to get to that place. Then be a good literary citizen, like, share, and repost, and get back to doing all the things you can control.
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Learn more from Jessica Berg at the Writer’s Digest Annual Conference July 23-25, 2026!
