Work
Six pieces of work from the past two years, each with the brief, what I did, and what happened. Most of the business writing went out under someone else’s name; that’s explained below.
How I work
Listen, then adapt. A lot of writers go into a project with their own preconceptions and plough ahead regardless. Interviewing musicians taught me the answers are rarely what you expect. You listen, and you adapt to what you hear.
Proof over flash. Buyers don’t see something and click buy, especially when the work comes through tenders and frameworks. So I go to the source, query numbers that look wrong, and say what’s measured, estimated or modelled.
The right voice for the job. My own voice is in my music writing. At work, most of what I write goes out under someone else’s name. I draft it; they sign it off or rewrite it.
AI, used properly. I’ve built AI workflows that draft from company documents. I decide the angle and the claims, and I check every figure before anything goes out.
01 · Scotstoun Stadium: one project, three formats
Customer proof that works as web content, trade press and thought leadership.
- The brief: EGG replaced 96 floodlight heads at the Glasgow 2026 Athletics venue while somebody else rebuilt the track around them. A good job, buried in method statements and test certificates.
- What I did: Found the angle (“somebody else’s building site”), structured the case study and directed drafting from the project file. Then reworked it for contractors rather than clients — a comment piece for the COO built around one transferable lesson — cold-pitched it to Project Scotland, and supplied a picture story to Scottish Construction Now.
- What happened: Project Scotland ran the comment piece under the COO’s byline as submitted. Scottish Construction Now ran the picture feature. The case study sits on the company site as a sales asset.
Case study · Project Scotland comment · Scottish Construction Now
02 · Aberdeen HQ: getting the numbers right
A flagship case study and technical report, where credibility was the whole point.
- The brief: 2,116 fittings remanufactured at an energy major’s 150,000 sq ft headquarters. Big numbers, and an existing client who would read every one of them.
- What I did: Took readings at source from the electricians and checked their calculations. One area’s results looked wrong; I queried it, a fitting fault was found, and the affected batch was rechecked and re-measured. As the relationship continued, I tightened how every figure is described: measured, estimated (with the method named) or modelled.
- What happened: A public case study and downloadable technical report, presented to the client and its two facilities management partners. EGG’s engineers and electricians remain on site as an ongoing client relationship.
03 · Awards: one win, worked four ways
Award entries, then everything the wins could carry.
- The brief: A small Glasgow firm, well regarded by the people who already knew it and unknown to almost everyone else.
- What I did: Wrote and submitted the award entries, then worked each win: a release picked up by the lighting trade press, and a feature for the Glasgow Chamber of Commerce that made EGG’s case while encouraging other businesses to enter the next year’s awards — giving the Chamber its own reason to run it. I drafted the founder’s quotes for his sign-off.
- What happened: Three wins in 2025: Most Outstanding Business and Net Zero Achievement at the Glasgow Business Awards, and the Environmental Award at the Inspiring City Awards. A Scottish Parliament motion congratulating the company was lodged and supported by 26 MSPs across parties.
Glasgow Chamber feature · A1 Lighting coverage
04 · CPD: making engineering judgement teachable
Sales enablement that doesn’t look like selling.
- The brief: Give specifiers a reason to talk to EGG before they’ve decided to replace everything.
- What I did: Wrote and delivered “Engineering Decision Making for Lighting Assets” for building consultancy SPACE Solutions: a four-pathway framework, gating questions, and a worked case study where the scale assumptions failed — pitched to a room of marketers, architects and engineers.
- What happened: Delivered to SPACE Solutions; a second session was booked by another consultancy.
05 · Writing in my own hand
No AI, no sign-off — just me.
- What it is: BITS, my column on new Scottish music for SNACK Magazine. The summer 2026 edition picks 11 new tracks from across Scotland. Each gets a short write-up that has to make a stranger want to press play — the same job as a good piece of sales copy — and it’s written to the magazine’s gender-balance pledge.
- Why it’s here: Everything above was written for someone else’s name. This is my own voice.
SNACK Bits (Summer 2026): Scotland’s Essential New Music Guide (bylined Andy Reilly)
Ian Prowse: The Tortoise and the Hair Raising Moments. One interview, 30 years of stories, and the job of finding the single idea that holds them together (bylined Andy Reilly)
06 · Editorial calendar: how I plan
I plan my music writing the way a content team plans a quarter: around fixed dates I don’t control, working backwards from each one.
- Pegs: gig dates, release dates, festival line-ups, Celtic Connections every January.
- Lead time: request the interview, record it, edit it, file it — timed to land before the peg, not after.
- One story, several formats: one interview becomes a written Q&A, a full-length podcast episode and short clips for social.
- Rhythm: a monthly column and 30+ podcast episodes in 2026, all fitted around a full-time job.
Applied: an illustrative quarter for a promotional space business
Illustrative only — built from public information to show approach. Laid out as Choose → Build → Launch → Learn.
| Month | Peg | Choose | Build | Launch | Learn |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan | New-year footfall; brands planning spring activity | Brand marketers with budgets reopening | Customer case study with results, cut into a web case, a Sales one-pager and social clips | Website, LinkedIn, Sales email | Which format Sales actually sent |
| Feb | Valentine’s pop-ups and promotions | Retailers testing physical presence | “First pop-up” guide built from customer interviews; quotes reused as proof points | Website, paid social, retail trade press | Enquiries attributed; pickup |
| Mar | Mothering Sunday and Easter promotions; new venue wins | Venue and landlord partners | Partner story on a new venue, in the venue’s own words; award entry drafted from the same evidence | Trade press, partner channels, LinkedIn | Partner reuse; award shortlist |
| Rolling | Results dates | Investors, partners, press | Proof-point library updated each time: numbers, quotes, photos, consents | Corporate pages, press | What gets reused most |
The point isn’t the dates. Every piece starts from one brief and one piece of real evidence, gets cut for each channel, and is judged by whether Sales and partners use it.