I have never written for television, but here are my notes from reading those who have.
Writing for television pays well but the hours are long. You will not get a chance to write that play. Nor is it likely that you will be able to go from television to film. It is not like that. On the other hand, writers are more important in television than they are in the film world: all of the top producers are writers. If you are really good, then some day you will produce, maybe even create, your own shows.
Writing for television means writing scripts. So you begin by writing a script for a show you would like to see on television. You send it to a company, like the BBC, that might be interested in making it. Your script will have all the words the show needs. A one-hour show needs a script of about 14,000 words.
Your first scripts will be no good – you are too green. Like in any art or trade, it will take several years of learning it before you will be any good.
Here are the numbers:
The BBC, for example, gets maybe 10,000 scripts a year. They have readers who read through these scripts. They read the first ten pages of each script. About 1500 of these are good enough to read to the end. Of these maybe 100 will be so good that they will ask the writer for a second script. Of these second scripts about 30 will be good enough to call the writer in to meet the producer and head writers.
When they call you in they are not so much interested in your script as in you. You have proved that you can write a good television script, a rare thing. That is why they want to meet you.
With numbers like these, your script must be as good as possible before you send it in. What is more, sending in an avoidably bad script will give you a bad name among the readers. They may not read your next script.
So make sure your English is perfect, make it look like a real script (you can find examples online), read it aloud, have friends look at it, stick it in a drawer for a few months and then read it again. All these things help.
But most of all, do not give up. That is the secret.
As in any writing, write what interests you, not what you think might interest others. Otherwise your writing will be dead.
You must also know your medium inside out. To write a good television show, you must live and breathe television. Just as to write a good book you must live and breathe books. This is why great book writers often fail miserably when they attempt to write a script. It is a different medium. Shovelware does not work.
Oh, and one more thing: you must know how to tell a good story. More on that next time.
See also:
Abagond 
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