Technical Editor Interview Question:

Please describe your typical editing process? When you edit a document, what do you do? Do you read it through entirely and then edit? Do you edit on your first read-through or make multiple passes, each for different items? Do you set it aside at any time?

Submitted by: Muhammad

I rarely have time to read fully through a manuscript before beginning my work, even though I work almost exclusively on shorter manuscripts (shorter than 10K words; all are journal articles or scientific and technical monographs). I always perform two passes through a manuscript: In the first pass, I fix all the substantive problems (logic, organization, clarity) and most of the minor copyediting details along the way. During that pass, I also insert many comments and questions asking for clarification. I then set the manuscript aside overnight so I can return to it with a different perspective for a second pass. If I don't have that much time (rush jobs are common), I still try to set it aside for at least an hour to accomplish the same effect. During that second pass, I tidy up my initial work and fix any errors I missed or introduced during the first pass.
This approach (at least two passes) is standard for all experienced editors (of which I know a great many). I sometimes do an additional pass if my initial edits require considerable work by the author; that final pass ensures that the author has responded correctly and adequately to all my queries and gives the results a final polish.
Submitted by: Muhammad