Skipping to what is one of the most important skills to have in editing, this month I want to talk about how we relate to the other person in the form of a review of their work. It may be a writer colleague, an engineer or software developer, your manager, the CEO, or a client. You might not have met the person or even know who they are. But you’re not just editing content. Reviewing someone else’s work can be a rather intimate way of relating to another human being.
I’ve been developing a not-so-lightning talk to present at the next Lone Star Chapter monthly meeting. If you’ve never tried it, let me tell you, it’s hard! I find that I can’t talk at the speed of lightning, and so far, I talk too much to keep it to five minutes. So while I’m struggling to edit myself for this talk, forgive me if I take advantage of this longer-winded forum to explore my topic.
My talk is titled, “Editing Mistakes I’ve Made So You Don’t Have To.” I cover some best practice tips on how to edit efficiently in terms of mechanics. But the worst mistakes I’ve made were in how I related to the person on the other end of the review.
One example I give is from a long-ago peer editing situation. I returned to a coworker a hardcopy markup on which, among other marks, I had written “Spellcheck!” in red ink at the top. Later I found out that not only was that person upset, but the rest of the team was offended, too.
What had I done to upset the whole group in a single review?
Was it the red ink? We all know now not to use red ink for a markup on paper, right? Any other contrasting color is less likely to remind someone of a test or assignment they got back from a teacher. You don’t want the writer to feel like she’s being graded.
Was the person just embarrassed at being caught in such an obvious mistake—that of not running spellcheck? Likely, that was part of it …
But what offended them the most was the exclamation mark. What I considered just a tiny stroke of punctuation conveyed a lot more than that. I later realized that what it probably “said” to them was something more like
You idiot!!! Why didn’t you run spellcheck?!
That tiny exclamation mark implied judgment on my part, a negative emotional reaction to my peer’s mistake. Probably not the best way to relate to your peers …
The team’s collective response was emotionally negative in kind. Can you blame them?
I confess that I didn’t understand all this at the time. Obviously, I didn’t forget it either.
Now I know that as editors or reviewers of the work of others, we have a responsibility to avoid colors, marks, and remarks that imply a negative evaluation of the person’s work and thereby evoke a negative reception to our otherwise well-meaning comments.
There is another human being attached to the content we edit. Who knew that people skills are not restricted to in-person, phone, or email communications? They are also embedded in our technical edits. And that deserves a big “!”
Paula Robertson has learned her editing skills over a long and varied career, while swapping out the various titles of writer, editor, and designer. No matter what her current job title, she has earned the right to call herself the “Insightful Editor.” In STC, her current job title is Judge Manager for the 2013-14 International Summit Awards.
It’s very important to remember that any published writing work, even something super-technical, was created by a person whose self-esteem is more wrapped up in that work than an editor might realize. Couching corrections in terms that won’t upset, insult or anger the author is vital. That’s why I always list “tact” as one of the hallmark characteristics of a good editor when I teach my workshops on editing and proofreading basics.
Thanks, Ruth. I’m glad to hear that I’m on the same page as you. Thanks for your comment.
Yvonne, Thanks for adding that explicit detail to describe the reception of those at a much more advanced level than were my peers at the time. The basic concept remains the same, regardless of who the editor’s audience is.
At my first job as technical writer, the organization culture strongly encouraged ‘separate self from work’. It meant that the editor’s notes are targeted at the document and not at the author. Likewise, the author’s comments were targeted at the editor’s notes and not at the editor. If implemented with a fair degree of success, this process does not allow any personal emotions, ego, esteem, respect or raised eyebrows. Every discussion, email, notice is for the work and everybody in team understands that the comment was not for the person.
PS: The team would always have lunch and coffee together for light-heart chats over those emails and review comments, but always with a smile!