Review Documents Like A Pro!
Below are some tips to help writers and reviewers reach a new level of efficiency. Feel free to share far and wide:
Leave the formatting alone. As a reviewer, your goal is to ensure the content is correct. Table numbering, TOCs, alignment, weird styles… let these small things go. Leave the editing to the medical writer or editor. What you see as an error might just be a function of your MS Word wreaking havoc on someone else’s hard work. If these issues are causing you a problem, please drop our own @Kelly Danyow a line. Her team can fix anything.
Improve it or leave it. New text should obviously improve the document. Correcting errors or inconsistencies, yes, please. Restating a clumsy sentence that could be clearer, bring it! Changing passive voice to active voice, uh, why? Pointing out an extra space at the end of a sentence or missing punctuation from a bulleted list, definitely no—this will all be addressed at document QC.
Make your comments count! You know what I am talking about, the nonspecific comment addressed to no one in particular. Don’t do this anymore, please. Make each of your comments carry some weight by providing a solution or clearly advocating that something specific be done to the document.
Comments addressed to you or your discipline? Answer them please! Enough said.
No more branch breaking. You reviewed. We get it. No need to prove it with a colorful trail of tracked changes seasoned with uninformative comments that read like Zen koans. This is white noise that only gums up the process and eats medical writing/editing hours, costing money. When a document is written efficiently, we all win.
Stay in your lane. Comments and edits from reviewers not proficient in a specific content area are disruptive, and it takes time to discuss and reconcile them. Instead, defer to your cross-functional counterparts to handle their areas of expertise.
Justin McLaughlin
CEO, Acumen Medical Communications