Many Heads Make Work Right

By Ramesh Aiyyangar

Writing is popularly considered a spontaneous exercise, and often is. Spontaneous writing, however, does not always result in high quality results. 

The problem has traditionally been solved among technical writers by means of a quality-control and certification system called "Peer Reviews." Peer reviews are educative, informative, enlightening, and provides a safety net that invests writers with confidence to go on writing.  

What is the peer review all about?

Peer reviews are vital to enhancing the quality, credibility, and acceptability of work submitted by writers.

The role of reviewers

At the head of this quality control mechanism are the reviewers. It is the reviewers' responsibility to maintain high editorial standards and to ensure that the work submitted fulfils its stated aims. The work is reviewed for style, format, sentence structure, etc., especially things that are a concern to writers. If the submitted work deviates from the company's standards/guidelines it will be either rejected immediately or the peers will ask the writer to resubmit the work after it has been revised. If the work is rejected outright, the reviewers often suggest that the writer re-write for suitability and higher quality. 

The review process

The review committee usually includes three of four reviewers, depending on their availability. It is good to have several people, but not more than six. Too many people can bring in as many opinions, and you'll never get finished. 

These reviewers ideally research or practice in the same area as the writer and are subject specialists. In this process, all work authored by the writer is sent to the reviewers. The reviewers then judge the work and return it to the writer. 

The criteria used for judging are discussed later in this article. In theory, neither the author nor the reviewers know each other's identity, thus ensuring impartiality. This is not always possible, especially if the subject area does not support a large community. It is quite possible that the reviewer will be able to guess the origin of the work by its content. 

The outcomes

After the work has been reviewed, it is then in one of three states; rejected, accepted, or returned for revision, with the suggestion that the author makes amendments to the article, which might meet the reviewers' satisfaction. If the reviewers ask for the work to be revised, the writer has the opportunity to amend the work and resubmit it for review. At this second review stage, the reviewers decide if the alterations the author has made have taken into account all the points raised in the first review. Accordingly, the paper will be finally accepted or rejected. 

By what criteria is work judged?

The criteria commonly used as benchmarks are broadly: 

• Is the document easy to read? 

• Do the arguments flow logically? 

• Are the conclusions strong? 

Some reviewers use a pro forma that directs them to these questions. Checklists and comments enable a structured and deeper analysis of the work. An obvious recommendation to a prospective writer is to consider how to meet the above criteria before starting to write. This should greatly increase the chance of meeting the standards specified.

Strategies for a successful peer review

As far as the author is concerned, the conventional peer review process for the submitted work comes a bit late in the day. The research has been done, the conclusions drawn and pen (or ribbon, or toner) put to paper. 

Trying to build in quality at the end of the production process is far too late. The obvious answer is to consider the quality aspect of the work before starting to write, by forming an action review plan at your workplace. 

The ideal quorum for a review committee is five people. The basic constitution is a senior advisor, preferably with plenty of experience as a writer, and four other members. The key to reviewing and, therefore, writing documents is to make the most important things explicit. 

To achieve this, writers could answers the following eight questions, which could then be discussed at committee meetings: 

• Who are the intended readers? - list three to five of them by name; 

• What did you do? (limit 50 words); 

• Why did you do it? (limit 50 words); 

• What happened? (limit 50 words); 

• What do the results mean in theory? (limit 50 words); 

• What do the results mean in practice? (limit 50 words); 

• What is the key benefit for your readers? (limit 25 words); 

• What remains unresolved? (limit 50 words). 

The most important question to be answered is:  What is the benefit to the reader? Care must be taken not to be  distracted from this. Many writers concentrate on the "what I did" and "what I found" aspects of the document, at the expense of selling the document to the reader.  

Action learning should provide a supportive, reflective environment in which writers can sort out just what it is that they want to say in a document, and how best to frame their thoughts so that the readers cannot fail to grasp them. 

Pre-print distribution

Another peer review strategy is the is the circulation of pre-prints. Pre-prints are the (almost) finished article. Rather than sending your documents directly to the user, it is best to first circulate it among other writers or subject specialists and elicit their opinion.

At the lowest level, this can be done within your department at your workplace, but it can also be done by sending the documents to colleagues in your network. 

If you are new to the technical writing business, you may not have a big enough personal network to do this.  In this case, it may be necessary to resort to cold calling: sending the work (and a covering  letter explaining why you have sent  the work) to people you have never met before, but whose work you have read or even cited. 

They may return the work without reading  it, but most people are flattered to be asked and are more than happy to help. 

Another option available to writers is the Internet. There are now many special interest groups that will preview and discuss your work. 

On the other hand...

The peer review process is used to guarantee quality and has survived for a number of centuries now. For a system to last that long, it must contain a number of advantages. However, it does have a number of distinct disadvantages too. 

One major  problem with the peer review process is that reviewers are, like most people, very busy with work and other commitments and these must come before refereeing, which is, almost always, an unpaid task. 

Although most do the job readily (it is considered a duty and a service to the writing community), they are not always able to donate the time and consideration that an article may need. 

This can result in writers only receiving very brief, unenlightening comments, if any at all, on a document they have submitted, especially if the document is accepted without revision. 

This may make it difficult to get meaningful feedback on work; for example about how writers can continue to improve their writing technique and research rigour or direction. 

Do’s and Don’ts

Never give a peer reviewer a large volume of material on short notice; if you're lucky, they'll read it, but don't expect any detailed comments. There are two good alternatives that always work better: 

• Send chapters or major sections for review as soon as they're ready. 

• Break the chapters/sections into digestible chunks, and send each chunk to someone who's expert on that topic.  

That way, you reduce that reviewer's work load and you also increase the likelihood of getting a detailed review.

Open peer reviews

While the case for peer reviews is strong and compelling, other preferences and options exist. Many people are unhappy with peer reviews, which they equate with censorship. 

They argue that with the new media, such as electronic archives, it is possible for all material to be published and for subsequent readers to leave their comments stored with the original article: this is known as open peer review. 

Conclusion

The best that can be said for peer review is that the focus of the review is the work, and how to improve it, not on the person as a professional. The worst that can be said for peer reviews is that it may be disruptive to interpersonal relations between employees, and if poorly planned, could add little or no value.

The message to all writers is to consider quality in your written work at all stages of the production process, from before the document is written, right up to when it is submitted for release. 

Use the criteria and benchmarks mentioned in this article as your guide. Finally, never be discouraged. Many documents that have been rejected have then later been recognized as being truly important contributions in their field. 

Ramesh works as the lone technical writer for a business unit in VERITAS Software. He is a regular contributor to STC activities in Pune. You can reach him at aramesh@veritas.com.

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