Research suggests that professionally edited manuscripts are more likely to be accepted than those without professional editing. But the precise timing of when to engage an editor remains unexplored.
You want to maximize your investment in professional editing by bringing your editor in at just the right time: not so early that most of their hard work is lost among further changes, but not so late that there’s not much room for them to suggest transformative improvements.
So when should academics hand over their draft for the best results?
Having edited papers for hundreds of business academics for over 14 years now, I’ve come to believe that there is, in most cases, an ideal stage to invest in editorial services. Consider whether or not the following statements apply to see if your manuscript is at that stage.
Is it time to hire an editor?
You have some funds (whether private or institutional) for professional editing: the average journal article costs between $500 and $2500 depending on word count and level of editing needed.
YES | NO |
Proceed | First, don’t make the mistake of seeking out an extremely cheap editor. Second, don’t worry! There are plenty of free tools at your disposal: help from your school’s writing center, online guides and writing centers, my own site and resources, a groundbreaking comparative tool from fellow editor Letitia Henville called Writing Well Is Hard, and yes, even ChatGPT (though the latter should only be used to create a working structure for a paper or suggest minor edits, with caution—and never for actually writing a paper). Make full use of these and low-cost resources (like our classes) to improve your writing abilities. Don’t focus on “sounding smart” or following all the finicky conventions of grammar, punctuation, etc. Big-picture impact is typically hindered, not helped, by those priorities—and even the free versions of LLMs do a passable job of catching the finicky stuff nowadays anyway. You can also petition your institution to increase its funding for editing, given the importance of strong writing to its faculty members’ impact and careers. |
The document in question is extremely important to your career/institute.
YES | NO |
Proceed | Unless you have an abundance of funds at your disposal, consider saving your money for edits to only those documents that represent critically important opportunities in your career. As noted, plenty of free or cheap resources exist to improve less important drafts. |
The research you’ll be writing about is done or very nearly done.
YES | NO |
Proceed | You definitely don’t need to finish your data collection/research in order to start writing at all (in fact, most people find it best to start writing while the research/data collection is still happening). But you should have the research essentially finalized before anyone starts editing that writing. After all, there’s not much point in polishing the windows of a house that only has three walls. |
Similarly, the draft is complete or very nearly complete (even if it’s really rough)
YES | NO |
Proceed | While a good academic editor can help you complete a draft manuscript (I’ve certainly done it for clients), it’s best if you can complete it yourself, no matter how rough or sketchy. That’s because editors have maximum scope to improve the writing when all the writing is actually there; if any part of what you’d like to say is missing, then we’re working with incomplete information and perhaps even extrapolating beyond our area of expertise. If, however, you’re feeling totally stuck and unable to complete a draft, this can still be a good time to bring in some editorial help. Just know that the less complete the draft is, the more experienced and specialized the editor or coach should be at this pivotal stage in the paper’s development. |
You’re confident that the paper’s core arguments and findings are sound.
YES | NO |
Proceed | If you’re not sure a particular research question, theory, or methodology has merit, it’s probably too early to bring in any kind of editor. Instead, get some feedback from peers: mentors, colleagues, conference participants, etc. If none of these free avenues prove fruitful, think about booking a session or two with an experienced academic writing coach. In that time, they should be able to help you answer all the fundamental questions about what you want your paper to say (and how and why). |
The paper has already been submitted somewhere and gotten some feedback.
YES | NO |
Proceed | Consider submitting it somewhere first to see how the journal responds. A sense (any sense) of how publishable the manuscript might be in its current state is valuable information when deciding whether to invest hundreds of dollars into refining it. Once you have some comments from a journal editor or reviewers, a good editor will be able to turn those thoughts into concrete, transformative changes that get you closer to your intended result (publication). Feedback like “paper is too long” or “some sentences unclear” can feel soul-crushing rather than helpful when you’re the one who has to decide what that feedback actually means and how to make changes that address it. Handing off that daunting, time-consuming work to your editor is (according to our clients) always money well spent. |
All this brings us to the very BEST time to bring your manuscript to an editor. For most journal articles, the best time to use our editing services is usually when you have a manuscript under “revise and resubmit” (especially at a top-tier journal). A great editor can help tremendously in turning this “foot in the door” opportunity into a firm win. Once we know the exact concerns that are impeding this article’s acceptance, we can help ensure they’re addressed and also give the whole document a meticulous polish for maximum readability. The end result shows the journal that you’re really taking this additional chance seriously—hopefully getting the resubmission off your plate and onto your list of publications that much faster. |
This is not to say that journal articles that haven’t been submitted anywhere yet are a waste of time and money to edit; we work on dozens of these a year, too. But it’s always with the knowledge that there’s a slightly higher risk that the paper could still have fundamental issues with its content or scope that might mean it ends up rejected; this is a heartbreaking outcome after all the time, work, and money that’s gone into it, but one that always precedes eventual acceptance somewhere more appropriate, in my experience—so don’t despair!
Finally, I want to acknowledge that some scholars and editors are firmly opposed to the expectation that faculty members should ever pay for editorial help out of their own pockets. I’m not one of them. I understand (and always try to work with) budget constraints, and I’d dearly love to see institutions provide more funding for editing. However, many of my clients do pay me out of pocket and have shared why they’re happy to do so: the best editors are a significant investment in yourself—your reputation, your success, your career, your visibility. The best editors give you precious insights into your own ideas and how to communicate them. Academic editing “is sometimes misunderstood as a picayune exercise unrelated to the content of the manuscript, but it actually reaches into the substance of what the author wants to argue or share,” notes Pamela Haag in The Art of Academic Editing, with good editors functioning “almost like [co-thinkers] with the authors.” In short, the best editors provide value that often extends far beyond one document. Hence, even if your school won’t cover an experienced editor’s help, I’d still recommend hiring one for those opportunities where you feel it’s warranted—particularly in the highly competitive field of business research.
-Catie Phares
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