Publishing early or even on time can make the difference between a best seller or a flop. It means you can beat the competition to market; make sure the resource is available when the customer wants to buy; less work is involves as there is no extra 'publishing' to convince the customer that the resource is worth waiting for and not buy your competitors'; everyone is happy and there is no pressure.
Why is it so often a rush towards that publishing date? We all know what needs to be done and how long it takes, but do we? Certainly from the start of a project there are usually 'key dates'. However the commissioning/ project approval stage often precedes this timeline, so the project is 'late' before it even starts. Once there is a complete and final manuscript there is a detailed schedule for the production part of the process. Very often this time is squeezed to accommodate a late manuscript and meet the deadline.
So what happens before a manuscript goes into production, how long does each stage take and what are the problems you might encounter? Below is a summary, but please note that the time taken for each stage varies with the scope of the project.
On-going research to inform publishing decisions
Deciding what to publish and when
Specific research: 2 weeks
Book proposal review: 3 weeks Possible problems could be that the book proposal needs changing substantially, requiring 2nd review and the reviewers do not deliver detailed enough feedback or when promised.
Author commissioning: 2 weeks Could be difficult to find suitable authors.
Project approval preparation: 2 weeks with another 4 weeks if the project is not approved and new information is required.
Writing: 12-24 weeks Author problems resulting in late manuscript
Review: 3-8 weeks: Bad review received.
Revisions: 2 weeks Substantial revisions required (possibly a second review).
Production: Approximately 36 weeks
Total: 62-81 weeks
For educational publishing the spring is the time to aim for publishing, so decisions about possible front list projects have to be made in September (November at the latest for smaller projects). This is between a year and 4-7 months before publishing. Project validation has to be February latest, writing February to June and handover to production at the beginning of July - result publishing on time or even early.
The success of meeting schedules is dependent on a team of people, making sure that everyone knows what is expected of them and when they are likely to have to meet these expectations is crucial to publishing on time.
So:
- give yourself enough time
- think and plan ahead
- be realistic about how long things take
- delegate
- be early and make it a habit.
Carol Usher runs a business called Clearwordz, which offers publishing services for science and education. My aim is to help make sure material for publication is clear and accessible to everyone; so your readers want to find out more.
Sign up for my newsletter and visit the Clearwordz blog page at http://www.clearwordz.com for posts on aspects of publishing, science and education, which I hope you will find helpful. Please do call me on 01600 891413 or contact me by email Carol@clearwordz.com, if there is anything you wish to ask; or to arrange for an initial discussion on how I can help you with your project.
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