Editing for business.
Business clients need to ensure their writing is accurate, concise and error-free. Most of my work with business clients also incorporates some plain English editing to ensure that technical jargon doesn’t stand in the way of reader comprehension.
I work with business clients on many different types of publications including reports, brochures, online copy, codes of practice and responses to government white papers. My role ranges from making sure that writing is gender-neutral to checking that graphs reflect what is written in the text.
No matter what a business client’s needs are, I ensure that the author’s intended meaning is clear and check that there are no costly mistakes in the text.
Case study.
Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy.
Editing.
The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM) is the peak body for the resources sector. With over 13,000 members, AusIMM delivers development services, runs a Chartered Professionals program by Royal Charter, maintains an events program and publishes a range of titles of interest to its members.
The publishing arm of AusIMM occasionally outsources editing to help maintain their publication schedule.
AusIMM needed the manuscript for The Geology and Resources of New Zealand Coalfields to be edited in preparation for publication and to ensure consistency with the client’s house style, with particular emphasis on checking references and citations, and figure captions.
A document outlining AusIMM’s house style was provided, as well as a word list. The manuscript extent was 364 pages, with more than 250 footnotes, 550 references and 150 figures.
I completed the editing within a tight timeline. The references and citations required extensive corrections in both style and usage. Many references lacked citations, and many citations lacked references. After the edited manuscript was returned to AusIMM and corrections had been made, I was asked to run a second check of the references and citations.
At the author’s request, AusIMM mentioned my work in the acknowledgements section of the monograph.