Pre-editing Questions

Before I start any editing job, no matter if it is for a random client, a friend, my boss, or even my own mother, I will not read a single word until I have that person answer the following five questions. Doing otherwise would be worthless (barring extenuating circumstances).


1. Who is supposed to read this material? (General public, news reporters, foundations, parents, executives, etc.)

2. What kind of feeling are you trying to portray? (This is usually answered by the first question. Is it supposed to be colloquial, business casual, business formal, academic, scientific, super excited child happiness, etc.)

3. How in-depth do you want me to get? (Do you want me to proofread for mechanics, grammar and punctuation? Do you want me to change words? Rewrite whole sentences? Do you want me to use my discretion to delete and rewrite however I see fit? Usually, I do not make massive changes, but I like to know how far I can go without stepping on toes.)

4. In what form do you want my response? (This tends to depend on the answer to #3. I can give you a clean document with all of my changes; I can give you a document with all of my changes and thoughts recorded; I can simply write comments on the document saying what changes I would make or recommend.)

5. What else do I need know or be aware of while I edit this?


As I said above, if I don't know the answers to these questions, I can't edit a document. "Editing" is not a single thing. Editing is a process by which we search and improve. But what we are searching for and how we can improve a document depends entirely on what that document is trying to do.

Most people are not aware of this. They tend to have an idea of what editing is and assume that I am going to do exactly that. Many toes get stepped on when assumptions are made (and if you are not asking these questions, then assumptions are being made on both sides), so save yourself a lot of trouble and find out exactly what you are expected to do before embarking on an editing project.