Corporate Editing - Types (or Layers) of Editing

There are four types of editing that I regularly apply to corporate reports. The corporate world tends to undervalue editing of documents, and often all four are carried out at the same time. In standard publishing, they are not only separate functions, they are often conducted by different people, who specialise in their type of editing. 

Sadly, there is a belief that because people have a university degree they don’t need an editor. I always retort that everyone, even an editor, needs an editor. If best-selling authors (think JK Rowling, multi-millionaire) have editors, why do we mere plebs think we don’t need them?

Content Editing

In theory, content editing is the most likely to be done in a corporate setting. This is simply checking that the document includes all the information it should and none that it shouldn’t. The reality is that the author is often far too close to the subject matter and document to see what they’re not saying.

I was once handed a major bid document, about two hours before the submission deadline, and asked to edit it. What they expected me to do was ‘proofread’ it – check for obvious typos, spelling mistakes and missed words. That wasn’t was it needed.

The document had been to the graphics department. The company recognised that not everyone was good with layout, colour and pictures, so we had a graphics department. The document was beautiful. Lovely layout, great style choices, beautiful and relevant graphics. When I handed it back, I said I couldn’t fix it in two days, let alone two hours. There were whole pages that said nothing. There was one section where the heading didn’t relate to the text in any way (or maybe the text didn’t relate to the heading). In fact, the subject matter of the text changed so dramatically mid-way through that I thought I’d dropped a page. There was no connection from one block of text to the next, no flow of thought or ideas through the document. I don’t remember the subject matter now, but as an example (and it really was this extreme), the heading was “Ice creams of the 21^st century”, the first paragraph was about chocolate bean harvesting in the Amazon, and over the page the next paragraph was about Italian summers. Are you surprised I thought there was a page missing?

But it really was a beautiful document. Strange that we’re more concerned about what the document looks like than what it actually contains.

Structural Editing

Structural editing follows on from content editing. Once you’re sure that the document has a story, structural editing checks that the story flows; that each chunk of text flows from the previous chunk and into the next chunk. Imagine reading Little Red Riding Hood, starting with the Red meeting the Wolf at Grandma, followed by her walking through the woods, and ending with her being reunited with Grandma after the Woodsman kills the Wolf. It’s a ridiculous thought, but often that’s how our corporate reports read.

Structural editing needs to be conducted in layers. First, do all the sections of a report flow; next, do all the paragraphs or sub-sections within each section flow; and finally, does every sentence within each paragraph flow.

Copy Editing

Copy editing is the nit-picky, time consuming, eye-straining, brain-numbing portion of the editing process. Which is probably why most corporates do it half-heartedly, or not at all. Copy editing is where you pick up all the inconsistencies, where you fix all the silly sentences, where you remove all the bombastic terminology. The process I use for copy editing is the main focus on this publication, because without a process you can’t possibly remember everything that has to be checked.

Proof Reading

Proof reading is what most people mean when they ask you to edit something. They mean, “Hey, this is really good writing. I know because I wrote it. But I’m not a typist, so there may be some typos in it. Please fix them.” And, essentially, that’s what proof reading is – it’s fixing the last minute errors, because that’s all the time you’re normally given. Typos, spelling mistake, really obvious grammar issues, and missed words. Nothing more.

Given that most corporate offices only proof read documents (often with a fair bit of slap and dash), and miss the three biggest and most effective components of the editing process, is it any wonder that our reports read the way a mouthful of dry sawdust tastes?