If You Build It, They Will Come: How to Write and Improve Author Instructions

MODERATOR: Anna Jester Business Development Wiley Partner Solutions https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8543-0311 SPEAKERS: Anna Jester Chelsea Lee Instructional Lead APA Style at the American Psychological Association (APA) @APA Jillian Poland User Experience Researcher Wiley REPORTER: Emilia (Emily) Arturo Managing Editor, Blood American Society of Hematology @moonlighterturo The advice of the speakers in the session "Standardizing Author Instructions" conjures up the adage: "If you build it, they will come." That is, if author submission instructions are easy to find, read, and use, the authors will be more willing to submit to your journal over others. Anna Jester opened the session with a slide containing a roadmap for the session: Jillian Poland would describe 4 principles to govern how author instructions should be written; Chelsea Lee would speak on the process the APA Journals team used for manuscript submission and evaluation and improved usability of the most recent APA Style Manual; and Anna Jester would end the session with a Q&A session. Four Principles for Standardizing and Improving Author Instructions Jillian Poland is a user experience researcher, working with Wiley to assess the experiences their clients have with Wiley's digital products. Her job includes conducting and analyzing surveys, one-on-one interviews, and focus groups with authors, editors, and journal administrators. Poland says that based on survey results, authors strongly prefer that manuscript submission instructions are simple, familiar, and not text-heavy. Improved submission instructions can reduce administrative burdens at all stages of manuscript processing and decrease overall time from submission to publication. Poland encourages writing submission […]