Mid-Proof and Post-Proof Tips
Mid-Proof and Post-Proof Tips
Being in a state of fatigue negatively affects your ability to work efficiently. But how do you know you're getting tired? And what can you do to feel refreshed?
Everyone is different, but there are some common signs that you're getting fatigued, and the sooner you recognize the signs and take action, the more efficiently you can do your job. Reading for hours on end at the computer is tiring—not just physically, but mentally, too. Recognizing signs of sleepiness is easy; nodding off or falling asleep on your keyboard is a very obvious sign. But what about before you get to that point, if you're feeling mentally tired?
The biggest sign you're getting fatigued is that the work gets harder—much harder—and slower. You may be chugging along and then realize that things aren't making sense anymore. Or maybe you can't concentrate; your mind starts wandering to your weekend plans or the new book you ordered. You start making a lot of typos; you find that you're reading the same sentence over and over, that you haven't really understood the last paragraph, or that you're taking five minutes to rewrite a single sentence and it still doesn't look right. Your eyes might start to feel heavy, or when you look away from the screen, a phantom negative remains. Maybe you get a headache or find you're just staring off into space. Time to take action! Instead of wasting time being unproductive in front of the computer, take a break.
Depending on the type of fatigue you're feeling, different types of breaks are called for.
If you fall asleep on the keyboard, wake up drooling, and your eyes cross when you try to focus on the screen, you probably just need to sleep. If you have a deadline approaching, set the alarm for twenty minutes and lie down. Sometimes, a power nap is the only answer. As this extreme fatigue is more likely to happen late at night, try to organize your schedule so that deadlines are not approaching at this hour, or take a short nap early in the evening. If you absolutely do not have time for a nap, get up and move around; get outside, even if it's raining or freezing cold. Fresh air can do wonders for reversing sleepiness. Run around, jog in place, do twenty jumping jacks—whatever it takes—and then get back to work. If you're the kind of person who feels even worse after a twenty-minute nap, and if the deadline allows, sleep for a few hours, and then get up and get back to work. Whenever you're feeling so tired that you have to take extreme measures like sleeping, make sure to go back a page when you return, refreshed, to proofreading. You'll assuredly have missed some important things and will likely have introduced some errors.
If the situation is not so severe—say, an afternoon slump—moving around is the answer. Get up, move around inside or outside, or take a few minutes to do some outdoor chores. If you can't get outside, walk around inside, do some stretches, make a cup of coffee or tea, get a snack, and look out the window. You should be doing this about every hour anyway, but if you've gotten wrapped up in a document or are on a tight deadline, sometimes breaks go by the wayside (although they shouldn't!). Don't worry, the ten-minute break will more than make up for itself in increased productivity when you return to proofreading.
Some other things you can do are to shift your posture, increase the zoom on your document, or, if there are some formatting issues that make the text hard to read (e.g., small font, highlighting, colored text), you can temporarily switch to an easier-to-read format for proofreading; just don't forget to switch it back to the client's desired format before returning the file.
If you're having trouble getting into the document even after a physical break, another option is to scroll down to the end and start working up; this doesn't mean proofreading backwards, but rather checking the sections from the bottom up, starting with the conclusion and moving to the results, methods, and so forth. Depending on your understanding of the document, this may be difficult, but it helps to break up the document a little, especially when you don't feel you're making much progress. Also, depending on the nature of your job (whether you work in-house or are a freelancer), you may have other projects on the go. Switching to another project for a while to take a break from the one you're having problems with may be beneficial. Spend an hour writing a blog or making phone calls or working on whatever other projects you might have, and then get back to proofreading with a renewed spirit.
Proofreaders all have processes they follow. These may start as checklists, such as the ones discussed previously, but usually, over time, they become so ingrained that they are basically automatic. For our purposes here, a checklist refers to a list of items to check for in a document, and it's used for all documents of the same type (e.g., proofreading orders in APA style). A style sheet is used for one document to keep track of the specific issues related to that document.
It's a good idea to have your process written down somewhere, even if you don't need to refer to it very often or have been editing for years. If you don't have a consistent process, if you approach proofreading and editing "holistically," or if you only have a vague idea of the steps you go through, there's a good chance that you're missing something or that you could be more efficient. If you don't know your processes, take a few minutes and write down the things you do, in order, for various types of jobs (editing, proofreading, writing, etc.). The next time you work on one of these orders, pay attention to what you're doing. Is it what you wrote down, or did you miss some things? Could you streamline some areas? Could you automate some tasks?
Even if you don't change a thing, it's important to know how you do things to better understand your editing and proofreading processes. If you're ever having problems, you may be able to look at your processes and tweak them somewhat to fix the problems (e.g., if you're missing formatting issues, you could add another pass just to focus on formatting). Simply thinking about your processes and writing them down will make you feel more organized.
Beyond basic editing and proofreading checklists, which will be pretty much the same for most documents, there are style checklists. Imagine there's a corporate style guide with a lot of specific requirements for formatting and terminology. This is where a checklist really comes in handy. It's worth the time not only to familiarize yourself with the style guide but also to come up with a checklist for things that are specific to the style—things to look for every time. This is especially useful if it's not a client you do regular work for or if the work is seasonal (e.g., a quarterly journal) and you don't do enough of it to have the style guide memorized.
It's also not a bad idea to make checklists for major style guides, but most proofreaders find that, with experience, they memorize the important elements of these and only have to look up little things here and there, which is easy to do in the hard copy or online version of the style guide.
Most editors use a style sheet to keep track of the issues specific to a document, but these vary widely in terms of how they're organized and what they include. Do what works best for you. Here are a few examples of how editors at Scribendi.com use style sheets:
"I use one for longer orders to ensure consistency within the order, and for orders from repeat clients to ensure consistency between pieces. My style sheets are very informal and consist of word lists, client preferences (such as use of the serial comma), and frequently used comments that I can copy/paste where needed."
"I use a piece of scrap paper to write down inconsistencies, client instructions, my notes (starred) of things I need to double check, and anything that I wouldn't normally catch (capitalization, nonstandard terms). It's not fancy, but it works for me."
"My style sheet is just a blank sheet of paper on which, for consistency's sake, I record the spelling of specific words and the relationship between a word or phrase and the client's chosen abbreviation."
"I do keep procedure lists for particular clients with specialized items that I tend to forget otherwise. As to style sheets proper, for each document, I take notes on a working 'notepad' of sorts—either a Notepad-type file or, more likely, a Sticky note. I keep one section on terminology/spelling and one section for miscellaneous. I also keep an actual notepad for backup."
"I use a very basic list in Notepad. As I go, I just note things that I want to check for consistency at the end or things I want to mention in the client notes."
"I use a slightly customized version of an alphabetized style sheet and include notes to the client as part of the style sheet—for example, I'll note if I see a client making the same mistakes repeatedly or if there are other issues I saw while I was editing."
"I generally just jot down notable things as I go—type of English, hyphenated words, acronyms, unusual spellings, heading formats, and so on."
As we mentioned previously, it's essential to pay close attention to the client instructions. After you complete the final pass, double check the client instructions to ensure you've addressed all the concerns mentioned there. This would also be the time to change the formatting back if you altered it for readability or ease of proofreading. For example, maybe the text was 7 point and red, and the client wanted it this way, but squinting at 7-point red type all day is hard on the eyes, so you changed it to 10-point black type. Change it back now.
Run final spelling and grammar checks to catch any remaining spelling and grammar problems or introduced errors. Double check the spelling of technical terms if necessary. Summarize your work in the client notes and return the document. Proofreading complete!
Last Updated: 10/01/2022