Training & Resources – Classes

For Editors:

Intermediate/Advanced Academic Editing
(Asynchronous, 12 April to 7 June, 2021)
8-week course, Editorial Freelancers’ Association
This course will provide you with evidence-based strategies to edit in three key academic genres: the journal article, the grant proposal, and the tenure and promotion dossier. We’ll cover strategies that can be applied in a range of disciplines, from STEM to the humanities, education, and social sciences. By the end of this course, you’ll have a set of materials designed to help you expand the scope of your academic editing business and market to a broader range of scholarly clients.

The course includes over three hours of video lectures, as well as required and optional readings, written or video analysis assignments, and discussion forum posts. Weeks two through seven will include assignments on which the instructor will provide individual feedback; in week eight, participants will create a two-page marketing plan integrating best practices for freelancing and creative entrepreneurship.

Please refer to my list of recommended, but not required, reading to supplement this training.

Anti–Hustle: Marketing Against Greed
(Live, 29 May 2021 at 10am PST / 1pm EST)
Webinar, Editors Canada
Marketing a freelance editing business can be uncomfortable for some of us. Some of the most often recommended strategies can turn off those of us who don’t gravitate towards large networks or who aren’t happy participants in the structures of late capitalism.

What if your marketing strategy could also come from a place of generosity? Of giving with no expectation of return? Of anti-hustle, of un-sales, of give without take? How might such an approach still enable you to pay the rent?

In this one-hour webinar, I’ll share the three-part anti-hustle strategy that I’ve used to double my freelance income in the past 12 months. We’ll discuss how giving away your favourite editing secrets, putting the spotlight on others, and amplifying Editors Canada’s brand can bring you more clients—and enable you to help other editors find clients too.

Craft a marketing plan that is generous, slow, and effective. Don’t hustle: we all rise by lifting others.

Note: Please familiarize yourself with the Editors Canada Professional Editorial Standards before attending this webinar.

Networking and collaboration session: Developing content marketing opportunities (Live, 13 June 2021 at 1:15pm PST / 4:15pm EST)
Editors Canada Conference 2021
Content marketing is a long-term marketing strategy that involves giving away your knowledge for free to potential clients, and thereby establishing their trust. Done well, content marketing should share information that is high-quality, relevant, and timely. As a result, content marketing is a lot of work! After a short introduction to content marketing for editors, this networking and collaboration session will divide participants into groups based on their preferred tactics, and provide participants with a structure in which they can collaborate to develop mutually beneficial content marketing projects. Come prepared to share your ideas, your incomplete projects, and your ‘some day’ marketing plans!

This session will be grounded in the ethos that editors are not in competition with one another, and that raising the profile of the profession and of Editors Canada creates more business for all of us. Participants are invited to see their fellow editors as supportive colleagues and potential collaborators–not as competition. If this perspective is new to you, please listen to a few episodes of Melanie Padgett Powers’ “The Deliberate Freelancer” podcast in advance of this event.

Beyond STEM: Academic Editing in Social Sciences, Humanities and Education
Recorded Webinar, Editors Canada
This 90-minute webinar will provide you with evidence-based strategies to edit academic writing outside of STEM fields. Learn common challenges for non-STEM academics in grant applications, publications, and promotion and tenure documents, as well as options for addressing these concerns. Discover strategies to help you increase your credibility among this niche audience. By the end of this webinar, you’ll be ready to expand the disciplines in which you feel confident providing developmental, structural, stylistic, or copy editing services.

Please refer to my list of resources and recommended reading to supplement this training.

Edit Your Résumé for In-House Work (Free!)
Recorded Webinar, Editors Canada
Your resume is your opportunity to show a potential employer that you know how to solve their problems. While your cover letter gives you the space to detail your achievements, your resume must succinctly demonstrate both the scope and the depth of your experience. Focusing on job-seekers interested in in-house positions in the publishing world, this free webinar will help you to craft a resume that highlights the impact you’ve made in your work history. Learn the persuasive strategies that work well in this genre, and techniques to tailor your resume format for different kinds of publishers.This workshop will include two case studies: “Kim,” who is just starting out, and “Emma,” who is pursuing a career transition.

Showcasing Your Skills and Accomplishments in an Online Portfolio
Recorded Webinar, Editors Canada
By showcasing curated examples of our work, online portfolios provide the evidence to support the claims we make about our editing skillset. Portfolios thus make visible the often invisible work that editors perform. When an editor builds their own portfolio, they can discover connections between their diverse accomplishments and construct a compelling story about who they are and what they offer.

This webinar series will draw on examples of editors’ online portfolios to help you determine what kind of portfolio you want to build, what content you might include in your portfolio, and whether and how to integrate a portfolio with your existing website.

For Research Administrators:

How to Read Research Grant Proposals like an Editor
Recorded Webinar, Canadian Association of Research Administrators
Research grant proposals need to communicate their message clearly, efficiently, and persuasively. In this 60-minute webinar, a professional academic editor will share three of her favourite strategies for improving the written content in research grant proposals. These are strategies specific to research grants and backed by peer-reviewed evidence. By the end of this webinar, participants who work with grants will be better equipped to support researchers in developing compelling, well-written proposals–and will know as well when to bring in an editor to help.

Did you participate in this webinar? Access my slides and references here.