Getting Yourself Published

Presenter

Dr. Muhammad
Mudasar Ghafoor
M.B.A., M.Phil

Will it be all on the slides?

Knowledge is experience everything else is just

information.

The slides will have all the information on them, but

the real knowledge comes with what you do during
this Lecture.

Lecture Aims

To help you to get into print more easily or

efficiently.
To maximise your hit rate with journal editors.
To help your University/Organization to further
enhance its reputation as a source of scholarship and
expertise.

Intended Lecture outcomes

After participating in this Lecture, you will

be better able to:
1.

2.

3.

4.

Confront constructively any writing-avoidance

tactics which may be holding you up.
Adapt your tone and style to write effectively
for different target audiences.
Get started on the planning of a new piece of
writing.
Increase your hit-rate with journal editors.

Writing for publication: the ten most

important words

Why?

Which?

What?

So what?

Who?

Wow?

Where?

When?

How?

And the most powerful

four-letter word in the
English language...
????

Writing for publication: the ten most important

words
v

Why? (rationale)

What? (content)

Who? (people, you,

me, them)

Where? (locations)

When? (times)

How? (processes)

Which? (decisions)
So what?
(importance?)
Wow? (impact?)

And the most powerful

four-letter word in the
English language...
????

Danger!

AWAT
Advanced writing avoidance tactic

Organising your writing

Jot down your immediate gut responses to the
following questions..
1.
2.
3.

4.
5.

Where will you (or do you) do your writing?

When (time of day) do you do your writing?
How long does it take you to actually put pen to
paper, or fingers to keyboard?
Who knows about your writing plans?
Jot down (in hours or minutes) what you think
is a sensible minimum element of time which
could be used to make some progress with your

Making time

We are all busy people too busy!

Yet if you want a job done well, give it to a busy
person.
How do prolific writers manage to do it?
By using the odd 5-minutes which keep turning up,
rather than waiting for the solid 2-hours which never
occur.

Urgent versus important

Urgent
Urgent but not
important

Urgent and important

Not important

Important

Lifes too short!

Neither important
nor urgent

Important but non-urgent

1
Non-urgent

Getting started
If you dont start, you certainly wont finish.
Phils first law of task management:
Most things get done, well enough, in the last 10% of
the available time.
Therefore, most things could have been done, even
better, in the first 10% of the available time.

But
Phils 2nd law of task management:
If it will only take five minutes of less, do it now!
This saves handling it ever again.

Getting started: lay an egg...

Draw an egg in the middle of a blank sheet of paper.

Write in the egg keywords of the topic or draft title
that youre going to be writing about.
Start brainstorming ideas and questions.

Getting started: lay an egg...

1

4
7

X-1

Title
keywords
5

X
2

Capture your btwivi.. and cityvs moments

While sharing ideas on your writing plans, note

particularly when you explain to someone
but thats what is very interesting as this will
be something important to convey with passion
and enthusiasm in your writing itself

And

can I tell you very simply. which may be good

WIRMI and WIIFM?

WIRMI
What I really mean is.

WIIFM?

Whats in it for me? i.e. the reader, editor,

publisher, target audience

Identifying your target audience 1

What is the specific audience for this piece of

writing?
What kinds of people will want to read what you are
writing?

How will this audience benefit from the work?

What is the right medium for this audience?

Identifying your target audience 2

What kind of language does the focus merit?

What are the likely backgrounds of the audience?

What prior knowledge does the audience have of this

subject?

Will the audience understand your point of view?

What kinds of things are important to this audience?

Target audiences

Stick an orange post-it onto your egg diagram.

List on this various primary and secondary target
audiences for this piece of writing, e.g.

Editor

Referee

Reader

Other kinds of target audience for the same topic

For the editor or referee...jot down:

1.

Name

2.

What kind of person is this?

3.

What makes them tick?

4.

What do they hate?

5.

Why are they reading your piece?

6.

Whats in it for them what are they going to get out

of your piece?

Addressing these seven factors in our efforts to

get published

It helps a great deal if we really want to write

and get published.
We can take ownership of our need to get
published, reminding ourselves of whats in it
for me?.
Writing is improved most by simply keeping
doing it, with plenty of practice, trial and error,
repetition.
We can deliberately use our writing to make
sense of what we are studying or researching.

How to cope with rejection

Everyone gets rejected.

It wasnt you who was rejected, it was just that lousy
paper you wrote!

Give yourself time to cool down.

Find out (gently) why:

From the editor/reviewer if possible

From friends and colleagues

Turn the feedback into next time Ill... action plans.

Look carefully at the feedback six months later it
will be much more useful then.

The journal editors agenda

Will it survive the 5-minute test?

Is the purpose clear?

Does the purpose match the journals?

Are the key points quick to spot?

Do the key points link to the purpose?

Does the author know why its important?

Is it readable?

What are the points that make a manuscript immediately

appealing to you? Ten most important points chosen by
editors:
1.

Professional appearance: how it looks.

2.

New/novel treatment of the subject

3.

Very thorough.

4.

Author guidelines followed.

5.

Good writing clarity and style.

6.

Relevance of subject.

7.

Title of manuscript.

8.

High-quality abstract.

Ten most common reasons for immediately

rejecting a manuscript...
1.

Author guidelines not followed.

2.

Not thorough.

3.

Bad writing: clarity and style.

4.

Subject of no interest to readers.

5.

Poor statistics, tables, figures.

Old subject / manuscript.

Unprofessional appearance.

Title of manuscript.

Too simple - reporting.

Referees and reviewers look for the

following in manuscripts:

Clarity, coherence, well-written.

Thoroughness.

Research method.

Appropriateness to the journal.

A unique contribution.

Advancement of knowledge.

Importance of subject

Generalisability and validity of results.

Timeliness.

Most common advice given by editors when

rejecting...

Write clearly, logically and sequentially.

Study and follow the author guidelines.

Have the manuscript critiqued before submission.

Think what readers want to know, not what you want

to say.

Getting the title right

Please jot down three possible titles for the piece

youre thinking of writing

1.

One normal title;

2.

One off the wall title;

3.

One fairly normal one, but with a twist in it.

Now please read out each of the titles, and everyone

else vote for which one you prefer as a reader

Two hands favourite

One hand second favourite

Now turn these outcomes into a draft Abstract

This article

What was your first verb?

Offers an illustration of

Focuses on

Challenges the paradigm of..

Describes how

Describes the effects of

Reviews the recent advances in..

Analyses the impact of

What can I do when?

1.

2.

Ive got 40 pages and I need 25?

I dont get constructive criticism from senior coauthor or supervisor?

3.

I lack confidence?

4.

Ideas have moved on from what Ive already written?

Intended Lecture outcomes

After participating in this workshop, you

will be better able to:
1.

2.

3.

4.

Confront constructively any writing-avoidance

tactics which may be holding you up.
Adapt your tone and style to write effectively
for different target audiences.
Get started on the planning of a new piece of
writing.
Increase your hit-rate with journal editors.

Thanks