What’s the focus for journal
publishing in 2022?
We kicked off this year with the Publisherspeak Journals Think Tank, a forum of journal publishing professionals that meets regularly to discuss challenges and brainstorm ideas. We had our very first meeting in January, where we discussed several priority topics.
The publishing landscape changed significantly during the pandemic. What’s the focus for journal publishing in 2022? The panel answers.
Collaborative research
As we discussed in a previous post, collaborative research was greatly affected by the pandemic. With borders being closed off in most countries, researchers were unable to travel and work together. The pandemic also affected the conferences that previously created opportunities for researchers to interact and collaborate. In 2022, the panel hoped that the world would open up in a stable way with travel restrictions being lifted globally. This will hopefully make way for collaborative research to restart.
A cohesive publishing lifecycle
A vast amount of data is already available, but in the current scenario, this is a lack of cohesive links between the different data sources. Linking metadata from one stage of the publishing lifecycle to the next ought to be a key priority. But for this to happen, accurate metadata has to flow throughout the system. The panel discussed two solutions:
- Reducing instances of manual intervention can help streamline the lifecycle.
- Persistent identifiers, such as grant DOIs from funders, can provide reliable and consistent metadata without authors having to rekey information.
Researcher experience
Simplifying author experience throughout the publishing process is paramount. Currently, reformatting manuscripts to satisfy the criteria of different journals is a significant challenge. Furthermore, extensive style guides can hinder efficiency. The panel discussed the scope of optimizing style guides across journals. With the resources already available, including PIDs like the ORCID iD, it is possible to enable authors to submit information without having to rekey all of their details for every submission.
As this discussion progressed, a new question arose: In the quest to improve author experience, do the reviewer and editor experiences get overlooked?
This led to a consensus that a holistic approach that focuses on improving the overall researcher experience is the need of the hour. Adjustments ought to be made to the current system to improve the author, reviewer, and editor experiences as a whole. This improvement can be facilitated by intuitive and comprehensive platforms.
Stay tuned for the next installment of the Journals Think Tank!
The publishing landscape is evolving rapidly with time, giving rise to exciting developments and new challenges. The Publisherspeak Think Tank brings together experts from diverse areas of the publishing ecosystem, to share their experiences and insights to adapt to challenges and adopt industry trends.
