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12/6/2017

The Editor’s Creed

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The Editor's Creed
By ​ Dan Kois, Laura Helmuth, and Jennifer Lai
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Last year Slate’s science and health editor Laura Helmuth wrote about editing for the Open Notebook, advocating that an editor subordinate her voice to a writer’s. Dan Kois, a culture editor at Slate, has strong feelings on the matter. So he asked to debate Laura about editing on Slate Plus.

Dan Kois: Ready to explain how you CODDLE WRITERS, Laura?

Laura Helmuth: Hello, Kois. Have you made anybody cry today?

Kois: Laura advocates for a gentle editorial experience, in which the editor's job is facilitating the author’s voice as unobtrusively as possible. I remember being very intimidated by that piece of Laura’s because my approach is the exact opposite. I view my job as facilitating the author’s voice ... but in the crispest, cleanest, Slate-iest way, and that entails a LOT of detail-oriented conceptual and line editing.

Helmuth: Ah, sure, so your editing style is: Write it like I, Dan Kois, would have written it if I, Dan Kois, had written the story.

Kois: Hahaha no, like an amazing version of Dan Kois + my genius author. Laura, you don’t EVER just wade in and rewrite a lede that isn’t working? You don’t ever add a joke or kill a whole paragraph that is lame?

Helmuth: I call it trimming to keep the focus on the main point, which (I tell the writer) is ever so much more interesting than this also-interesting but slightly less intuitive little bit here ... see, now, it didn’t even hurt and now it’s gone. You and I both work with a lot of freelancers—probably more than any other editors here do, since we don’t have a lot of books (for you) or science (for me) writers on staff.

Kois: Correct. I probably edit 15 pieces by freelancers a month. 

Helmuth: And freelancers are delicate creatures. They don’t get paid much, they usually work alone (which can be a little crazy-making), and they don’t have a long experience with any one editor. So every piece they write for a new publication is like going on a blind date.

Kois: As a longtime freelancer, I sympathize with the freelancer’s plight! But nevertheless, my two primary concerns are not the freelancer’s feelings—they are a) getting the piece as good as it can be, and b) making that happen as efficiently (though politely!) as possible.

Helmuth: Our different strategies might have something to do with our beats: It seems like books people are much more thick-skinned and used to criticizing one another than science people are. Science writers usually stick to a new study or mountains of evidence. They don’t often make an argument or express opinions—I mean, they do at the bar or sometimes on blogs, but it takes some coaxing to get them to say what they REALLY think to a big and sophisticated audience like Slate’s. 

Kois: You are dealing with people who are authorities on their subjects, and are not used to being edited closely?

Helmuth: Oh, yes, sometimes that makes it tricky. But then I resort to the “help the rest of us understand” approach. Not questioning their expertise, but getting them to talk to the non-experts in an entertaining way. A lot of what I do is ask people to sharpen their arguments—which maybe isn’t something you have to ask for in a book review?

Kois: I do sometimes have to get people to sharpen their arguments. Not as often, probably, as you do. (Book critics are argumentative people.)

Jennifer Lai: So where do these different editing styles come from? Was it a deliberate choice you made when you came into your position (in terms of managing people), or is it a function of how you write yourself or have been edited by others?

Kois: I learned my editorial style COMPLETELY from ... being edited by editors at Slate. Slate was one of the first places that ever paid me to write anything, and it was definitely the first place I was ever seriously edited. I remember the first time I ever filed a piece to Slate—a Culturebox to Julia Turner about iTunes celebrity playlists. It was my first experience with Track Changes, and when Julia sent it back to me and I opened it up, I almost barfed. There was so much red on the page it looked like a crime scene.

Lai: But you kind of liked it? 

Kois: She was right about everything! Every cut she made, every wording change she suggested, was more efficient and elegant and BETTER than what I had. I was like, Oh, so this is what editing is.

Helmuth: Tip for freelance writers: Set your Word preferences so that the cuts are in green or purple or something less aggressive. Because CUT is mostly what editors do. … And I don’t think any of us lie about the fact that we love what we didn’t cut or change!

Kois: Yes! It’s not a bunch of lies! If I didn’t have good feelings about the piece I would just kill it. I remember her email itself was very encouraging—“This is a good draft, there’s a lot that works”—I think she actually told me not to be intimidated by all the red, and that she was happy with where it was going.

Helmuth: The “this is great” email memo to a writer is an important part of the job.

Kois: So that’s what I try to do now. I almost always follow that model—extremely detailed edit, chipper cover note.

Helmuth: Have you ever gotten payback? Has Julia ever written a review for you that you slice up into a million pieces? Like, “You have such great material here”?

Kois: She is a much, much better writer than age-28 me. So it’s not as violent.

Helmuth: Ha! Were you ever edited by Plotz? Dude is cruel shoes.

Kois: Thank God, no.

Helmuth: David Plotz’s editing instincts are perfect, but he is NOT concerned with the thickness of his writer’s skin. This doesn’t bother me when he edits me. (I’m pretty thick-skinned.) He once eliminated several paragraphs of an introduction by telling me: BORING.

Kois: LOL.

Helmuth: But I definitely edit his edits. When Emily Bazelon wrote this fantastic, deep story about the Nazi origins of modern anatomy, I was the first editor and Plotz was the top editor. He had some great suggestions, but there was one paragraph he didn’t like. So he highlighted it and typed: BLAH BLAH BLAH. I DON’T CARE ABOUT THIS. When I sent the story back to Emily (Emily, do not read this), I took out that line and said something like “David thought we could probably cut this part.”

Kois: That is awesome.

Helmuth: But Dan, don’t you worry that by rewriting things for the writers, you’re squelching their voices? Kois-ifying it too much?

Kois: I try to steer away from edits where in looking over it, I realize, “Oh this is just me trying to be clever.” But part of my job is not to Kois-ify necessarily but to Slate-ify—or in my case to Slate Book Review–ify. There is a certain level of prose elegance and argumentative flair we want out of these pieces, and sometimes it’s easier to just give writers examples rather than try to drag it out of them.

Helmuth: Yes, examples are good. Sometimes they just take the examples you give them, and sometimes they’re inspired to try something different but get what you’re looking for by looking at the editor’s “here’s how you might try it” suggestions. Hm, that doesn't sound mean enough to be coming from you. It’s a good strategy!

Kois: I want writers to walk away bruised but invigorated and wanting more. Like they just ran Tough Mudder or something.

Helmuth: Ha! They’ll be limping for days but paradoxically feeling victorious. You probably don’t have to worry too much about one of my main editorial challenges: Making complicated things simple.

Kois: I am usually trying to get my writers to stop making simple things complicated.

Helmuth: Whether it’s a scientist writing or a science writer who has done a lot of reporting on a given subject, I think it’s really tricky for the writer to know what our audience doesn’t (and doesn’t need to!) know. One of my most common edits is to ask people to clarify, simplify, or remove jargon and technical details. If they’re interesting, great. But usually they get in the way. Also, I try to be easily confused—I’m always looking for ways that a smart but nonscience reader could misunderstand something.

Lai: What advice would you give young journalists?

Helmuth: The first advice journalists get (or should get) is “Don’t take editing personally.” But of course they do. How could they not?

Kois: Every time I get an edit on a piece I wrote, I still have to remind myself not to take it personally.

Helmuth: And you have to be willing to try again. Almost nobody can write the perfect piece for Slate the first or second time. It’s a learning process.

Kois: Thankfully when you’re learning with Laura, she’ll send you a carton of chocolates along with your gentle edit.

Helmuth: SHUT UP KOIS.

Kois: BORING

Dan Kois edits and writes for Slate’s culture department. He is writing a book called How to Be a Family and co-writing, with Isaac Butler, an oral history of Angels in America.

Laura Helmuth is the health, science, and environment editor at the Washington Post. From 2012–2016, she was Slate’s science and health editor. Follow her on Twitter.

Jennifer Lai is an associate editor at Slate.

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10/24/2017

The Essentials to Project Management Communication

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​The Essentials to Project Management Communication
Communication by definition is the means to effectively transmit the info at hand to different individual or to a group of people and at the same instance minding to their input n order to achieve a specific end point. In a project, failure to transmit a design scheme finally take's to mistakes and confusion within the squad members thus setting the see in a serious and tough side. Plan management communication is taken as one of the very serious responsibilities of a project director and must never be brought lightly. Yet if a high-quality and excellent plan is in place, without an appropriate project supervision communication scheme, the project will not emerge prosperous.

When understanding what the plan management communication plan role should be, a project director should take into account the plan's clients or stakeholders also as the design group. A project director should be able to respond the coming inquiries: What data should be conveyed at a macro phase, what should be continued private, what specific skills and responsibilities should be transmitted to the other parts of the team or to a single person, how will you convey it in the very effective style, how will you incorporate the group's suggestions and very importantly, how will you enforce it? Keep in mind also that the role of the communications plan should constantly be in arrangement to the design plan, schedule and resources.

Once a use is established, a plan manager should now settle on what the project handling communication necessities are. This essentially symbolizes that as a project handler, you should be efficient to sort the point of information or procedure that the client and group wants all over the the life cycle of the project. With regard to your clients, frequently they want a blow by blow account nonetheless it doesn't damage to find early on what data they demand to take from you. Likewise learn how oftentimes they will need the data to be passed on a everyday or weekly basis.

Upon making project management communication program requirements, the succeeding step is to produce a communication schedule plan. To assist you in this attempt, try using a project planning computer software that can supply you with a project planner in which you can establish a schedule on when to apprise a squad or a singular individual with the required data they ask to realized a job. Lay out in particular the time line on when you will communicate a proper task. Most project supervision software system will as well present a place for you to supply an overview of what the plan is all about and then basing on the acquired schedule will provide you to express the duties and obligations to your team. It would as well be a good view to make a flow chart so that at the onset of the project, your group would know what the asked delivery dates are and how interdependent and essential it is to accomplish it in time. Provide them with a extensive project tracking tool wherein they can easy transmit with each other. Web dependent project handling computer software is a great instrument to effortlessly transmit educations and information as well as get a valuable remark that would improve your processes. A project supervision software package that offers online solutions would plainly establish info and communications much more available.

An average communications meeting should as well occur to apprise and provide an up to date enhancement of the project. It will also be a spot for squad members to grow opinions and fears.


Read more: http://www.articlesphere.com/Article/The-Essentials-to-Project-Management-Communication/222961#ixzz4wRwGOGVF
Author: John L. Ratch

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10/10/2017

how to engage volunteers through social media

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How to Engage Donors and Volunteers Through Social Media

Although social media has been with us for a while now, some non-profits are not integrating it with their outreach strategy. Some of the reasons offered for the non-inclusion of social media spans lack of knowledge about social media, insufficient time and limited resources. While these are valid reasons, the benefits that non-profits stand to gain from using social media to engage donors and volunteers far outweighs its' non-inclusion.

For instance, according to Statista, "Facebook had more than 1.94 billion global monthly active users, including over close to 1.74 billion mobile monthly active users."  Judging by this fact, incorporating social media networking sites such as facebook, twitter and google+ will increase the ability of your organization to reach a wider audience.
 Social Media has revolutionized the way organizations gain exposure. As a result, the days of requiring a hefty budget in order to reach a wider audience is over and belongs to the past.

To actively engage with donors and volunteers through social media, content should be prioritized. Donors and volunteers alike appreciate relevant and persuasive content. They are more likely to engage with a non-profit that provides relevant content than a non-profit that doesn't. Despite this express desire of volunteers and donors, some non-profits focus predominantly on design and relegate content to the background. What happens is that they end up stagnating and not reaching their engagement goals.

One of the best strategies for providing persuasive content is through story telling. Use the art of storytelling to portray activities that your non-profit organization engages in. It is easier to convince people through story telling than through facts since our brains are open to reading about and listening to stories. Also, stories about individual clients tend to elicit high response rates from donors and volunteers alike. Such stories have the propensity to connect them (donors and volunteers) to your cause and to propel them into action compared to stories about large groups of people.

A visual means of telling stories is through the use of online videos. Keeping online vidoes short and engaging will lead to the attainment of goals. Some softwares that can be used for online videos include power-point and imovie maker. These programs are easily accessible and are quick to use. Consequently, they save you time and money making them budget friendly options.

Now that we are aware of the programs that can be used in the creation of videos, what kind of content can be generated with power-point and i-movie maker ? A starting point can be with events that your organization is already implementing. For example, if your organization is hosting a workshop or a fundraiser, you can record it and share it with a larger audience. Also, you can create videos of your volunteers in action and share them. The possibilities are endless!

In order to save time on your social media engagements, apps  such as Tube Mogul and AWeber may be opted for. They provide a single point for uploading videos to multiple social media sites. 

Using social media to engage with donors and volunteers is a worthwhile venture that can yield maximum returns if done right. Storytelling and the use of apps will result in the creation of persuasive content and time saving benefits.


Written By Sherita N Brace
Sherita N Brace is an International Development Professional and a Blogger. She serves as a Consultant to non-profits and provides grant writing services, program planning services and communications services.

Reference:

. Facebook : Statistics & Facts. Retrieved October 11th from 
https://www.statista.com/topics/751/facebook/
​

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9/14/2017

why should non-profits  design their communications strategies with cultural differences in mind?

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Why Should Non-Profits Design Their Communications Strategies with Cultural Differences in Mind  ?
Culture is defined as the way of life of a group of people. It encompasses the way they dress, sing, dance, among others. One of the key characteristics of successful non-profits lies in their ability to communicate their message effectively to their constituents. According to data gleaned from the Institute of Medicine, it is estimated that over 11% (31 million) of the U.S population is foreign born. Therefore, a non-profit desiring to build and nurture relationships that results in positive outcomes should aim at developing an effective communication strategy that takes cultures into account.

People from various cultures have unique ways of viewing issues/incidents that influences their realities. For instance, individuals belonging to high-context cultures(Asians, Native Americans, Latin and African Americans) tend to use indirect communication styles and focus less on verbal interactions. On the other hand, individuals belonging to low-context cultures (mostly Anglo-European Americans) employ a direct communication style and focus more on verbal  interactions. With that said, certain colors can also evoke strong emotions among individuals of one cultural group whereas the same colors will have little to no effect on individuals from a different cultural group. 

Owing to these nuances, it is essential for a non-profit to tailor its' message and branding materials with the culture of its' target audience/constituency in mind. Decisions on factors such as colors, images and symbols used should be  carried out with their cultural underpinnings in mind. Failure of non-profits to develop a communications strategy that incorporates linguistically and culturally appropriate messages will result in a rejection of its message. Another unwelcome effect will be the negative perception that its' brand might develop.

There are many resources that a non-profit can utilize to ensure the delivery of thoughtful, timely and culturally sensitive messaging to its constituents. Also, nonprofits can reach out to communications specialists at SNAB Global Development who can help them in the design of their communications materials. 


​
​Written By Sherita N Brace
Sherita N Brace is an International Development Professional and a Blogger. She serves as a Consultant to non-profits and provides grant writing services, program planning services and communications services.

References: 
  • Beyond Culture . Edward T. Hall, 1976, Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc
  • Race, Ethnicity & Language Data. Standardization for Health Care Quality Improvement. Retrieved September 18th from http://www.iom.edu/datastandardization​

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