How do I whittle down my massive reading pile?

January 5, 2009 7:51 AM

How do you manage your reading pile? Not the one you have for pleasure, but the pile of things (reports, proposals, books, etc.) you have to read for work.

Part of my job is reading proposals and manuscripts for potential books to publish.*

Currently, I don't so much have a "system" for getting this done. I just have a pile. And it grows and grows until it's monstrously large because I don't actually have time to read during the workday, and I find it difficult to make myself read mostly lame proposals at home. How do I organize myself so that the reading pile actually gets done? What do you do to get through similar piles of reading?

Here are the things I'm supposed to do:

• Log a proposal or manuscript when it arrives. (I am horrible at keeping logs. I hate them. They seem like an unnecessary step—that is, until someone calls, wondering what happened with The Greatest Proposal You Will Ever Read in Your Life, and I have no idea what it is or if I've read it.)
• Read it and decide whether to pass it on to my boss, or to reject it.
• If I'm rejecting, write a letter and return the ms/proposal.
• If I'm forwarding it to my boss, write a concise assessment.
• Note in the log whether I forwarded it on or rejected it, and what eventually happens to it.

What sort of system would you set up for yourself to get through this series of steps for approximately 30 manuscripts or proposals?

*While I am a publisher, I am not your publisher. Please don't pitch me your book. Besides, as you can see from my question, I don't even actually get through my reading pile as it is.

posted by ocherdraco to work & money (10 comments total)

Well this is not a system, but I have a 30min bus commute every morning to work, so instead of listening to music and staring out the window, I just started taking that time to read some work material I have been neglecting. It makes the commute go quicker, and I'm not burnt out that early in the morning so actually some of it sticks.
posted by wile e at 8:04 AM on January 5 [1 favorite]

I worked a job once that was mostly downtime. I was supposed to record usage statistics daily, but I found it very difficult to get myself to do it, despite the fact that I had plenty of time to do it. So I made a rule that I wasn't allowed to do anything else at work until I finished this task daily. I would get it done in the first fifteen minutes, and then not have to worry about it. So I think this has more to do with your not wanting to do it than anything else (and who can blame you?).

Parkinson's law says that work expands to fill the time available for its completion, so if I were in your position, I would dedicate the first hour of my day to reading the manuscripts (if you really don't have time at work, make that the first thing you do after you come home). Don't do anything else until you've spent exactly one hour working on this--after that hour, reward yourself with dinner. This is currently my system for grading papers--and, even though I usually have a huge stack of papers to grade, it normally only takes me one or two sessions to get through them. When you give yourself a time limit for an unpleasant task, you get a surprising amount done during that time. Rinse, repeat.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 8:04 AM on January 5 [1 favorite]

I think the problem boils down to two things: "Part of my job is reading proposals and manuscripts for potential books to publish" and "I don't actually have time to read during the workday". How about setting aside an hour each day to get your reading done at the office? Eating and reading go hand in hand, how about during lunch? Anyway, if you really have more to do than time allows I'd talk with your boss about the unrealistic workload. We all have a certain capacity, and when that's exceeded the solution is "hire more help" not "do it at home".
posted by waxboy at 8:10 AM on January 5 [2 favorites]

About time: I have a pile of textbooks waiting here before I start on an intimidating postdoc project. I have an exercise bike in the basement and good lighting. I combine reading and biking. Other than that, it is a matter of developing a schedule and sticking to it. Not easy but it helps.

About organization. There must be tons of tips out there about how to quickly scan a text. Such as 'only skim through the text until some sentence comes along that sticks; work backwards to find out whether something else actually leads up to that sentence; read on to look whether the sentence is followed by more good (or abysmal or whatever) stuff. Work out structure of what you saw. Decide whether it's worth reading word for word.'
This would be one way of reading a text inside out, as opposed to 'from front to back' or 'last paragraph only'. I think you'll need some structured way of reading single texts as opposed to what your question suggests you're trying: to structure your pile of proposals before even reading.

About 'mostly lame proposals' and your footnote. The combination of not having enough time for reading and the quoted average quality level of the proposals would doubtless be difficult for anyone to cope with. You're nevertheless risking that your lofty attitude costs you time reading: low motivation levels always slow down one's work. You are actually waiting for the moment - some time in the future - were you actually do stumble upon The Greatest Proposal You Will Ever Read in Your Life. Why not live in happy anticipation?
posted by Namlit at 8:46 AM on January 5

Zotero
posted by chrisalbon at 8:53 AM on January 5

I'm an editor and I have the same problem sometimes. Here are my tricks to make myself do the parts I don't want to do.

About the reading:
Leave work an hour early and go to a cafe with a bunch of proposals. The leaving early and the fun setting will make reading them seem kind of like a treat. Don't leave until you've read 5.

About the logging:
I also hate logs and anything that I deem "administrative." So I try to make it seem more casual by hand-writing some lists instead of keeping everything on the server in excel docs or what have you.
Get a new notebook and have that be your logbook. Opening a notebook always seems like less hassle than opening a document to me.
Use the notebook to track when you get something, then bring it with you when you go to the cafe to do your reading and write down 2 sentences as you finish each proposal.
Then you can refer back to it for the rejects and use it to type up something for your boss about the good ones.
(Don't lose it though)
posted by rmless at 8:58 AM on January 5

Here's a system I would use:

1) Pull out one proposal or manuscript from stack and slide into pocket or bag.

2) Buy a mini legal pad and a pen and slide them into another pocket.

3) Go about day. When unused time is available (like standing in line, sitting in the park, etc.), pull out reading material, read until bored, and make a mark for where to continue. Repeat until done with item.

4) Use mini legal pad to maintain log. Use same or another small legal pad to compose letters and assessments on the spot if desired.
posted by Theloupgarou at 9:08 AM on January 5

@waxboy: It is expected in my industry that we will all magically fit the reading in around everything else we need to do, and that we will most likely do it at home. Publishing isn't a 9 to 5 job. It's more like a 9:30 to 7 job that dribbles on into the evening. There's a reason editors used to have 3-martini lunches—they needed them.
posted by ocherdraco at 9:12 AM on January 5

I'm an editor and former slush-reader, and this is what has worked for me.

1. Every morning, as soon as you get in to work, log the manuscripts. Do this while you drink your coffee. Anything that shows up on Monday gets logged Tuesday morning. Friday and anything over the weekend gets logged Monday. Yes, it sucks, but unless you're getting dozens of manuscripts a day, it won't take that long. Plus, let's face it: it's nice to have a moderately brainless task with which to segue into your day.

2. Reading it. This is, I realize, the time-consuming and annoying part. First, make a list of things that are automatic rejections. Did they follow the submission guidelines? If yes, keep going. If no, reject it. (Sure, there's a chance you'll miss something amazing, but really, if they can't follow submission guidelines, they're not going to be able to follow other guidelines, either. Forget that.) Is the cover letter addressed properly, not to a competitor or to someone who's not worked at your company for years? Do you have a typo/misspelling policy? (That is, more than X typos, grammatical errors, or misspellings in X pages/words = rejection. If you don't have one, consider developing one, as it can save a lot of time and effort.)

Then you have to actually do the reading, but I'd suggest that most of the reading can really be skimming. Are you reading things all the way through, regardless of what you think of them? If you are, stop. If the first ten pages of the book aren't good, the odds are that the rest aren't going to be all that great, either. If it seems lame, it probably is. Read a few pages and the synopsis, say "hey, this isn't working for me," and reject it.

As for finding time to read, not reading the entirety of every submission will help, but other than that, it's one of those things that you just have to accept. Read during lunch. Keep a manuscript in your bathroom, and one in your kitchen. At night, tell yourself that you have to read one manuscript before you can start your pleasure reading.

3. You have a form letter for the rejections, right?

4. I'd make a form letter for stuff you forward, too. Very simple--you could even do it by bullet points. Genre, length, I like these things, I see these things as potential weaknesses, it's similar to this and that but [different in this way]. The letter should be fast and easy to fill in.

5. Log what's happened to things every morning. Yesterday I rejected this, this, and this, and I passed this on to my boss. If you want to flesh it out, add a column to your log for a brief evaluation, and just throw in a few words about the book. Title by author, rejected, writing flat and lifeless, plot has gaping holes.

My personal system is finally more or less ordered. I made a spreadsheet with columns for date received, title, author, length, rejected/accepted, date of acceptance/rejection, and evaluation. Nothing gets more than about ten words of explanation, but that's been enough to jog my memory when I've needed it to. It's sort of a pain in the ass, but every morning, I open the spreadsheet and update it. If I stay on top of it, it's a few minutes a day. Slack, and it's suddenly something that takes a month to catch up on.

It may be that you're at the point where you need to suck it up and say 'okay, for the sake of my job, I'm going to spend this weekend doing manuscript evaluations.' And then you do that and get caught up, and *then* you have the system that makes it easier.

Also, if you're a deadline-motivated person, (I am,) set deadlines for things. Tell people you'll get back to them within [six, eight, ten] weeks, and then hold yourself to that.
posted by meghanmiller at 9:15 AM on January 5 [2 favorites]

I love the grammatical errors rule. That's peachy. (And no, I don't read all of everything—it's really the processing stuff that gets me down.)

The morning logging appeals to me, to. Since I can't delegate, delegate, delegate (I'm the bottom of the delegating food chain), I need to automate, automate, automate as much as possible, and having a set schedule for doing so seems like a good idea.

Hopefully this will become routine, so that it'll be "pile and process" rather than just "pile."

@rmless: The cafe plan sounds nice—maybe a good idea for the first hour or so of summer Fridays (please, please don't let summer Fridays be canceled because of the economy).
posted by ocherdraco at 11:13 AM on January 5