Can you suggest a way to manage this process?

[Geoff Hart <ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca>]

Elizabeth O'Shea reports: <<I have to send a document for review today 
to seven different reviewers. The impossible goal says all their 
comments and changes have to be reconciled, implemented, and signed off 
by tomorrow evening.>>

If the document is of any significant length, this borders on the 
impossible--even getting seven reviewers to return a document in a 
single day is unlikely at best unless their manager is wielding the 
whip. The approach is unreasonable even if it is possible; rushing 
materials through a review in this manner almost guarantees that errors 
will occur. For future reference, clearly and diplomatically inform the 
manager that this is an insane approach, and that reviews require more 
planning. The solution to stupidity is not to endure it, but rather to 
cure it before it causes problems. Of course, that's not a diplomatic 
way to phrase this. <G>

One approach that may reduce the insanity somewhat: Does each reviewer 
really need to review the entire document? The usual answer is "no"--in 
general, reviewers will have different levels of expertise in different 
aspects of the document, and it's better to focus that expertise on 
those sections than it is to dilute that expertise over the entire 
document. Reviewers are only human, and have limited attention spans, 
so focus that limited resource where it will do the most good.

Second, make sure to emphasize to the reviewers that their 
responsibility is to catch fatal errors. Make it clear that anyone who 
only corrects typos will be spanked with a hardcover copy of the Oxford 
English Dictionary--remind them that with seven reviewers all having 
their say, there will be so many new typos that it makes no sense to 
even run the spell checker until after all the reviews have been 
incorporated. (Speaking of which, don't forget a final spellcheck in 
your rush to meet the deadline. Typos are irrelevant compared with 
fatal errors, but they do draw attention.)

<<We use Word. Track changes has been on since the content owner edited 
the existing document. There have been substantial changes. There will 
be more substantial changes when the reviewers get the document, and 
seven different people will be making them.>>

I've handled smaller-scale versions of such projects, under more 
reasonable deadlines, by retaining one master copy of the document, and 
naming each reviewer's copy clearly (e.g., Collective mess--GH 
review.doc). Then review the edit manually, but with Word's help, as 
follows:
- Open the master copy, then open the first reviewer's copy.
- Use the "find next change" function to find the first edit (including 
comments).
- If the edit is reasonable, copy it into the master document; if not, 
don't. Why waste time copying edits that you won't end up implementing?
- When you reach the end of the document, repeat the whole process with 
the next reviewer. As you make progress, you'll discover that many 
comments inserted by Reviewer 4, 5,... have already been copied into 
the document.
- Once you've copied across all the reviewer comments, run through the 
document to evaluate each one: where the comments agree, accept them. 
Where they disagree, insert a comment and move on.

By the end of this process, you'll have incorporated all the edits that 
require no significant mental input from you, and flagged comments that 
require more thought. Now you have to resolve any disagreements. Some 
you can decide on yourself, but others require a phone call: "I have 
two recommendations here: a 12-ohm resistor and a 21-ohm resistor. 
Which is correct?" If you can't get an authoritative answer, bump the 
question to the manager and make it their responsibility to get an 
answer. (Always try to do this first by yourself, but if you really 
aren't the expert, can't get the experts to agree, and have no time to 
put the two experts in the same room to argue it out, it's the 
manager's responsibility to find a solution.)

<<We don't have time for everyone to review a single electronic copy of 
the document in turn.>>

Have a look at a solution such as WebWorks Final Draft 
(http://www.webworks.com/products/wwfd/overview.aspx). Haven't used 
this, but my impression from reading the marketing bumf is that it 
falls somewhere between Acrobat's review features and Word's track 
changes in its approach. That is, it's not nearly as effective as track 
changes for serious and extensive technical editing, but far superior 
to Acrobat for simultaneous review of a single copy of a document when 
the goal is higher-level reviews.

<<The alternative is seven electronic copies with unique file names or 
paper copies. I don't think paper copies are feasible.>>

Paper works just fine, but is inefficient and more prone to error. 
Plus, you don't have time for that approach now. Stick with Word, then 
figure out a more sane solution for the next review task.

--Geoff Hart   ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca
(try geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com if you don't get a reply)


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