Managing Your Journal

Journal Roles

At this point in the journal creation process, it is up to the manager to decide how to manage the editorial team. Here are examples of roles:

• editorial control (final say)
• editorial policies (copyright, permissions, scope, author guidelines, blind review guidelines, etc.)
• editorial support (copy-editing, layout editing, peer reviewing)
• technical skills (web layout, layout-editing)
• author/reader correspondence

For more information about these roles, including tutorials, please see Section 6 of the Journal Hosting Guide.  

Journal First Issue Checklist

Here is a list of things to check for when reviewing a journal's first issue:

• In general, the journal is achieving its outlined scope/focus/aim.
• It is free of defamatory content and content that could be a conflict of interest.
• The editorial board is well-developed, diverse, and free of conflicts of interest.
• Overall, the content is free from serious copyediting errors. If there are many, suggest going back with professional input. Publication is fine if there are a few simple errors.
• [For those that already have an ISSN or EISSN] The ISSN and EISSN are visible and formatted correctly according to LOC standards.]
• The PDF is accessible. In this scenario, accessibility means:
  • Headings are used and applied (H1, H2, H3, etc.).
  • Images are appropriately descriptive.
  • Alt text is included with all images.
  • Links are linkable and working.

For a printable PDF of this checklist, see Section 7 of the Journal Hosting Guide.