CURRICULUM VITAE

Education and qualifications

• O-levels: English Language, English Literature, Mathematics, French, German, Biology, Physics/Chemistry, History, Greek Literature (in translation), Dutch
• A-levels: English, French, Politics and Government
• BA Hons: Political Theory and Institutions (French and Russian subsidiaries).

Employment history

Freelance career
In the past couple of years I have been working mainly on high-level academic medical journals, but I have also worked for organisations such as the European Association of Urology, and small business clients.

Before that, I worked mainly on medical textbooks for academic publishers such as Chapman & Hall (now part of Taylor & Francis) and the company’s various imprints including Kluwer Academic Lippincott-Raven, Routledge and E&FN Spon, plus Radcliffe Medical Press, Pira International, the World Cancer Research Fund, Foulsham, Hodder Arnold, the King’s Fund, and small business/corporate clients among others.

My remit is always to edit or proofread copy to tight deadlines, ensuring conformity with house style and accuracy, plus managing length and content, figures, tables and photographs. A lot of the copy I deal with has been poorly translated or is written by people whose first language is not English, and I turn this into intelligible English prose while not losing the author’s own voice or style.

March 1990 to February 1991
Chief Sub-Editor, Transport Week (title closed in 1992)
Morgan-Grampian Ltd, MG House
30 Calderwood Street, London, SE18 6QH

As Chief Sub-Editor on Transport Week, a 56-page weekly title for managers in the road haulage business, I was responsible for all aspects of the magazine’s production, reporting directly to the editor and running a team of three sub-editors plus a designer. Transport Week was produced using full on-screen page make-up (LeAPS) and was electronically transmitted to the printers. Specific responsibilities included:

• rewriting/sub-editing copy, writing headlines, captions and standfirsts
• reviewing the work of my sub-editors and designer
• reading and revising proofs and sending corrections
• managing/supervising staff, copy flow and all aspects of production
• teaching of sub-editing skills to trainees.

November 1987 to February 1990
Senior Sub-Editor, Pulse; Managing Editor, Financial Pulse
Morgan-Grampian Ltd, MG House
30 Calderwood Sreet, London, SE18 6QH

As a senior member of the sub-editing team on Pulse, and Financial Pulse, I handled all aspects of production from raw copy through to final page for all sections of both publications. I sub-edited copy for style, content and length, liaised with the desk editors, wrote
headlines, standfirsts and captions, sized pictures and so on. I undertook some page layout and design.

Before moving to the sub-editing department of Pulse I held several other posts within the medical publications group. I joined Pulse in November 1987 as a reporter on the Money Pulse section; I was promoted to the news team in December 1987 and became Deputy News Editor in May 1988. Promotion to Managing Editor of Financial Pulse followed in October 1988. I opted to move to the sub-editing department in July 1989 when Financial Pulse was restructured.

The post of Managing Editor of Financial Pulse involved editing and production work (taking copy from the raw state through to final page, including sub-editing, proofreading, headline and caption writing) in addition to managing and briefing a team of four in-house journalists plus freelancers and a designer, planning the content of the magazine and its regular supplements, researching and writing articles, and commissioning specialist writers. Although the Editor, Nigel Duncan, had overall responsibility for the magazine, my role was its day-to-day running as the title was just one of his many editorial commitments.

March 1985 to October 1987
Assistant Editor, Containerisation International
The National Magazine Company, National Magazine House
72 Broadwick Street, London, W1V 2BP

Containerisation International is a monthly publication for the container shipping and transport industries. My time was divided roughly equally between sub-editing/ production duties (including the full range of sub-editing tasks for news and features, comprising page design, liaising with section heads and the printers, and co-ordinating copy flow) and news/feature writing. I covered specialist, technical, financial and political topics.

January 1984 to March 1985
Editorial Assistant (promoted to Assistant Editor in July 1984)
Environmental Services Group, IMSworld Publications Ltd
York House, 37 Queen Square, London, WCIN 3BL

My duties included researching, writing, editing and proofreading copy for the World Drugs Market Manual and Pharma-Prognosis International, with special responsibility for the political and economic analysis sections for each country covered. I wrote some of these myself and commissioned others, taking all through to the camera-ready stage.