Plan a journal’s first issues around work the team can actually deliver

1. State the proposed publishing model precisely

The joint transparency principles ask journals to describe their publishing frequency clearly and keep to the schedule except in exceptional circumstances. They also reject guaranteed acceptance and call for honest handling of review delays. These principles do not prescribe one universally correct monthly or quarterly frequency.

Write down whether the proposal concerns discrete issues, continuous article publication with periodic issue closure, or another clearly explained arrangement. Identify what the promised date means: a planned internal milestone, a public issue date or the online publication of a particular article. Do not make one date silently stand for all three.

Reference: COPE / DOAJ / OASPA / WAME: transparency principles, publishing schedule and peer review

2. Separate the desired first-year calendar from available content

The fictional journal proposes issue closures in months 3, 6, 9 and 12, with four articles as a planning assumption for each. Four times four gives sixteen planned article places across the year. This is a workload scenario, not an acceptance quota, a claim that sixteen suitable papers exist or evidence of a publishing history.

At the exercise’s starting point, six manuscripts have completed the invented editorial decision process and are ready for copyediting. Four are proposed for the first issue and two remain available for a later issue. The other ten annual places have no accepted manuscripts assigned. Record that gap instead of filling it with expected submissions or invitations that have not produced papers.

On small screens, scroll the table horizontally, or focus it and use the arrow keys.

3. Count work at the stage it has actually reached

Maintain separate counters for submissions received, manuscripts under assessment, reviews requested, completed reports, editorial decisions, copyedited files, corrected proofs and public articles. A reviewer’s agreement is not a report, and an accepted manuscript is not a published article. One manuscript may also return to an earlier stage when a substantive issue appears.

For each issue candidate, keep its owner, current artifact, unresolved dependencies and next check. Editorial selection remains the editor’s decision; the production calendar cannot create acceptance or bypass unresolved scientific concerns. A slot in an issue plan should never be presented to an author as a completed publication.

4. Test a concrete production sequence

For the four first-issue manuscripts, assume three separate role holders can each handle two manuscripts per week: copyediting, typesetting and author-proof coordination. Each manuscript needs those stages in that order. These are deliberately invented capacities for a scheduling exercise, not industry standards or turnaround recommendations.

If the team finishes all copyediting before starting any typesetting, then finishes all typesetting before proofs, the three stages take six weeks in total. With separate available people and two-manuscript batches, they can overlap as shown below and finish the planned proof stage in week 4. Final checks and a buffer occupy weeks 5–6. These weeks count from the production cycle’s own start. The end of week 6 is an internal readiness checkpoint; the proposed public issue closure remains in month 3, separately scheduled after that checkpoint.

On small screens, scroll the table horizontally, or focus it and use the arrow keys.

5. Check whether the apparent overlap is real

The four-week sequence depends on three different available role holders. If the same person performs copyediting and typesetting, week 2 assigns that person two full batches and the assumption fails. Add actual weekly availability, other journal duties, leave and cover to the plan before claiming the work fits.

Also distinguish a staff processing allowance from an author response. “Proof coordination in week 3” assumes the necessary author replies arrive in that window; the team cannot guarantee them. Record the response dependency, follow-up owner and what happens when a query changes the manuscript. More calendar cells do not create additional staff hours.

6. Rehearse a delay without lowering editorial standards

In a fictional delay, manuscript 4’s proof raises a substantive question in week 4. The production coordinator refers it to the responsible editor and marks it blocked. The manuscript does not become ready merely because week 6 is approaching. Reassess the planned issue using the actual state of the other three articles and the journal’s stated publishing model.

Possible decisions include revising an internal target, carrying the affected manuscript to a later issue when appropriate, or transparently communicating a change to a public schedule. Select the option through the journal’s responsible editorial process and inform affected authors honestly. A contingency plan is not authority to publish an unresolved article, invent an earlier date or obtain a paper by relaxing review.

7. Use evidence from a rehearsal to choose the next commitment

Before making a frequency promise, rehearse a complete non-public production cycle with suitable authorized materials. Record actual stage durations, rework, staff time and unresolved dependencies. Compare those observations with the teaching assumptions and revise the next plan. Do not report a rehearsal as a published issue or a few successful files as a year of operating history.

The launch decision should leave a dated calendar, named capacity owners, an issue-candidate ledger, a delay communication route and explicit unresolved gaps. If evidence cannot support the proposed frequency, change the plan before committing it publicly. A completed worksheet does not establish indexing eligibility, editorial quality or admission to a directory.

Questions for a practical final check

• Define what the proposed date and frequency mean.
• Separate planned places from accepted and published articles.
• Use named capacity units and actual role availability.
• Check dependencies and possible double-booking.
• Keep scientific questions out of deadline shortcuts.
• Retain rehearsal observations separately from public history.