I completed my BSc degree in Chemistry at Imperial College, London, with first class honors in 1993, and stayed on at Imperial to study for my PhD in organometallic chemistry supervised by Professor Sue Gibson and sponsored by the Associated Octel Company.

My first job after university was as a teacher/lecturer at three tutorial colleges in central London, at two of which I was head of chemistry. Although I found this to be very rewarding, and it significantly improved my skills in organization, communication, and presentation, I wanted to find a career in which I could use my knowledge of chemistry to a greater extent, and develop skills in other areas. Another major attraction to working for Science of Synthesis, which I joined in the middle of 2003 as Assistant Scientific Editor, was the opportunity to work on a large project as part of a closely integrated team.

I was promoted to Scientific Editor in 2004 and to my current position in early 2007; the second of these promotions involved much the greater change in my job description. As both Assistant and Scientific Editor, much of my time was spent copyediting and proofreading authors’ manuscripts, but as Senior Scientific Editor, these tasks are no longer part of my remit. Broadly speaking, my main responsibilities now are to ensure, as far as possible, that volumes are completed on time, high editorial quality is maintained, and editorial processes run efficiently.

Specific aspects of my current position include management of our freelance editorial team (including budget planning), as well as training and allocating work to our in-house editors. I provide support to the editors, answering their editorial queries, and approve the copyedited manuscripts before page proofs are made, providing feedback where necessary. The knowledge of our house style and extensive experience of tackling a range of editorial issues that I built up as a copyeditor have proved invaluable in this “problem-solving” role.

I am also responsible for the provision of feedback to authors on their preliminary tables of contents and sample pages (although I do not prepare all of it myself). This involves much discussion with our eminent volume editors and authors and is particularly important because, by ensuring that authors are familiar with our style and know what is expected of them from a very early stage, the later editorial processes run much more smoothly for all concerned. Another part of my job that I particularly enjoy is the devising and implementation of strategies for improving and streamlining our editorial processes: the world of scientific publishing is now in a state of rapid flux and it is important to keep up with the latest developments.

I also have opportunities to attend international conferences, representing the editorial office and meeting authors, volume editors, and (potential) users of Science of Synthesis personally. Working at Thieme has enabled me to learn German which, although not of primary importance to my everyday work, I have taken to keenly.