Publishing Journal Articles: Strategies for Success

Concept of the workshop

It is essential for Ph.D. candidates and scientists to develop an impressive publication record. The publication of high quality journal articles is imperative in order to apply for jobs or for research grants, to communicate findings, and to define their reputation in the field. This “publish-or-perish” approach, however, may decrease the quality of the journal articles.

By providing adequate training, it is possible to maintain high quality of publications. Unfortunately, Ph.D. candidates and scientists often do not receive any formal training to publish journal articles. Instead they learn the craft of publishing “by doing” and by making mistakes.

Journal articles should be published in order to influence the field – not simply to increase the list of publications. In this workshop, Andrea Sanchini will discuss with participants on how to navigate the different steps of publishing and how to deal with the peer review process, increasing the chances of acceptance.

Included Topics

• Introduction to scholarly publishing
• How to select a target journal
• H-index, impact factor and other journal and article metrics
• The peer review system: submitting, revising, and re-submitting
• How to effectively communicate with editors and reviewers
• Copyright and licenses
• Ethical issues in publishing (e.g. predatory publishing, authorship disputes, plagiarism)
• Open Access and Open Science
• Artificial Intelligence in scholarly publishing

Learning Objectives

At the end of the workshop, participants will be able to:

• Understand the “bigger picture” of academic publishing
• List key criteria for choosing a target journal
• Write the cover letter for their next manuscript
• Describe the stages of the peer review process and its variants
• Communicate effectively with editors and reviewers during the publication process
• Recognize and avoid common unethical practices in academic publishing

Teaching methods

This workshop follows a balanced approach, including input presentations provided by the trainer, individual learning phases and group exercises. In addition, hand-outs, checklists, sample articles and examples of cover letters from the trainer's own experience in publishing articles will be provided.

Preparing for the workshop

During the workshop, participants can draft a cover letter (half page to one page) for their next publication. Therefore, before the workshop participants are asked to preparethe (preliminary) title of their next publication.

Workshop target group

The workshop is especially useful for Ph.D. candidates of Natural, Life, Social Sciences and Engineering faculties at any stage of their Ph.D. More experienced scientists such as early Postdocs can also take advantage of the workshop, since they can optimize their strategies to publish journal articles.