Create a Production Schedule Editorial
Depending on a given publishing company's chain of command, the managing editor, production manager, or production editor creates a book's production schedule. Typically, production editors create the production schedules, since they function as point person and keep track of editorial, design, manufacturing, typesetters, indexers and printers. Production editors take a book through the production process, from manuscript to bound book, and the schedule allows them to keep better track of all the books on which they are working.
Instructions
Instructions
1. Identify the type of book project you need to schedule. Production schedules vary according to the type of book, most notably whether it's fiction or nonfiction; one-color or four-color; or has additional elements, such as photo inserts, indexes and appendices.
2. Get the bound-book and final files to manufacturing dates from the manufacturing department. The bound-book date allows you to keep editorial informed on when they can expect finished books to arrive. The final files to manufacturing date is a production editor's end date. Work backwards from the final files date when creating the schedule.
3. Include all the steps the book project must undergo when creating the schedule. The steps track the project's routing process: what stage the book is in, who is reviewing it and how long they have. Some publishing companies have templates on Excel that take into account holidays and adjust dates as you type in schedule information.
4. Distribute the schedule to all relevant parties, both to those in the office as well as outside vendors who depend on the schedule to track the book project. Update the schedule as it changes, and redistribute it so everyone is on the same page as to where a project has lagged and why.
