Meet our members: Lisa Robertson
Lisa works freelance from her home in Leamington Spa, Warwickshire. She specialises in producing clear health information for patients and the public, and complements this with regular proofreading work for longstanding business clients.
In this interview, Lisa shares how she built a fulfilling editorial career on her own terms – from local government and business proof-editing to specialising in accessible health information and patient communications.
Lisa's story
The opening page: My favourite word
That’s a very hard question to start with! I’m going to say sesquipedalian. As someone who specialises in plain language, I love that the word used to describe long, complicated words is itself a long, complicated word.
Chapter 1. How it all began
Q: How did your career begin and what led you into the world of editorial work?
A: After graduating in Psychology and Education, I started working for my local council within the children’s services planning, performance and commissioning department. I had various roles over time and the organisation morphed continuously, but essentially that’s where I stayed for the next 14 and a half years.
After two periods of maternity leave and a more significant change in role, I started to think about the future: did I want to be doing this forever? It took me a long time to finally take the leap, and I decided that freelancing would be the best option for me so I could be flexible around my young children.
I’d always enjoyed writing reports, presenting information in accessible ways and structuring documents that people would actually read and act upon, so I took this idea and did some research into how I could build it into a freelance career.
Q: How did you get started in your new career?
A: I began trading as Editwrite in April 2015, and my first client was the local authority I’d just left! But this was a strategy-writing job – the bread and butter of what I’d been doing for years.
To develop the editorial element of my new career, I joined the SfEP (now the CIEP) and took the proofreading and copyediting introductory courses, as well as a grammar refresher and some short courses with the Plain English Campaign. My first proofreading job was a disaster as I’d taken on far too much in too short a space of time, but I just had to put that behind me and move on.
It was actually a couple of years in that I decided to invest in the comprehensive ‘Basic proofreading’ course with the Publishing Training Centre. Even though my clients weren’t looking for such training, I wanted it for myself – and I’m really pleased I did it. Understanding where traditional proofreading and editing came from helped me to understand how to apply it to what I was doing.
My first regular proofreading clients came through a CIEP local group colleague whose work was expanding – and we both still work with these clients today!
Chapter 2. What I do now
Q: What does your work look like today, and what do you enjoy most about it?
A: Most of my proofreading work comes from regular business clients, and I have built up really positive relationships with them over time. I’m usually the only editorial professional involved in a piece of work, so while the client may call it ‘proofreading’, we would probably call it ‘proof-editing’. I regularly proof-edit materials assessing candidate suitability for job roles, magazine articles for a professional membership organisation, business plans and pitches for startups looking for investment, and student reports for an independent school. It’s great to know that I’m always getting a steady stream from these clients.
Q: Is there a particular project or collaboration that has shaped your approach?
A: Five years ago, I worked with a small charity supporting people with a rare blood disorder. They had some funding to produce a range of resources for children, young people, families, schools and other professionals. I was initially brought in as a proofreader, but the project manager and I worked so well together that she gave me a bigger role in writing as the project progressed. I loved doing this piece of work, as well as finding it hugely rewarding to be making a difference for the people the charity supports.
Reflecting on this a couple of years later, something clicked and I knew I wanted to do more of this sort of work, so I joined the Patient Information Forum to get myself trained up. Health information has been a real area of development for me since then, and I’m delighted that I’m now one of a handful of freelancers working on a big project with an NHS trust to review all their patient communication content. I have since become one of the first freelancers to be accredited as PIF TICK Competent and have started working with another new client to produce healthcare guides. This feels like something I’ve been working towards for some time, and it is the perfect balance to my regular proof-editing work.
Chapter 3. My biggest challenges
Q: Are there particular challenges that shaped your development as a professional, and what did you learn from them?
A: I'm sure I’m not the only one to say that I enjoy being the right amount of busy but that I find the extremes either side rather stressful! I’m not always great at being productive when I have spare time, but I get easily overwhelmed when I can see a bottleneck approaching.
I think having good relationships with ongoing clients means that I now have the confidence to ask for an extra day or offer a slightly shifted timeline that everyone’s happy with. I also try to build breathing space into my diary, knowing that I need lots of breaks to be working at my best.
Q: Self-promotion can sometimes feel tricky. How have you found ways to talk about your work that feel authentic and comfortable for you?
A: When I started out, I tried a bit of networking at local groups for small businesses, but I didn’t particularly like it, neither was it generating any paid work for me. I also fell into the trap of thinking I needed to be all over social media, but I found that this similarly sapped my time and energy for zero reward.
I now feel like I’ve found my place on LinkedIn, and that’s it in terms of proactive self-promotion. I don’t do selfies or videos and I don’t plan or schedule my posts – I just write when I have something I think is interesting to share or discuss. Sometimes it flops; sometimes it really gets people talking. But usually it’s somewhere in the middle, and that, for me, is where the authenticity lies.
Chapter 4. My proudest moments
Q: Which achievements, publications or collaborations stand out as particularly meaningful to you?
A: Becoming a CIEP Professional Member in 2022 was a huge milestone for me. This wasn’t my first career; I don’t always work full time; I’ve never worked in traditional publishing; I’ve never worked on a book; I’ve never worked on an academic journal article.
At the beginning, I thought these were all essential parts of being a ‘proper’ proofreader or editor and that the work I was doing meant I was just tagging along for the ride. But, as time went on, I realised that my work was equally as valid in this wide-ranging industry and that there was no reason for me not to pursue professional recognition.
Proceeding to Advanced Professional a couple of years later felt like less of a leap, but it still means a lot to me that my work is recognised in this way by my professional body.
Q: Is there a moment in your career that made you think, ‘Yes, this is why I do this!’?
A: Receiving a chocolate brownie traybake in the post from a client! In all seriousness, though, it’s more about what this represented. It had been a particularly busy period for a regular and longstanding client, and they sent all their proofreaders a treat to say thank you.
It doesn’t usually come in edible form, but any message of thanks after a piece of work, or a compliment on LinkedIn, or some friendly chat with a client over email – all this gives me that ‘Yes!’ kind of feeling. It means I’m doing something right and giving the client the outcome they are looking for.
Chapter 5. How I stay connected
Q: Editorial work can be quite solitary. How do you create connection and community alongside your work – formally or informally?
A: I enjoy working at home on my own and don’t miss the corporate office environment one bit. But in terms of connection, my CIEP local group has been my go-to right from the start. I’ve made some wonderful friends this way, as well as some fabulous colleagues to work, share and learn with. I’ve just started as co-coordinator for the group, and I’m really pleased to be giving back in this way.
Online connection works well for me too, so you’ll also see me pop up on LinkedIn and the CIEP forums.
Chapter 6. My life beyond the desk
Q: What brings you joy outside of your editorial work?
A: I enjoy running – not as fast or far or often as I used to, but it’s still a big part of my life. I go to parkrun when I can and volunteer there every so often as well. My family, my cats, reading fiction, seeing friends for tea and cake, and doing Joe Wicks workouts to cancel out all the cake also bring me a lot of joy.
Chapter 7: My advice for others
Q: What advice would you give to someone just starting out or considering a career in the editorial profession?
A: As I alluded to earlier, when I started out, I really didn’t consider myself to be a ‘proper’ proofreader or editor and I wasn’t sure I had a valid place in this profession. There may be people reading this who are feeling that too.
I don’t have all the answers and don’t claim to have the perfect business. However, by volunteering to do this profile, I wanted to show new starters that it is possible to be, feel like and get recognised as an experienced editorial professional without taking what may be considered a traditional route through publishing or academia. It’s also possible to start out doing one thing and end up specialising in another as time goes on.
Take it step by step, build up your experience and training, and find out what inspires you. The professional recognition will follow naturally, as should your own confidence in feeling like a ‘proper’ editorial professional.