Finding Your Strengths as an Editor

“When somebody trusts you with their piece of writing, that is a real honor,” she says. “I always want to do right by my clients. But that also means being able to defend my decisions and explain my choices if someone pushes back, and I needed more than just instinct for that.”

That realization sent her looking for formal training, and it was the Editing certificate program at the University of Chicago that quickly rose to the top of her list. “If your goal is to become an expert in the field of publications, why not go to the standard-bearer within the industry?” she says, noting the University’s role as the publisher of The Chicago Manual of Style. Practically, the evening classes fit around her schedule of work and family. Just as important was that the program’s reputation meant the credential would be taken seriously.

In the coursework, editing came into focus not as a vague talent but as a sequence of distinct practices, each having its own purpose and place. “I don’t think most people are aware of how complex and layered editing is, and I’ll be honest, I’m not sure I was fully aware before this program,” she says. In her first manuscript editing course, her instructor walked the class through the seven layers of editing, from big-picture structural concerns down to the smallest mechanical details. “Before, I didn’t really have a language for the different levels. In this program, you learn every single layer, and you learn the order and why it is the way it is, and how they serve the author in the long run.”

One class session in particular gave her insight into her own strengths. Working on a first-person narrative in an intermediate manuscript editing course, Thompson found herself flagging timeline inconsistencies and character issues. Her instructor pointed out that those elements technically fell outside the assignment at hand. But the instructor also noted something else. “She said, ‘That’s a little bit outside this lane, but I also see that’s a strength of yours. You notice those details. You have an eye for that.’ That was really helpful for starting to understand where my strengths are as an editor.” 

Thompson says that that sort of feedback is exactly what’s hard to come by for freelancers in the wild. “When you are working as a freelancer, a client is not obliged to give you any kind of feedback. If they really like your edits, they’ll probably hire you again, and if you don’t hear from them, you don’t know.”

Since completing the certificate, Thompson has built Ink & Insight Wordsmithery, a freelance editing practice centered on narrative nonfiction with a focus on personal stories and memoir-like work. She registered her business, built her own website using Squarespace, and joined a range of editorial communities recommended by her instructors, including ACES, the Editorial Freelancers Association, and the Northwest Editors Guild. Meanwhile, her network continues to grow, with a fellow student from the program even having become a referral source. Overall, she’s been struck by the generosity of the editing community and how editors regularly refer work to one another based on specialty and availability.

Thompson’s next goal is to move upstream into developmental editing. For that step, she plans to return to UChicago for the Introduction to Developmental Editing course, with an eye toward the Editing certificate program’s other electives as well. She also sits on the Student Advisory Board for the Professional Development Certificate Programs at UChicago, where she helps organize events that keep editors current on topics as varied as manuscript structure, freelance business development, and the role of AI in editorial work.

On the latter topic, Thompson is pragmatic. “Spellcheck was a new tool that editors worried about when it came out too,” she notes. But in the end, each technological shift has pushed the profession to articulate more precisely what it does and why it matters. “So much of editing is actually educating,” she says. “Whether you’re moving a comma or editing for parallel construction, the writer wants to understand why.”