The Editorial Process Coordinator as Project Manager

Becoming an Editorial Process Coordinator

For the larger part of 2022, CFO Services Project consultant Nicolas Forest worked as an EPC at an information provider with a large portfolio of services tailored to the needs of professionals all over the world.

As happened in many companies, the Covid crisis challenged the client to rethink their way of working. The implementation of a new business-as-usual within the Content Creation division led to the introduction of a new editorial process alongside new roles and stakeholders.

One of the roles created was that of an Editorial Process Coordinator for which the client called on TriFinance. ‘The main challenge in this role,’ CFO Services project consultant Nicolas Forest says, ‘was ensuring that all stakeholders were involved at the right time so we could deliver the publication within the budgeted timeframe.’

This came down to managing stakeholders to keep abreast of progress, assessing deadline impact, and communicating adequately to all parties involved. Because Nicolas had to manage multiple publications simultaneously, it was essential to maintain a high-level overview while demonstrating a sufficient commitment to each publication and stakeholder individually.

A steep learning curve in legal matters

A second challenge for Nicolas lay in the nature of the content of the publications. During previous missions, he had acquired a good understanding of finance and business processes, but that knowledge was not immediately relevant to the creation of content on legal topics.

In order to communicate efficiently with stakeholders, Nicolas had to move quickly to reach an acceptable level of knowledge in legal matters. The content created for the various publications covered a variety of legal topics, from commentaries on new marriage legislation to more practical use cases on housing disputes. 

‘For the project to be successful, I needed a good understanding of major legal topics, and how to capture them in new content,’ Nicolas says. ‘That meant a lot of reading, studying, and communicating with various stakeholders.’

Preparing a quality knowledge transfer

As this role was only temporary, a good handover was almost as crucial as ensuring business as usual. The new way of working had not yet been translated into proper documentation for each publication. A great deal of knowledge was spread across different stakeholders without a coherent planning overview.

To keep the content creation going, quality knowledge transfer to the new EPC was essential. Nicolas prepared and structured all planning documents for the following year. He merged documentation from previous years and aligned it with the new way of working. 

For each publication, this resulted in one clear overview listing the different stakeholders, timelines, and deliverables for the coming year. During a short but intensive handover, all documentation was handed over to the new EPC, who could take on their new role immediately.

Managing stakeholders

As in real life, the occasional bump in the road occurred. This required several interventions with stakeholders to realign on a more appropriate deadline and deliverables. ‘Nevertheless,’ Nicolas says, ‘the project can be considered a great success as all budgeted publications were delivered during the course of the project. Plus: this project allowed me to gain my first project management experience in a totally new business environment.’

‘It definitely improved Nicolas's project management skills, and significantly boosted his soft skills,’ says CFO Services Care manager Laura Debaets. ‘We noticed a clear advancement in his French language skills because the publications' target audience consisted solely of French-speaking professionals. That became particularly noticeable in Nicolas’s formal writing skills and in his increasing ability to understand challenging French Legal texts.’

For more info, you can always contact Nicolas Forest. (nicolas.forest@trifinance.be or 03/201 25 60).

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