Bound Together Are We Allies Or Enemies

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Bound together: Are we allies or enemies?
As both author and editors share the goal of creating accurate and usable documentation, one might think they would naturally work in harmony. Walking through the literature on author-editor relationships, however, a different picture is painted. Indeed, the author-editor relationship is often cast in an “adversarial” light (Grove, 1990), featuring the two players in a battle for authority over the work. Authors are depicted as sensitive, sulky, defensive types who think too highly of the words they have written (Rude, 2002) while editors are pictured as arrogant “know-it-all jerks” (Paine, 1993) who take pleasure in making their presence known through the many red marks they leave on a document.
Strong relationships, strong products. While the relationship between authors and editors can be a sensitive one, requiring careful and respectful handling by each, it can also be one in which great dividends are reaped if cultivated properly. Indeed, a good author-editor relationship can lead to strong technical documentation that may not only boost the reputation of the author (Eaton, Brewer, Portwig, Davidson, 2008), but also lead to larger fiscal profits by the company commissioning it (Spencer, 1995; Blackwell, 1995).
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Both authors and editors play a role in building the author-editor relationship, but editors bear the larger burden. Editors’ roles are often poorly defined (Grove, 1990) making it difficult to know where lines of authority are drawn. While good editors believe that authors have the ultimate authority over the writing, to effectively guide authors in producing quality documentation, editors have to assert their own authority (Speck, 1991). When the time comes for editorial muscle to be flexed, the author-editor relationship will largely determine how this show of authority will be