Life as a Physiopedia Editor

Top Contributors - Alexandra Stead and Vidya Acharya

Introduction

We want being part of our team to be as enjoyable and beneficial as possible. We appreciate this is a volunteer role, and so we want to give back and reward your efforts as much as possible. Not only will being a Physiopedia editor look good on your CV, you will receive continued training, access to resources, feedback on your edits and you can also unlock multiple benefits, such as free access to our Plus platform, Physiopedia merchandise and social media shout outs. Refresh what being part of the editorial team involves here.

Editor Roles

There are three potential editorial roles that you can do as a volunteer at Physiopedia. This includes:

Content Editor

This is someone who is deemed to have sufficient skills/ expertise to support us with editing our content. You may have a specialist interest area, or keen to broaden your knowledge into multiple areas, whilst refining your editorial skills. Most people here at Physiopedia will have originally started as an editor and this volunteer role is fundamental for us to remain up-to-date.

Lead Reviewer

This is for our experienced editors who have demonstrated exceptional commitment, knowledge and quality in their work and are looking to take their skills to the next level. They may mentor new editors, perform higher level quality checks on submitted reviews, and help coordinate topic-specific initiatives. Lead reviewers often specialise in particular content areas while maintaining broader editorial responsibilities.

Subject Matter Experts

These are people who are highly specialist in an area, who are keen to provide specialised knowledge to a small specific clinical area. These team members are recognised authorities in particular fields such as orthopaedics, neurology, paediatrics, or specialised treatment techniques. They provide expert review for complex topics, guide content development in their specialty areas, and serve as consultants when questions arise about specialised content.

The team is managed and supported by Alexandra Stead, the Quality assurance manager. This is who you will be sending monthly activity reports to and is responsible for ensuring Phyisopedia’s quality remains high. Alex is supported by the Content Manager, Vidya Acharya, who is responsible for maintenance of our pages and the behind the scenes reports. Together Alex and Vidya are here to support you and are at hand to respond to any queries in the Slack channels.

Volunteer Requirements

We appreciate that many of our editors have full time jobs and busy lives, and as a result we want to keep the requirements to a minimum. We follow the philosophy of teamwork that many hands make light work! With this in mind, we have just a few monthly expectations when joining our team, which collectively helps us continue to drive Physiopedia forwards, enabling it to grow and remain up-to-date. The time that you invest into Physiopedia should reflect the time we invest into our dedicated editors.

To make expectations as an editor clear, we have created the 4C’s to summarise the required monthly tasks, which contributes towards our values and vision. The 4C’s include connection, completion, collaboration and curation. See below for more information on each of the 4C’s:

CONNECTION	COMPLETION
We run two monthly team meetings which cover team updates and discussions on relevant topics. There is also a full Physiopedia team huddle with the CEO. We ask that you attend at least 1 monthly meeting for updates and team talk and be active in dedicated Physiopedia Slack channels (comment, react, post).	We ask all volunteers to complete a minimum of one quality full page edit or page creation. We understand this takes time to produce quality work and so have kept the quantity of this requirement low. Please post all completed pages into the content Slack channel.
COLLABORATION	CURATION
We are a community of like-minded individuals who want to develop our skills and provide educational content to rehab professionals across the world. To facilitate collaboration we ask that you provide actionable feedback/ comment on at least one person's edits each month that are posted in Slack, checking for quality and accuracy, utilising our quality checklist.	We are dedicated to maintaining quality and with almost 6000 pages now published, this is a mammoth task. As part of our review process, the management team will highlight numerous relevant pages for review. We ask that everyone review one of these pages to check for quality and provide it a quality rating, which will help direct the team to the pages that need priority editing.

Monthly (4C’s each month) summary:

CONNECTION: Attend at least 1 monthly meeting for updates and team talk
COMPLETION: Complete 1 quality page edit or 1 page create based on the monthly focus/ requested pages, prioritising the orange and red reviewed pages first. If you wish to complete additional edits each month, feel free to base this on the monthly focus or have freedom to edit any other pages you deem necessary.
COLLABORATION: Provide feedback on 1 persons edits
CURATION: Review 1 page related to the next monthly focus to check for quality

If you are subject matter expert you have slightly different expectations:

CONNECTION: Aim to attend at least 1 monthly meeting for updates and team talk
COMPLETION: Complete 1 quality page edit/ creation/ review a month
COLLABORATION: Provide feedback on specialist pages
CURATION: Review/ keep track of specific area of quality on pages of category/ area

Attending team calls

We have various calls each month. We would love you to attend them all, but understand that you may have other commitments that prevent you from doing so. We try to accommodate for different time zones to help you to be able to attend. As part of requirements we ask that you aim to attend one live call or catch up on the recording of calls that you miss.

Our calls are relaxed but informative on what is going on at Physiopedia as a whole and within our team. These monthly calls include:

First week of the month: Monthly Physiopedia Huddle [1 hour] - this is a whole team call and includes editors and employed staff from both Physiopedia and Plus. This call is led by our CEO Rachael and is a great way to gain oversight of the company.
Second week of the month: Monthly Editor Team call [30 minutes] - this call is specifically for the editors of Physiopedia and is led by the Quality Assurance Manager, covering updates on progress made, announces Editor of the month (EOTM) and discusses specific topics.
Third week of the month: Content Review [30 minutes] - this is led by the Content Manager covering editing feedback and Q&A.

Sharing your edits

We pride ourselves on collaboration and a like-minded community. All our editors have gone through the same training process and possess a high level of skills, expertise and quality, for whom we trust with editing our content and pages. We also appreciate that no single person knows everything and therefore, we review, share, feedback and make adjustments to our content and support each other to produce the best quality resources that we can.

As a result, we ask that all our volunteers share the edits they make in a dedicated Slack channel (Physiopedia Content), for editor peers to review and feedback where necessary, creating an open and supportive environment. The quality team can also provide comments and suggestions for further edits. We ask that you share pages throughout the month as they are completed, giving time to action any feedback within the month. We hope this process provides a safe space to learn and develop your editorial skills, whilst providing an extra layer to our quality checks as a team.

Submitting an activity report

We ask all volunteers to complete a monthly activity report. This is for us to complete our quality audit checks and for us to have oversight of what pages are being edited each month. This should be a quick 5 minute task completed at the end of each month. This is sent to the Quality Assurance Manager, who will then reply to you with any additional feedback.

The activity report is linked to the 4C’s and when submitted, enables you to gain points and unlock rewards as part of our benefits package. It is a great time for us to check in (not check up) and for us to connect with you. We also ask that you share any updates with us which could be personal or professional, that you are happy with us sharing with the team as we want to be able to shout about your achievements.

We understand that some months are busier than others, and there may be times that life prevents you from doing your role. Where this occurs, reach out to our Quality Assurance Manager, Alex, who can support you and look at options moving forwards. We ask that you still complete an activity report every month, even if you do not meet requirements, so can still check in with you and remain connected.

Appraisals

We want your time at Physiopedia to be both rewarding and enjoyable. We want you to develop as many skills as possible and feel connected to as many people across the world. We are always looking for ways to improve our volunteer experience and offering and as a result, the team will regularly reach out to you for feedback and to see how you are getting on. As part of this, we offer appraisals after 3 months of being with us and then annually to provide you with feedback on your development as an editor, which is fantastic evidence for your portfolio. This also provides you a dedicated opportunity to share with us your experiences, thoughts and suggestions to make the team and role the best it can be. The Quality Assurance Manager will be in touch when it is time to have a review.

Summary of your role:

Complete the 4C’s as part of your role each month.
Connect via Slack, where you can share your edits and gain feedback and seek support, as well as chat with other volunteers. Make sure to have your channel notifications switched on so you can keep up to date with messages.
Post editing pages as you complete them for timely feedback.
Attend our different calls (where possible) to connect with the team and receive updates, or catch up with the recordings.
Submit an activity report each month to update us on your progress.
Earn points each month which are linked to editor levels and benefits.
You are eligible to receive monthly and annual awards.
We want you to have fun, learn and feel connected to an amazing team of global professionals!