Quick tip: Read your draft to your SMEs

Did you ever work with a SME who kept putting off reviewing a white paper draft?

Maybe English wasn’t their first language.

Or maybe they weren’t sure how to express their comments on your draft.

But they were too embarrassed to admit it.

Here’s a smart way around that:

1. Schedule a meeting or Zoom, and read the draft out loud to them.

This works best with a group of three or four reviewers max.

2. Invite everyone to interrupt if they have any questions, if they disagree with anything you just read, or if they can’t understand something.

3. Listen carefully, don’t get defensive, and attempt to resolve each comment. At least ask around the table if anyone else has the same view.

4. Try to re-word any troublesome sentences on the fly and get everyone’s okay.

This reading-out-loud approach can feel like slow-going.

But it’s really a win-win:

• You get your comments
• Everyone feels like you listened to them
• Some reviewers gain more confidence
• You come away with a corrected draft

This simple trick can save days or weeks of review time or get a white paper that’s stuck in reviews moving again.