Welcome to Editing with Focus! You’ve come a long way to get here, but finally, your content is in place. It’s well-organized, with an audience-friendly style and tone. By now, though, you’re feeling some time pressure, because your deadline is most likely looming, or even receding. Under these circumstances, it’s tempting to just send your work to the next person in line and be done with it. But hold on. Your document is not quite ready; you haven’t edited it yet.

I. Editing as a Good Use of...