Referee work: They don't teach at grad school

I recently received an invitation from a journal publication to review their manuscript about a topic I am familiar with. I felt surprised, confused, and flattered at the same time with a lot of questions in my head. How could they know me and find me? Am I the right person to do this? Why should I give free labor to do this while I am swamped with my own dissertation work? What's in it for me? Peer-reviewers, despite their pivotal role behind the scene, do not get any credit in the publication, right?

Recognizing that I am a novice in this side of academic world, I reached out to my PhD Committee members, JS and TP, as well as my research manager whom for I work as a part-time research assistant, KS. I separately asked them about the questions I should ask myself in deciding whether to decline or accept this invite to be a reviewer. Their responses generally said that it is a good sign to be asked to do this referee work, and helped me build a mental checklist to make a decision, as follows.

Question 1: Am I the right person to referee this manuscript (based on the abstract)? 

• The answer is yes if you know the subject matter in some way: you know the country, you know the question, you know the theory, etc.

• If it’s all tangential, you can decline the invitation.

Question 2: Is this a journal that I would hope to publish in myself someday? 

• If you’ve never heard of it and it doesn’t look like a credible or good journal, then skip it.

• If you've heard of it and it’s a journal that makes sense aspirationally to you, it’s a good thing to say yes to review the manuscript.

Question 3: Is the journal predatory or irreputable? A definitive source on predatory publishers: https://beallslist.net/#update

• If yes, decline.

• If no, go to the next question.

Question 4:  Look at your calendar, can you devote a couple of solid hours to referee work in the time before the deadline?

• If you feel like this is a good use of your time, go for it!

• If you are too busy with existing commitments, decline and move on.

Having gone through my decision tree above, I responded YES to the invite.

I completed my first referee work! What an experience aside from data analysis processes of my dissertation.

I have some observations.

1. It is time consuming: 5 hours in total for my deep focus work. I spent the first 2 hours just reading, understanding the manuscript, and taking notes. I then spent 3 hours to write detailed comments on the paper and write my report to the journal that contains my overall impression of the work with both strengths and weaknesses as well as major vs minor issues. I was being extra careful in writing my report of review to the journal (hence, 3 hours spent on the writing part). I needed to take a moment to read my report through and put myself in the place of the authors, asking "How would I feel if I received this report? Will I find it constructive, courteous, and professional?"

2. I surprisingly enjoyed reading the manuscript for it gave me an idea what my second paper of PhD dissertation on stunting policy implementation in a decentralized context might look like. I particularly learned from how the authors explained their steps of qualitative data analysis from the 24 interviews they did.

3. It has boosted my confidence that I am considered an expert in nutrition governance, ha! It made me feel powerful to be one of the referees to decide if the manuscript should be rejected or accepted in that journal.

I shared my above-mentioned observations to the three people whose opinions I sought in the first place to help me make a decision. Their responses were absolutely uplifting with two common ideas: 1) It is indeed time-consuming, and 2) I will later find that I can do it faster as I do more of this.

"This is how you learn about the ins and outs of the professional side of things. Especially how long it takes to do a good review—you’ll find that you can get faster, but it inevitably just takes some time, and it’s important to be fair and honest at the same time. So, good show!" TP

"Wonderful! And you’ll learn to get a bit faster, but it is time consuming. But I think writing reviews makes me a better researcher. Getting reviews back from people who have really invested time and thoughtfulness into the review is priceless. So you are putting great karma out, and will get it back!" KS

"It will get quicker as you do more of these. I wouldn’t advise spending that much time (five hours) on this kind of work in the future, but doing reviews is part of the professional responsibility of being an academic." JS

I am grateful for the closed doors in my life just as much as I'm grateful for the opened doors, including these people. I am particularly grateful for their excellent mentorship as I try all these new things about being a professional academic that are not taught in the graduate school. They affirm my belief that great leaders develop others. Indeed, I am indebted to the people who have supported me, believed in me, challenged me, and pushed me to move toward where I am today. I will do the same to other aspiring scholars (i.e. female first-generation students, young people from the Global South). Freely I have received, freely I will give.

Well, that is how I went about the referee work. That was my first time reviewing a journal article, but it may not be my last. In the midst of today’s crazy state of the world with an unprecedented level of uncertainties, misinformation, and disinformation, I would just focus on my circle of influence: how I can serve in my small corner of the world, and be excellent in it.