Yesterday: PhD student’s paper is accepted! Yay! But also, other PhD student’s paper is returned by the journal after nearly 6 months due to inability to get reviewers. This happened to another trainee’s paper last year as well. Anecdotally, it sounds more & more common.
Journals: Please improve your processes. Make your default review times longer. See if you get all reviews in faster if you ask for reviews within 4 weeks rather than 2. Also: invite more junior people to review. They’re often more eager to review & are up on newest methods.
Publishers: Make your websites easier to use. Don’t make people log in to say yes or no. Make keyword selection easy.
Scientists: Please encourage everyone to follow the rule of thumb that one should review 3 manuscripts for each manuscript one gets reviewed. This is how the system continues. Those who are getting but not providing reviews are free-riding, and it is not cool.
