Profile: Elizabeth Spiegel
I became an editor almost by accident. In 1999, after working for the ATO in Newcastle for 14 years, I returned to Hobart as an IT trainer with the ATO.
After 12 months in that position, I was offered a job in the web publishing team, preparing content that would help people understand and comply with their tax obligations. I wasn’t nominally an ‘editor’, but I was checking text against a corporate style guide, making sure it fitted in with the rest of the website and could be found and understood by people who weren’t necessarily familiar with taxation law. I also responded to external and internal feedback and identified gaps in the information we offered.
Elizabeth (second from the left), her sisters and other hikers on the Great Ocean Walk.
At the suggestion of the editing team’s manager, I joined what was then the Society of Editors, Tasmania, in 2006, just as they were looking for someone to take over management of the society’s website. I had just completed a degree in internet studies, so had the skills to take on that job, just in time to set up the site for the 2007 Hobart conference: From Inspiration to Publication.
That led to me joining the executive committee, and I’ve never left. I’ve been Website Manager, Vice-President and President, as well as representing the society — and later, the branch — on the Accreditation Board, the IPEd board and various committees and working parties. After next year’s conference, I plan to take a break.
Having identified that much of my work was, in fact, editing, I completed a Graduate Diploma in Editing and Publishing at the University of Southern Queensland and, a year later, the accreditation exam.
In 2014, the ATO was hit with budget cuts and I was offered a redundancy. I looked at the figures and took the opportunity for early retirement. Since then, I have stuck to freelance editing, working on a few books each year as well as a range of other projects.
I live in Lenah Valley, on Mouheneener country, in the shadow of kunanyi, with my husband Chris, adult daughter Rebecca and two editorial assistants, Bubble and Squeak. (They’re siblings — he purrs and she chirrups.)
Bubble and Squeak
[Photo credit: Elizabeth Spiegel]
When we returned from Newcastle, Chris claimed it was inevitable we would settle here, where I grew up and where my father’s family have lived since the 1840s.
In my spare time, I research my family history — this year I’ve completed a Diploma of Family History — read, potter in the garden, and sew. We usually manage one overseas trip a year; this year we’ve instead revisited some of our favourite spots on the island, and visited some that have been on our bucket list for many years.