Authoring an Article

Manuscript Guidelines for Benefits Quarterly

To prospective authors: Thank you for your interest in writing for Benefits Quarterly. The following guidelines are intended to make this process easier and more enjoyable for you.

Kathy Bergstrom, CEBS
Editor, Benefits Quarterly
(262) 373-7633
[email protected]

All material submitted for possible publication should be sent to [email protected]. Unless other arrangements are made, material should be sent as a Microsoft Word document for text and as a Microsoft Excel or PowerPoint document for graphics.

1. Articles should range from 1,500 words to a maximum of 4,000 words.
2. Benefits Quarterly articles should be educational in nature, include professional papers representing works of substance or original research and be geared to be useful to the employee benefits practitioner. The articles can follow traditional text or essay formats or appear as a series of "briefs" that touch on several topics. These could be used for the purposes of updates on diverse topics, or to summarize a research study in easily readable form .
3. Article submissions should relate to the employee benefits field and can include subjects applying to retirement, health care, insurance, law, banking, investments, government, consulting, plan management and administration, actuarial matters, labor relations, accounting, claims management, deferred compensation, work/family and other areas of human resource management including compensation.
4. An executive summary of the article, approximately 200 words, should be included.
5. Attach a brief biographical note for the author(s), including present position, responsibilities and address, as well as educational background, professional affiliations, etc. Figures/charts should be submitted as separate files in the format in which they were created originally, e.g. Illustrator (preferred) or Excel. Figures submitted in PowerPoint sometimes will work if text can be edited and colors changed .jpg, .gif and .png files generally won't work because they cannot be edited. Tables and figures should be constructed so they are completely understandable on their own and should be clearly referenced in the article.
6. When a substantial amount of copyrighted material or documentation is included in a contribution, full details should be given as to the source of the research material and provision that permission has been received for inclusion in the article.
7. When data is used, endnotes (not footnotes) should indicate the source of data or concept stated. Be sure each endnote has its matching reference in the text.
8. When research material has been utilized in preparation of the article, a bibliography titled "References" should be attached to the end of the article listing all research sources.
9. The editor will obtain signed copyright agreements from all authors before articles are submitted to the International Society.
10. The editor will review all articles submitted for consideration and may suggest revisions. The editor may refer articles to outside third parties for review prior to publication. A summary of suggested revisions will be submitted to the author with respect to suggested changes.
11. Submissions may not advertise the products or services of the author's employer, or any other entity.
12. The use of public generative artificial intelligence (AI), such as Chat GPT and other large language models, and AI-assisted technologies in the writing process is restricted to improving the readability and styling of the work. The technology must be used with human oversight, judgment and control, and authors must carefully review and edit the result. Authors are solely responsible for the accuracy and quality of their work. Authors are required to submit a copyright agreement to the International Foundation and, therefore, are responsible for ensuring that the work is original and does not infringe on third-party rights.
13. The use of public generative AI or AI-assisted tools to create or alter images, figures, tables and artwork in submitted articles is prohibited. This includes enhancing, obscuring, moving, removing, or introducing a specific feature within an image or figure.