Before submissions can be allocated to reviewers, you will need to configure the reviewing system to match your review process. There are 4 main steps to be completed before you can Allocate submissions to Reviewers:
1. Configure Review Settings
2. Configure Marking Scheme
3. Configure Acceptance
4. Add Reviewers and give them topics
From the dashboard, find your Setup Review card and click on Configure Review Settings.
1. Configure Review Settings
Step 1a) Important Dates
Confirm if the dates are correct and input the date you expect to notify the authors by.
Note: Reviewing Starts and Reviewing Ends date won't start and close the review. The system will never send out notifications to Authors automatically.
Step 1b) Reviewing and Allocation
Here, you are setting up the system so that when you allocate reviews, Ex Ordo can ensure your requirements are met. Several settings are configured at this stage:
A) How many reviewers should each submission get? Choose the number of reviewers you wish to look at each submission. The number you choose may be dependent on the number of reviewers available.
B) What is the maximum number of submissions per reviewer? Ex Ordo will stop allocating to a reviewer at the limit inserted here. As reviewers are giving their time and expertise for free, it is recommended that this number is kept low – however, this is not always possible.
C) Nepotism in Submission Allocation. Choosing to prevent nepotism means that reviewers will not be allocated submissions from their colleagues. The system will check similarities in email addresses (domains) and organisations. We have more options available on request - outlined here: How does nepotism affect my review?
D) Blind Review Settings. The chair can allow reviewers to be able to see the names of the authors (Single Blind) or hide the names of the authors from the reviewers (Double Blind).
As a default setting Authors can't see Reviewers' names.
E) Decline Assigned Reviews. The conference chair can decide to allow or prevent reviewers from Declining their assigned submissions. Where the chair decides to prevent reviewers from Declining the review, the reviewer won't be able to decline any allocated review they got assigned.
Step 2) Configure Marking Scheme
Now that you've entered the basic review settings, you can start on your marking scheme. Find your Setup Review card and select 'Configure Marking Scheme Settings'.
A detailed description of how to set up your marking scheme can be found in the How can I personalize my marking scheme? article.
Step 3) Configure Acceptance Settings
The final step in setting up your review is configuring your decision types. Find your Setup Review card and select Configure Acceptance Settings.
Step 3a) Decision Formats
In the acceptance configuration stage, you can decide about your decision types, and how would you like to accept/reject your submissions. There is an option to import your acceptance types from the submission stage, or you can configure new acceptance decisions.
Step 3b) RSVP
In Step 2 of the Configure Acceptance Workflow, you can ask your accepted authors to reply to your RSVP invitation. Detailed information on how to use RSVP and configure your acceptance can be found here.
Note: We do not recommend using the RSVP feature if you are using the panel's feature.
Step 4) Add Reviewers and assign them topics
The last step in setting up your conference for the review is adding reviewers. You can read all about that process here.