A journal submission involves more than a manuscript file. Figures, supplementary material and a cover letter have to travel with it; a revision adds another set of changes to track. I decided to turn the records around that work into a downloadable spreadsheet product. Manuscript Control Desk came first, for an individual researcher. I then developed Manuscript Agency Operations OS as a separate product for people handling manuscripts on behalf of clients.
These are workbooks for organizing decisions and files, not software that writes papers or handles journal decisions. The individual version centres on the state of a researcher's own manuscripts. The team version extends that work into hand-offs and client reporting.
Connecting a status to the work behind it
Control Desk uses nine connected sheets within an Excel 365 workbook. I divided manuscript status, next actions, submission materials and records into separate sheets. A status such as “in revision” should lead to the work still to do and the material needed to do it, rather than serve as the whole record.
I packaged the workbook with a quick-start guide, licence and support documents. The product images and seller materials were based on the actual workbook. This meant preparing both a usable starting point inside the file and a description outside it that represented the same product.
I designed it for desktop Excel 365, without automatic synchronization with email or journal portals. An authorized person checks and enters the records, keeping the file wherever they choose. I kept the scope within an existing file-management workflow rather than building a service that required manuscript uploads.
Checking the package that would actually be delivered
The first listing selected an older bilingual package even though the product was intended for English-speaking buyers. I identified the remaining Korean text and had the package rebuilt in English, with an additional check to establish which release files were being selected.
A formula check would not have caught that mistake. The workbook could be correct while the sales archive still contained an earlier version. After correcting the language, I treated the identity and language of the delivery package as a separate release check before republishing it.
Extending the workflow to client work
I chose to keep the individual product and develop the team product alongside it. The intended buyers for Agency Operations OS were freelance editors, small agencies and larger support teams. Their records had to cover more than the progress of one person's paper: a hand-off also needs to explain what was approved and what the next person is receiving.
The team package combined a 13-sheet workbook with an operations playbook, four standard operating procedures, an intake form and 24 client-communication templates. The procedures cover submission, revision, transfer and closure; the intake form gathers information at the start of a new engagement. I arranged the working path from a dashboard through approval and revision to submission evidence and client reporting, linking the current stage to the material that needed to move with the work.
Licensing was split into three buyer packages for individual editors, small agencies and larger teams. They receive the same functional files; authorized user counts and client-reporting rights differ. Agency and Studio, for example, permit verified, non-editable status-report PDFs for the relevant client, but not distribution of editable source workbooks. The two products address the same general workflow, but differ in who is using the records and who needs to receive them.
What release established
When I rechecked the product landing page on 7 September 2026, it publicly displayed both workbook scopes, licence choices, material presented as actual-workbook demonstrations, and Gumroad product links. The manuscript and client records used in those demonstrations are fictional. Their task and deadline counts are not customer-usage figures.
Verified sales and revenue were zero in the record checked on 3 September, not a current sales figure. I had not tested checkout and file delivery through a purchase or established how actual users worked with either product.
The tangible result was a workbook for individual manuscript records and a larger set of documents for team hand-offs. Correcting the English release also gave me a concrete packaging rule: inspect the files being delivered, not only the source used to build them. The products reached public pages. Whether their structure reduces a buyer's work still has to be established through use.