What are the attributes of great co-authors?

This a good question - I answer this based on my personal research experience.

This covers the basic points ! Thank you, friends!

Best wishes,

Sundar

Reginald,  Thanks for the fine question that makes us think.

It behooves you to have a coauthor with as great or a greater scholarly reputation than your own. Somehow what you say acquires greater light and heat.  You must also have a coauthor with whose positions you concur.  It makes no sense to have an article pulling in two different directions. In humanities and even in the hard sciences, it helps to have a coauthor with a clear but graphic writing style to make both your discoveries memorable.  Finally, I find that in scholarly writing, a sense of structure should everywhere prevail, a methodicalness and meticulousness that makes one argument convincingly flow from the other.  A coauthor who is sloppy about organization is seldom of much value. Rep, coherence, and structure of 2 authors make for fine reading.   

A good starting point is to initiate (or continue) a regular literature review in your field. You should not only know what's new, but you may find very good writing and want to investigate whether co-authors are available. I believe there is one expert author. Define the role of the co-author very cautiously... this is not just a typing service.

What are the attributes of great co-authors?

This a good question - I answer this based on my personal research experience.

This covers the basic points ! Thank you, friends!

Best wishes,

Sundar

That's quite a response from Sandur - and I can go with the majority of what he states. I co-author a lot (but I also co-edit a lot as well). I suppose though, at the end of the day, I still want the same from both processes. I only pick co-authors who I know are already established experts in the field and have a good publication track-record. That said, I am currently co-authoring a few book chapters with recent post-PhD students who are neophyte publishers. Two reasons for that; one is truly believing in 'giving back' through research mentoring - and the other is 'high praise' from their expert supervisors. I will still expect (and hope) the same from both experienced and neophyte co-authors though. That is:

1. Motivation, commitment and enthusiasm.

2. Attention to detail.

3.  Able to meet tight deadlines.

4.  Good 'sound-boards' i.e. able to bounce ideas back and forth until a common agreement/consensus is reached. 

5.  Someone who accepts constructive criticism gracefully and is able to give the same back. 

6.  Someone with good insight and foresight i.e. can spot the next project to co-author on. 

7. Important for me, but maybe not everyone, good social skills and a good sense of humour.

A co-author share the ideas and knowlwdge while writting or preparing the manuscript. They play a main role in critical review and finalizing of manuscript. It is also true that there are many co-outhors who did not contribute effectively. This may leads to delay or poor quality of manuscript...

I have published articles alone and also with coauthors. The mainthing is the good teamwork. The coauthor has to be able to work under pressure of work.

This depends also on your own needs and capabilities: e.g. if you are good in methods and data collection, you might be interested in somebody who is good at writing literature reviews and vice versa; if your English is excellent, your co-author does not have to be so good in it.... Still, the co-author should have time, interest/motivation/ability to contribute and be honest, too.

Its Depends on the intention of the coauthor, most of the papers wrote-up by many authors for several reasons:

1. If the paper have many disciplines or should use a unique analysis software, then the role of the coauthor come out to help the main author to do the analysis or write-up  about phenomena.

2. If the coauthor looking for academic promoting and try to collaborate within paper even if its not in his field.

Regards

Every research article when needs to take a form of document requires a great support from the team (or more energy to be spent in case of an independent researcher).

The synergy in the team counts and match of skills which other members have lesser expertise, would need to be bridged...

The feeling of ONENESS is the attribute that counts for team's performance. Each authors within the research team contribute to the successful outcome of their output. 

Dear @Reginald, it is always a good idea to have a coauthor to stimulate the work; sure, sometimes there are some problems and issues, but they should be solved; the advantages are more than small disadvantages.

I have worked with a co-author on a book project, which was definitely a positive experience. Ditto for a collborative special issue put out by 5-6 colleagues. In both bases the qualities that I most appreciated were

1. Willingness to keep channels of communication open at all times. This was vitally important as we were hardly (if indeed ever) in the same geographic location during the entire time the book was written.

2. Honesty in terms of progress meeting deadlines etc.

3. A steady feedback loop which allowed both us to stave off the worst of the writer's block (this was specific to the book although there was some of this reading/editing going on amongst the authors of the special issue as well).

4. A shared vision about goals, etc.

These particular things were relevant to our specific book project no doubt but I think #1. is a universal given. I daresay other things would come up in a collaboration over a paper, but I guess the unsaid quality of trust underlies all the above attributes.

If they can inspire you just one new and valuable idea, then that is enough!

I would like to have the following attributes in a coauthor:

1. Perfect understanding and on the same wavelength

2. Ability to plan and also meet those tight deadlines.

3. Realistic in estimating their capability

4. Motivation, commitment and enthusiasm.

5. Well-read and keep abreast of the knowledge in the particular domain of mutual interest

6. Willing to work and be a good critic to make sure that what is written is accurate and well received.

A coauthor who likes to help or contribute rather then seeing his name added

My new Springer book with Dr. Ahmad Taher Azar is set to be released by Nov.2014:

Details:

 Computational Intelligence Applications in Modeling and Control

Series: Studies in Computational Intelligence, Vol. 575

Azar, Ahmad Taher, Vaidyanathan, Sundarapandian (Eds.)

2015, XV, 911 p. 318 illus., 33 illus. in color.

It is interesting to note that I met this co-author - Dr. Ahmad Taher Azar - in an International Conference only (at Tunisia), and we are now good friends.

This link supports my writing about "co-authors" and "international conferences" in recent threads in ResearchGate (RG).

Have a great day, friends!

With best wishes,

Sundar

http://www.springer.com/engineering/computational+intelligence+and+complexity/book/978-3-319-11016-5

In my opinion some of the attributes that a coauthor of a manuscript should have are:

- To have the appropriate knowledge and the necessary experience of the main subject of the manuscript to be prepared.

- Good personal relationship with the author of the manuscript to be prepared.

- Good disposition to work hard in the preparation of the manuscript, particularly the specific part of it under he/she responsibility.

- To have the necessary time to carry out the task assigned by the author.

- To have previous experience as co-author or author in the preparation of other scientific manuscript in the same or similar field.

- To have a good knowledge of the language in which the manuscript is going to be prepared.

- To have a good writing skills of scientific papers.

- To have an open and responsible attitude in front of criticism made by the author respect the quality of the work done.

- Should be ready to discuss openly and without any fear his/her views with the author of the manuscript on any part of it that she/he considered necessary.

Nageswara Rad has put it very well - "Perfect understanding and on the same wavelength" .Yes, this is among the foremost requirement (though a perfect understanding on all aspects is "Utopian") and I also hold "professional ethics" and "proficient knowledge" for the researchers to qualify as my co-authors.  For PhD students and post-doctoral fellows, this is all given -so OK. For new colleagues, yes, we need to be in good synchronization. Absolutely.

Best wishes

Sundar

Dear Ankush Sachdeva - I fully agree that co-authors should contribute and should not just have the names added. Quite often you may see that heads of some research organizations have their names added as "co-authors", and this has been acknowledged frankly by the authors when I ask (as conference chair or session chair) about the "role" in conferences I have conducted. Especially, when I see papers with 7 or 8 names as authors, I ask the authors usually to explain the role of each authors, and I get this standard reply that the last names may be "Head", "Dean" or "Principal" of the college they work!

Best wishes

Sundar

Sundarapandian - the sentiment of 'perfect understanding' may well be commendable - but a bit 'utopian' I would argue. I often write with very good co-authors - but I doubt that we ever reach 'perfect understanding'. We just collaborate well and overcome hurdles as they present themselves. 

Dear Dean - I don't think I used the words "perfect understanding" anywhere, but instead I used "synchronization" or "same wavelength". For the final output to be passed on for submission, it is ideal that all co-authors are synchronized & in good agreement. I agree that "perfect understanding" is Utopian.

My PhD guide (late) Dr. Byrnes encouraged us to think differently, and welcomed if we had any disagreements on organization or different proofs etc. Finally, we settle on some middle-path and submit paper. This helped us in evolving the paper to a form ready for submission in a high-impact factor journal. To elaborate further, for a new result, I presented a proof using Krasnoselskii's condition (which uses Index Theory), and he wrote a proof using Lefschetz's fixed point theorem (LFT - Algebraic Geometry). As we had some disagreement on which proof to be used in the paper, he came up with a third proof - simpler than the previous ones and using only Poincare-Hopf theorem (three proofs to the same result).

[Sorry - the previous paragraph may require some mathematical concepts, but those who know Algebraic Topology, may appreciate it. I have given a link to the paper for the same reasons.]

Thanks for bringing some warm memories!

With best wishes

Sundar

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/1099-1239%28200101%2911:1%3C87::AID-RNC550%3E3.0.CO;2-J/abstract

After publishing few papers one can easily identify that many co-authors just for name sake are the authors in papers (without any significant contribution), and one can's also escape in giving their names due many solid reasons and matters; and these sleeping co-authors will never care to check, edit or else give any suggestion.

A co-author must be enthusiastic for any paper, must follow a time frame and must sincerely check, analyze, update and edit papers nicely along with giving good suggestions --- if even 3 co-authors of any paper are serious about its drafting and early acceptance - then paper gets defined and refined and when submitted in a team mode gets accepted.

IN recent years I selected few very active co-authors and published very good research as well as review papers and these all got accepted in 1-4 months in good journals ....becoz all co-authors contributed significantly. It decreased my work load also as a team leader. In this process I taught good writing skills also to my juniors and now they are also writing excellently.

Main author / any experienced author can make develop good skills also in co-authors.

But sleeping co-authors will never do --- since they know well that their name is going or will go...

Dear all, Coauthor is most important than author why because coauthor may be guide or important person who gives flavor to ideas of author which encourages and improves the quality of research in all dimensions. It is not the putting  coauthor under author I am making them aware in what sort of research quality publishing and what is the usefulness, what is the topic dealing under circumstances can be discussed and can be explained clearly and I can get valuable information further can be implemented in research way useful for further readers, researchers which is very useful of coauthors.....N V NAGENDRAM 

I don't agree with the assessment that "Coauthor is most important than author". Ideally, in a paper, all authors should play an equally important role, and must have added some substantial portions in the paper to get credit as one of the authors of the paper. Regarding the PhD guide being a co-author, he/she is most important than the author (student), etc., it is not mandatory that guide's name should be added to the author as "obligatory author". There is already an active  discussion going on in Research Gate about this. If the contribution is not substantial, we can thank people including guide, dean, principal or any (project) supervisor in the "Acknowledgements" section of the paper.

Have a great day!

With best wishes

Sundar

Sundarapandian,

We are both in agreement. I should have read your last email closer. You yourself identify that the concept of 'perfect understanding' is Utopian. I didn't pick that up - so goes to show that great minds think alike. No need to apologise for the mathematical illustration - and very glad that you had a positive relationship with your supervisor. Sounds a shame that he/she is no longer with us. 

For an effective research contribution:

It is important that co-authors should possess similar levels of intellect and willingness to truly contribute in the research work. Compatibility factor no doubt is must, but the other qualities that are desirable in a co-author include genuine interest in the area, enthusiasm, achievement-oriented, synergistic approach to accept and contribute in further advancement of the work. Research paper writing becomes quite an enjoyable task, if the team members complement and enrich each others with their learning and expertise. 

One who is along with you throughout the make of publication and is equally happy when it gets through

Co authors should have virtues in place as they evolve to become AUTHORS and while handling others as co-authors.

"If , You are not the only author. Is your research getting you where you want to be? Where you need to be? Indeed, you have many co-authors. what are the interests of your co-authors? Are their interests aligned with your interests?"

Blue Collar Professor, http://shawnhumphrey.com/about/