Features

The Technical Communicator’s Machine

By Daniel Maddux | Member

The machine

In a previous article (“Mythbusting ‘Just Let the Engineer Write It!’” in the February 2011 Intercom), I explained how technical communicators use their training to achieve results that subject matter experts alone just can't produce. An engineer may use his or her technical training to make sure a mechanical machine runs correctly. Technical communicators use their training with writing and organizing technical information to produce greater efficiency, more safety, and fewer mistakes. The “machine” we use turns complex data into productivity.

So, then, the question remains, how does the technical communicator build and operate this machine? What processes are we trained in to take unusable chunks of information and turn them into documents that really help people? Let's look at how our machine is put together.

The Cover: Organizing the Project

An Aberdeen group report in the May 2007 issue of Intercom showed that involving technical communicators in the early stages of a project correlated with a 92 percent success rate in meeting companies' goals. Why does getting technical communicators involved early improve projects' success rates so much? Because we know what kind of “cover” the machine needs.

The guts of a machine may be great, but no one will be able to use it unless it has a good cover or casing that both protects the internal mechanisms from danger and keeps those using the machine from being injured.

Likewise, technical communicators are trained in how to protect the quality of the documentation with which they're working. We know what methods of document review and storage help users find and use the right documentation. We protect users by helping to ensure that the documents are not just well written, but also stored and conveyed in a manner that keeps the information from being misunderstood. This kind of work has to be done up front.

The Motor: Putting Together the Documents

Without a good motor, a machine isn't going to run—not at all, for anyone. As technical communicators, we know how to make sure that our machine has a good motor. Let me share a story that makes this clear.

The big energy company's accounting department had a problem. Van had been working there as a senior accountant for decades, and he had always done a good job. The problem was, Van was getting ready to retire, and no one else knew how to perform the tasks that he completed each month. What made matters worse was that when Van wrote up procedures to explain what he did, they came out as dense masses of prose that even the other high-level accountants couldn't decipher. The procedures he wrote didn't function as a machine that others could use to learn what Van did. They came out as broken, unusable pieces and parts.

So what was the solution? To get some help from a technical communicator.

A brand-new, entry-level technical writer who had been trained in writing and organizing technical information (me) was assigned to make the procedures understandable to the other accountants. How? By using his extensive knowledge of accounting? No! (I had none, and I would not have been nearly as skilled in that area as the resident experts, regardless.) Rather, he completed the documentation by using his training as a technical communicator to find the flow of the information, rewrite it in a usable way, and ask questions when gaps appeared in the information flow. Very quickly, high-quality procedures took shape and were approved. This example further illustrates that if a technical communicator is properly trained, she or he will be able to write across industries.

Without the expertise of a technical communicator, the “motor” in these procedures was broken.

The Wiring: Making Sure It's All Right

But even if you've organized the project correctly and put together the drafts of the documents, there's still more that you must do. Just as with a machine that needs good wiring in order for signals and energy to move throughout it, documents need good “wiring” to make sure that the right signals go in the right places and that the usability of the documents won't “short circuit.”

How does the wiring installation and inspection take place? First, a technical communicator knows how to put documents through reviews with subject matter experts in order to ensure that all of the applicable information is included and that the information included is correct. When appropriate, a technical communicator tests the documentation to make sure it actually helps users do their jobs.

And let's not forget the proofreading, the final once-over, and the tweaking that ensures that the documentation is as perfect as it can be. A trained technical communicator knows how to do this and how to do it quickly. The little errors that tend to crop up in a document, if not eventually removed, create static in the user's mind. The static, if it builds up enough, tends to distract users from the important information in the document. Trying to use a document that has typos is like trying to enjoy a Beethoven sonata while the pianist keeps playing the wrong keys on the keyboard. You lose focus on the message and begin to notice the errors.

The Switch: Setting the Users Loose

When all of the parts of the machine have been put together, all that remains is to flip the switch and turn it on. The users begin to apply the information to do their jobs. After that, it's just a matter of maintaining and/or upgrading the machine/documentation. But that's information for a future article.

I hope that you've learned something useful and that you'll be able to use the concept of a technical communicator's machine to prove your worth to employers and clients.

Daniel Maddux (dmaddux@elitedocumentation.com) owns Elite Documentation Incorporated (www.elitedocumentation.com), a technical writing company based in Houston, TX. Aside from researching how technical communicators can best meet their clients' needs, Daniel enjoys his volunteer work and martial arts training.