RE: Drafts -- some people not clear on the concept...

Subject: RE: Drafts -- some people not clear on the concept...
From: Steven Oppenheimer <writer -at- writemaster -dot- com>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Mon, 23 Sep 2002 10:24:28 -0700


My sources of complaint are three-fold:

1. Jobs where a boss or editor grabs a draft off a desk, or off the network drive, before I've told them it's ready -- and then they go ballistic, when in fact they are looking at writing in such a rough stage that I was not ready to show it to anyone. Their behavior is rude, impulsive, and just plain dumb. Sure, it may be their "right", but what is to be gained? It makes a lot more sense if they wait until the employee says, "Hey, boss, now I have something ready to show you."

2. A good boss -- my definition, of course -- does not mind looking at a very rough, crude, even sloppy first draft. The purpose -- and the *ONLY* purpose, at such an early stage stage -- is to make sure that the writer is not, in some sense, headed down the wrong path on the project. A capable reader, and a capable manager, can read for the general direction or sense of things when necessary, as well as reading for details and fine points when appropriate (generally at a later stage of a project).

3. An inability to prioritize flaws in a draft, and -- a closely related problem -- an inability to see the forest for the trees.

My writing all this is partly motivated by a recent experience, and maybe a concrete example will help make my point of view clear. About six months ago I wrote a business plan for a company being started by some people who are not very experienced in business. I took their rough ideas and organized them, provided structure, a solid outline, raised a host of issues they had not even thought to ask -- issues that will surely be raised by potential investors -- and then provided plausible working answers to these same questions for these businessmen to review and edit. I did background research on their competitors (which they should have done in the first place), and addressed those issues as well. I put a lot of work into this thing, and gave them a very strong starting point.
In short, I had taken their half-baked, disorganized thoughts about their business, and I provided a terrific FIRST DRAFT of the document that would serve as an excellent foundation for laters drafts, and for planning the running of the business itself. Then one of the businessmen went ballistic because I has misspelled his name, and also because a single technical number (an important number, but still one single number) in the document was mistaken -- both trivial errors, easily corrected with a word processor.
And, I am not at all sure that these errors were mine; I have yet to review my tape recording of the original meeting, for all I know they may have provided me with the wrong information in the first place. But even if the errors were mine, they were trivial and easily corrected. This is what I mean by nit-pickers. I don't mind that they found the errors, but I frankly do mind that they got upset over them. And as for all the added value I put into their plan, that they missed entirely. I have no patience for clients like this. Then again, these guys were pretty much amateurs, and my main mistake was not seeing that in the first place, and so agreeing to work for them. So far their business has gone nowhere, and I suspect that that is where it willl remain.

In any event, I'm always open to constructive feedback and corrections on my work. But I do appreciate it when the merits of my work are acknowledged and appreciated alongside the necessary and inevitable corrections. I am very skilled at organizing and structuring ideas in an orderly way, accessible way. As for the inevitable errors, these details are so easy to correct with word processors -- that's what technical reviews are for -- I see no reason for readers to get upset over them.

Hope this clears things up a bit.

Steven Oppenheimer
Marketing and Technical Writing
www.writemaster.com
writer -at- writemaster -dot- com



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