RE: Uncooperative SMEs

[Rose -dot- Wilcox -at- pinnaclewest -dot- com]

Dear t,
<<Does anyone else out there in tech writer land deal with a similar environment?>>

I went through the same thing here about 2 years ago.  The thing that really killed me about that is that I had dealt with many, many environments where the SMEs were uncooperative.  Generally, my hard work, intelligence, and good attitude (and yes, checked considerable ego at the door) gradually has won around any group of SMEs to my side.  I would start out with resistence but in the end have the SMEs writing unsolicited glowing letters of appreciation to my boss. Not so here.

Here I was hired to write System Documentation, which included reading code and documenting it.  In order to complete the documents I needed around 15 minutes to 60 minutes of SME time per document.  The main thing was "what is the business function of this application?" along with sometimes needing answers to missing/confusing pieces of code.  

A few of the SMEs were by nature cooperative.  Those documents got finished.  The remaining SMEs could not be budged, and I tried every weapon in my considerable arsenal before admitting defeat.  I then escalated, but management, who was willing to pay me for *days* of non-productive time, was not willing to risk angering the SMEs by asking them for 15 minutes to 60 minutes of *their* time.  Due to this stalemate, the documents did not get finished, and the plan of having a tech writer to write the bulk of the System Documentation was judged a failure.

However, I was still well liked enough to be sent to another part of the company and kept busy for another several months, creating all kinds of docs for all kinds of other departments. This fall I was brought back to become this groups Requirements writer.  So I guess, even though the System Documentation was judged a failure, I was not.

So I would say, politically, when you are in a CYA environment, take a clue, and CYA.  :-)

Since I came back, things have changed.  The SME culture, which remains pretty doc-resistant, is being pressured by new management, users, and a new QA department.  Inroads are being made through no doings of my own, but still, I take advantage of them.  

Survive the best you can, and eventually something will change.  Either you will go mad and run screaming into the night  (not recommended), the environment itself will change due to management changes and/or going out of business (mixed bag), or the economy will pick up again and you will have job options to pick from!!!!  

<<
 If so, 
how do you stay productive, get the information you need, get reviews done 
in a timely fashion, and so forth? 
>>

I was not able to stay productive.  However, I did use my time wisely in self development, along with CYA as needed.
I did not get the information I  needed.  If I were to do anything differently than I did, I would  walk around the floor more and chit chat with people more. (In my defense, walking around the floor was depressing as developers were usually not in and when they were, they were heads down and wouldn't talk to me anyway, but still, making a bit more of an effort might've wrested a few other pieces of info out of them.)  

For the record, I used bribes (donuts), changed interviewing/researching tactics to match individual SME styles(the ones who  like written questions got them, the ones that liked phone interviews got that, etc.), did regular walkarounds on the floor just to say hi, insisted on going to lunch even though I was routinely left off the lunch list, talked to  management and asked advice on the problem, talked to management and *gave* advice on the problem, left phone messages/emails/stickies on the desks as well as walking around, etc.

Another tactic was to get information from other people in the company who could answer some of the  questions:  sometimes other developers who had some familiarity with the code in question or with BSAs who had familiarity with the functionality intended by the code.  However, the BSAs were even busier than the developers (although generally more approachable) and management frowned on my creative solution in this instance.

I did not get many reviews done, let alone get them in a timely fashion.  The developers most likely to give reviews and answer questions were contractors.

The other thing that I learned in retrospect is not to blame myself for the situation.  When I posted the about the sitch on Techwr-l I got a lot of elementary "how to get along with SMEs" advice that I have known for years (I am a 19-year vet of this game) and some blame that I had done something wrong.  Expect that some of the writers who are out there will assume it is your fault.  In some instances, it may be the writers fault, but in others there really exist very resistant pockets of SMEs out there.  And it has even happened that the same management that was willing to pay good money for a writer's time was NOT willing to support the bottom line by insisting on SME reviews and/or time answering  questions.
For some reason, they respect my skills here and keep me employed, so in retrospect, I did something right, even though individual products did not come out the way I would've wanted.

In short, my suggestions:
Keep doing what you are doing in cajoling, etc.  
Cover Your Behind.
When not productive, learn new skills.


Rose A. Wilcox
CHQ, 17th Floor, 034
Tranz1 QA/Documentation
602-250-2435
Rose -dot- Wilcox -at- PinnacleWest -dot- com

Faith is the bird that sings when the dawn is still dark.

--Rabindranath Tagore



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