TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
You might want to start to resolve this situation by defining what QA can do
in testing a help system. My QA folks (who are about the best in the biz),
may make suggestions as to style or content, but they know that part of the
project is my area to determine. What they do for me is to make sure the
topics appear when they are supposed to, check links and graphics, and look
for holes that I might have missed, and identify errors in content. They
don't tell me how to write or structure it, they do like asking how I do
this, though, and that's cool with me.
In other gigs, I have had to put together a "checklist" to remind the
reviewers what they are and are not responsible for. I attempt to couch it
terms of making their lives easier... And that seems to work better than a
defensive "stay out of my area" approach that I have seen other folks take
(and not just writers...programmers, project managers and QA folks can be
just as territorial as we are.)
As heavy-handed and inappropriate as the tactics may be, be grateful that
they care enough to even look at it, many shops don't have that luxury.
I've found it best to address the tactics first... There are too many
unknown variables in the situation, to risk attacking agendas, roles or the
power structure. Make it a win-win by showing that it's a better use of
their resources to QA the system, and less effective when they begin QA'ing
content.
HTH
Connie P. Giordano
Senior Technical Writer
Advisor Technology Services
A Fidelity Investments Company
704-330-2069 (w)
704-330-2350 (f)
704-957-8450 (c)
"You can't build a reputation on what you are going to do." - Henry Ford
-----Original Message-----
From: Peruzzi, Carol [mailto:cperuzzi -at- fnis -dot- com]
Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2003 4:31 PM
To: TECHWR-L
Subject: Need feedback
I have been the sole technical writer for a company of about 19 programmers
and, originally, no qc department. Over the last year they have hired 6 qc
people and a qc manager.
Now, whenever they qc a new executable in our suite, they also qc the help,
which I think is a good thing. However, now they have started changing my
sentences. Not saying that the content is wrong, just changing the order of
my sentences, or the sentence structure.
Additionally, they are telling ME where I should put topics in my manuals
and my on-line help. I have 26 on-line help projects and 24 manuals. It's
not that easy to move a topic from one manual to another when in the other
24 manuals we may reference the original manual in which it appeared.
Finally, they will copy an entire two or three pages of the manual or
on-line help, make changes to it, and email it to me without marking the
changes. There may only be one or two words that they want changed and I'm
supposed to read through it, word by word, and find them. Or, they tell me,
just insert the new one into the online help and the manual. Yes, right, and
redo all of the formatting, yada yada.
My question is, is this normal for a qc department to do this? Writing, to
me, is highly subjective and just because you don't like the way I phrased
something, doesn't mean it is wrong.
I feel they should only make changes if some is incorrect, misleading or
confusing. It has gotten kind of heavy handed. I really need some feedback
on this..I'm going to schedule a meeting with QC and I need to know what the
norm is, if there is one.
Carol S. Peruzzi
Paralegal/Technical Writer
Eastern Software Corporation
50 S. Water Avenue
Sharon, PA 16146
Phone: 724-981-5087
Fax: 724-981-5092
www.easternsoftware.com
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Order RoboHelp X3 and receive a $100 mail-in rebate, plus FREE
RoboScreenCapture, WebHelp Merge Module and iMarkupSoftware, for a total
giveaway value of $473! Order here: http://www.ehelp.com/techwr-l
Help celebrate TECHWR-L's 10th Anniversary starting this month!
Check out the contests at http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/special/contests/
Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday TECHWR-L....
---
You are currently subscribed to techwr-l as:
archive -at- raycomm -dot- com
To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-techwr-l-obscured -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
Send administrative questions to ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com -dot- Visit http://www.raycomm.com/techwhirl/ for more resources and info.
