Re: dispensing with documentation reviews

Subject: Re: dispensing with documentation reviews
From: Dick Margulis <margulisd -at- comcast -dot- net>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Fri, 28 May 2004 09:05:47 -0400




Ann Pai wrote:



What are my options for appropriate responses? Am I wrong, or unrealistic,
to take a hard line on this? I've expressed my discomfort with unreviewed
documents going out the door. I also plan to review our standard licensing
agreement ASAP to make sure we disclaim the documentation as an express
warranty.



Well, here's a thought:

Suggest to your management that you understand the need to keep costs down in these competitive times, yada yada yada. Then propose that RIGHT NOW the customer support department starts to collect baseline statistics for the number of support calls that can be traced to incorrect, incomplete, or poorly organized user documentation, for existing products. Suggest that this statistic be tracked over time as new products are released under the new regime. Obviously, to be valid, the raw number of calls has to be calibrated against the running total of installed seats for each product and some factor for how long each user has been using it (new users will call more regardless of doc quality). But if you can get the math right, you can use this report to show the cost of eliminating doc reviews and then management can choose one option or the other based on the results.


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References:
dispensing with documentation reviews: From: Ann Pai

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