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RE: Striving To Increase The Page Count Was: Estimation of the number of pages...
Subject:RE: Striving To Increase The Page Count Was: Estimation of the number of pages... From:"Sherry Michaels" <sherry -dot- michaels -at- docntrain -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Mon, 3 Jan 2005 08:59:53 -0700
I've been watching this thread with interest, and I agree with Sharon.
As early as possible, you have to have an idea of page count for estimation
purposes. I've never been in an environment, in all my years of consulting,
where page count was a measure of productivity, although I have heard rumors
of it. I have seen estimation and time clash unbelievably, usually because
funding sources of the project do not have any idea of what it takes to
produce high quality documentation. In our own business, we do ask project
team members to estimate their own portions of the project, and I do find
that many technical communicators have a great deal of difficulty with
trying to do so. We eventually get to an appropriate estimate that allows
developers to focus on getting a high quality result out, while the funding
stakeholders give us the space to work. Out of hundreds of projects done for
many, many clients, if we are writing documents, we estimate page count. We
also, estimate benchmarks for review and final delivery dates.
It does seem as if productivity and estimation are getting mixed in this
thread, a sort of apples and oranges mix. I think that if it's actually
happening, increasing the page count to "appear productive," is a short
sighted approach to the work. It's going to bite someone in the butt in the
long run. That has nothing to do with giving a decent estimate for project
management purposes, in fact, it's counter-productive at the maximum.
It may be interesting to note that we have specifically asked our clients
(over and over again) to "define quality," in their terms. The same answer
comes up every time: "a useable product, on time, at or under budget." We
always have started with a rough estimate of page counts to determine what
the time and budget elements would be. The quality element is self-imposed
to assure usability.
Ideally, of course, in good project management you want to pull the
estimate, timing, quality, and cost elements together to end with what
stakeholders (including the developers) would all call success.
Sherry
Sherry Michaels
Michaels & Associates, LLC
11639 E. Wethersfield Rd.
Scottsdale, AZ 85259
480-614-8440 Local
877-614-8440 Toll free
480-614-2775 FAX
www.docntrain.com
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