Planning of documentation

Subject: Planning of documentation
From: Joanne Wittenbrook <jwittenbrook -at- ameritech -dot- net>
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Date: Thu, 8 Mar 2007 11:39:50 -0800 (PST)

>Do we know if the majority of us participate in real planning of
>customerdocumentation?

I have. Most companies of significant size use basic project management practices. In my last big project I was creating documentation right along with development, and of course there was a ton of changing as screenshots and such changed. I was in on meetings with the developers as we discussed requirements and interface changes.

Of course there was a big push when the product was finally launched to get all the stuff up to date and ready to distribute. I had to consider that there was a help desk to be trained on the software and a sales force to be trained on selling points. End-user documentation also had to pass through the Advertising group to make sure we followed Corporate guidelines for appearance and identity. All this had to happen before a release.

I suspect some of the backward cycles of creating documentation is why manuals have gotten a pretty bad reputation in the general public. There are a lot of bad ones.
Joanne

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