RE: What do you do when you don't have anyone with the time to review and edit your docs

["McLauchlan, Kevin" <Kevin -dot- McLauchlan -at- safenet-inc -dot- com>]

Wade Courtney wondered:

> I've just recently finished a user guide. I've sent it out 
> for review, and I
> have reviewed and edited it many times myself, but I am at a 
> point where I
> can no longer spot my mistakes. What do you do when there is 
> no one to read
> your stuff, and they still want to push out the docs anyway 
> without a proper
> review.
> 
> I feel (sorry David) that they are going to come back to me 
> and nail me for
> mistakes, even though they know that there wasn't a proper 
> review. I have
> worked for employers in the past that expected perfection. I 
> realize that
> this concept is not realistic, but it's still very prominent.

What kind of products do you document?

Does that same company not test/review the hardware or software 
before it gets kicked out the door? 

They don't have QA?

Around here, hardware gets beat up by everybody (developers, 
testers, me..., QA) before it ever gets released.  
Software gets unit-tested by developers and in peer-review, 
gets validated by the Engineering-Test group, gets used and 
abused by me as I document it, and then gets verified by QA 
as the last step before General Availability release.

My docs get reviewed by Eng-Test and at least spot-checked 
by QA.  After release, the Sales-Eng and Customer Support 
groups make time to beat the crud out of it... which at least 
shows me places to improve for next time.   :-)

All components get additional sets of eyes on them if we 
have a Beta - which we usually do. 

If your company doesn't care about the quality of the docs, 
then why are they giving you grief about errors and omissions?
If they do care, then why aren't they subjecting it to 
independent review just like any other component of a 
product offering?  

I'm not berating you, here, I'm suggesting a line to take 
if your next performance review seems to be less than 
stellar ('cuz, at that point, what have you got to lose, 
and they might start respecting you if you rear up on 
your hind legs and properly question their commitment to 
giving customers well-tested product, the way the good 
companies do). 

 - Kevin   (who talks a good game, anyway...)


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