Managing Your Doc Projects, by J. Hackos

[Emily Skarzenski <71220 -dot- 341 -at- COMPUSERVE -dot- COM>]

Stuart Burnfield <slb -at- FS -dot- COM -dot- AU> asked the following about _Managing Your
Documentation Projects_, by Joann Hackos:

>>>Is this the right book for me? I'm mainly interested in documentation and
not 'instructional design'. I've heard good things about JoAnn's course,
but I really want your thoughts on the book. <<<

Yes, yes, yes. I recommend this book wholeheartedly. It contains all kinds of
*EXCELLENT* information on how to organize and work through a doc project from
start to finish. (And it doesn't deal with instructional design, specifically,
but with managing *any* documentation project.)

She also deals with the concept of "levels" of a documentation organization, and
how you can help guide your organization from being a Level 1 organization
(where documentation is always an ad hoc project, getting done any which way it
can) to Level 5 (publications nirvana, where things flow perfectly in time and
space and all tech writers smile). This is both comforting (you realize you're
not the only one stuck in a situation that's virtually oblivious to the needs of
tech writers) and very helpful, since she gives practical instructions on how to
change this -- both in your own work and in the attitude/support/resouces you
can elicit from your company.

This book contains pearls of wisdom acquired through decades of managing
projects and is *well* worth the  $40 pricetag. I've never seen so much
intelligent advice on this subject in one place. Buy it, read it, absorb it!

Emily Skarzenski
ICS Deloitte - Chadds Ford, PA
71220 -dot- 341 -at- compuserve -dot- com