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Subject:In the Trenches, A Bit of Venting From:unclebonsai -at- hotmail -dot- com To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 13 Nov 2002 10:22:20 -0700
I am starting my second month in a really wonderful contract position. I
love the work and working with developers who think technical writers are
valuable team members. My one rough spot is the other technical writer
(on-staff) who, well, doesn't seem to want to write.
The company I work for hasn't had user documentation revised in over 4
years. Revisions consisted of faxed "Tech Notes" to users. (This is for a
narrow-niche office management application.) Since I've been here, I've
written ten FAQ documents that the Support Group uses daily, documented
six features of the software (over 60 pages of material), and edited three
large training lessons. The staff writer, let's call him Mr. MFA, has
written ten pages in the past three months. He's never written technical
material before, but has experience in writing financial reports and
corporate investment documents for PR/Advertising.
There is a lot of work that needs to be done, since there is really no
existing documentation, and also because the application is used in a
federally regulated environment. My attitude is to write the documentation
NOW and worry about structure, workflow, etc. as it comes up. (Note--I am
speaking of the structure and workflow of the documentation PROCESS, not
of the documentation itself.) Instead, Mr. MFA has spent the past week
searching company servers for all the documentation available and proposes
spending two weeks reviewing the documentation for its appropriateness for
the application. I should mention that the application can be considered
new in that it is a complete rewrite of the application, features and
interface. The older documentation I have seen doesn't really apply. And,
I think our time would be better spent writing than meeting about writing.
While I have been a technical writer for a number of years, I haven't
really been in this position before--defending my decision to document
instead of wool-gathering. Have others been in this position? What advice
can you give me? The job market is very tight right now, I love where I
work. And I don't want to make any mistakes that might cause my contract
to not be renewed. Your advice is appreciated.
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