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I've taken to scheduling a weekly meeting with each developer. We sit down
for 15-30 minutes, and I ask them questions about their areas of expertise.
At first they didn't want to commit to these meetings, but I got the project
manager in my corner, and now no one seems to mind. My trick is to keep the
meetings short and bring gifts of coffee, soda, cookies, etc.
Much luck, I know how it feels.
-----Original Message-----
Subject: Expectations too high?
Im not entirely new to technical writing but landed in a rather unique
situation, Im supposed to write all the help files, user manuals, training
docs for 5 x custom developed software programs, but Im sitting in a office
on the other side of the building. I don't get included in any of the
project meetings, and have no idea when the latest releases takes place or
what is in them.
The developers think I have to write
the manuals out of my own knowledge, on my own steam, but I don't know the
products. Anyone else facing the same situation?
So what I did (my first project was to do a technical installation manual)
was to gather info that was done previously by the developers, and combine
these. I know what a manual should look like, so I formated the
information. Then I went around gathering more info, and presented it to
the 7 x developers on that specific project. The tore the whole doc to
pieces, and one of them then sat and documented the correct info.
Well, all I can say, is I got a document out of them in the end.
What is the correct way this should work, how do you guys get the product
information?
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