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----- Original Message -----
From: "Tony Markos" <ajmarkos -at- yahoo -dot- com>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com>
Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 2004 10:48 AM
Subject: Enchanted Development Organizations Was: Re: Expectations too high?
>
> Question out of curiosity:
>
> If you are a Tech Writer who attends developer
> meetings, do you feel it is worth your time?
Depends. I'm tolerant of the inevitable time spent on discussions not
directly related to my work, because there's no fixed price I could put on
the value, to me, of the occasional white board diagrams, and the chance to
get on the dev team agenda with documentation concerns. It is worth as much
time as it takes.
Also, meetings are like the proverbial watering hole -- everyone gathers
there. My being there enhances my proj cred. Over time, I acquire cachet --
this amounts to more recognition and trust from the SMEs, which leads to far
fewers off-handed answers when I query them.
The down side is that developers sometimes don't want to hear about
documentation--they've got other pressing discussions on their minds. They
don't always appreciate my presence, and I've come out of these meetings
feeling a lot less positive about the idea that I belong there, that's for
sure too, but it isn't a key factor. As the documentation person, I can
step way back, and ask for summaries and overviews that other team members
also glad to get (esp any newer ones). It may be cold and gusty sometimes,
but I've got a real high collar :-)
Ned Bedinger
Ed Wordsmith Technical Communications
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