[no subject]

["Larry Kunz ((919) 254-6395)" <ldkunz -at- VNET -dot- IBM -dot- COM>]

How many of you caught Rick Chandler's talk during the Trends
Forum at the STC Annual Conference last month?  (He was the guy
who pulled three people out of the audience and had them make
paper airplanes.)

At the risk of oversimplifying, his thesis was that we shouldn't
tell people how to use products.  We should tell them how the
products can meet their objectives and let them figure out how to
use the products for themselves.  Our proper role as technical
communicators is to convey understanding, not instructions.

I was reminded of this when Elna Tymes was quoted earlier this
week as having said:

> Companies who understand that they sell information are ones who work
> closely with customers, who pay attention to how products are used and
> what business problems they solve.  The customers of these companies buy
> products and services based on how well a particular set of problems can
> be solved - and it's the information that tells them how to solve the
> problems, not the things.

Rick says that companies sell products, and good technical
communicators inform, rather than instructing, the consumers of
the products.  Elna seems to go even farther, saying that the
best companies don't even sell products.  They sell information --
information directed at meeting the consumers' objectives or
solving their problems.

What do you all think?

Larry Kunz
STC Assistant to the President for Professional Development
ldkunz -at- vnet -dot- ibm -dot- com
http://www.networking.ibm.com/eNetwork

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