Re: Understanding v. instruction

[Elna Tymes <etymes -at- LTS -dot- COM>]

Jim -
> >
> I think that "inform, rather than instructing" is a false distinction:
> is not instruction a form of information? I think that for many
> companies, information that solves customer problems  _is_ the product.
> Companies that do this well will be very successful in the biggest
> growth industry of our time.
>
> I don't think that's what Elna is talking about, though, as her
> subsequent post confirms. She is talking about companies that sell
> solutions in the form of products, be they software or machinery. An
> important component of those solutions is explaining how to use the
> product to solve the problem. These explanations can take many forms:
> conceptual, procedural, descriptive, or tutorial. To privilege any of
> these forms without knowing the situation in detail is asking for
> trouble.

Not exactly.  When companies make products and sell them, they generally
think that the product is what they're selling.  Nope. The product is a
symbol for all or part of the solution to their problem, and the
information associated with the product is what actually sells the
product and tells the user how to solve the problem.  My concern for
years has been why companies spend so much money on the product and so
little attention to the information.

The information describes the problem so that the user (or purchaser)
can recognize it as something he either has experienced, or may have to
experience.  The information sometimes also describes the consequences
of that problem.  The information then also describes how the product
(or whatever form the solution comes in) will solve or help solve the
problem.  Other information (and this is what tech writers have done for
decades) shows/teaches the user how to use the product to solve the
problem.

All of the above is information, and is vital to the sale of a product.
So why not pay more attention to how it does the jobs information is
supposed to do?

Think, for instance, of a rubber washer, the kind you buy at the
hardware store to repair a faucet or a garden hose connection. Taken
outside the context of a problem statement, few of us would know what it
is or how to use it. Some might think it was an odd sort of hand
decoration, much the way some kids think pitted olives are for sticking
on the ends of your fingers and eating by putting your fingers in your
mouth.  So by itself, without information, the product (washer) is
useless.

However, most of us have learned by example that faucets and hose
connections have washers in them.  Sometimes washers come in little
packages with pictures describing where to put a washer.  A few of us
have household repair books that show/tell how to repair a leaking
faucet or hose connection, and describe a washer as part of the
solution. Some of us have friends or family to tell us what kind of
washer to buy to fix the problem.

The point is that the user (you) has a problem (a leaking faucet or hose
connection), and in problem-solving mode is looking for information.  If
the user already knows how faucets and hose connections work, he have
some of the information; otherwise he'll try to figure out what to do.
The explanation of what to do can come from a variety of sources, but it
too is information.  So if he goes into the hardware store and discovers
that there are many sizes and kinds of washers, he still has to find out
what kind he needs.  And that answer is still more information.  After
he selects the washer he wants and goes to fix the problem, he may need
even more information to show/tell him how to take the faucet apart and
replace the worn washer, then reassemble it all.  And all of that is
information.

So clearly the information is more important than the product, right?
In this case, the manufacturer is assuming that most of the information
on where and how washers are used, and what kind is appropriate, is
available elsewhere - when was the last time you saw a user's manual
with a rubber washer? Some hardware stores address this lack of
information by posting helpful charts (more information).  But this is
clearly an example of a manufacturer spending more attention on product
than on information.

I think I'll stop now. You get the picture.

Elna Tymes
Los Trancos Systems

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