SUMMARY: Online Help TW teams at MS

[David Goldfayl <davidgoldfayl -at- PMSC -dot- COM>]

Techwhirlers,

Last week I posted a request to the list regarding the size of  TW teams used by
MS.

I was asked why I wanted to know this info. It has nothing in particular to do
with MS. The reason was so that I could present a numerical comparison between
other TW teams used on  packages I know local Proj Mans etc will be aware of. I
am very interested in the human 'resources' dedicated to creating online help
from 'go-to-whoa' to make a case for ongoing (and the increasing need for)
resource allocation.

Thanks for the responses I received. Not a lot in terms of quantity, but more
than made up for by their quality. In particular, thanks to: Mary Deaton, Lydia
Wong and David W. Locke.

===========================

Mary Deaton wrote:

Office has maybe 5-10 writers per product (Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint),
about half that many editors, at least one designer for each product, a
print production specialist, and an entire team who manages the database
used for writing, and so on. Writes do NOT do the Help coding. They just
write. Oh, and the indexers. For the first AnswerWizard the indexing team
was 5-8 people.

Last time I worked with the Office team was for Office 95 and I know user ed
had close to 100 people. It is doubtless larger now. Probably 60% or more of
the people are contractors.

A smaller product, like Greetings Workshop, might have 4-5 people on the
docs team with at least one editor, a graphics person, and maybe a technical
specialist.

In a very small product, like mouse, you might have two people writing, an
editor, a shared designer.

Only large products like Office would differentiate between print and online
writers. Most writers move around between mediums.

User analysis is done by people outside user ed--marketing and usability.
Program management also plays a role there. There is not usability on every
set of docs, so it would not be accurate to assign a headcount to that.

===========================

Lydia Wong wrote:

(snip)
I attended the WinWriters conference in February, and teams from Intuit did
presentations. I believe they said that the team that documents Quicken and
Quick Books has about 9 people on it, including editors, a multimedia
person, and perhaps a QA person? Sorry I don't remember more specifics.

Also, to give you more of an idea about their work, they have a user's guide
(book) and online help system that are pretty much completely separate.
Finally, they have a tools person who I think works with several teams
there.

===========================

David W. Locke wrote:

Steve McConnell in Rapid Development says that 20% of development is an
appropriate level of staffing for training-doc department. There is no
separate doc department at MS. This figure is for all learning product
components of the document set.

Another CS thought leader, Casper Jones says 4 hours per function point.

MS has in the past used a very deliberate content distribution strategy to
foster customer relationships and expertise.
(snip)

===========================


As has always been my own experience, excellent and well informed info shared
within the list.

Thanks again.

Cheers
David Goldfayl


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