Re: Who dreams up these things?

[Mike Stockman <stockman -at- jagunet -dot- com>]

On 09/28/1999 8:32 AM, David Farbey (David -dot- Farbey -at- lazysoft -dot- com) wrote:

>But process models on their own cannot replace content.

This is a powerful statement that seems so obvious, and yet I feel like 
renting some billboard space and posting that statement outside the 
offices of several of my clients of recent memory.

While I was at one site, they were aware that there were problems with 
the documentation, but insisted that a new process was all they needed. 
We had writers there who were dutifully copying down exactly what the 
engineers were telling them without any more understanding than the end 
users for whom they're supposedly writing. You can't explain something 
well unless you understand it better than your audience.

My suggestions that we all needed to learn more about the technology 
weren't met with dismissal; they were met with responses such as "well, 
that would be nice if we had more time." There was really no priority 
placed on making sure the writers learned and understood the subject.

How do you respond to something like that? My response was to make sure 
my contributions were as technically accurate and clearly explained as I 
could make them, but that didn't solve the overall problem.

----->Mike

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