Tag Archives: strategy

Webinar: Towards an Agile authoring methodology – learning from Lean

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Agile programming has grown in popularity and it has led to new challenges for those involved in providing user assistance for those applications. So is it time for technical authors to develop an equivalent method for developing content for these projects? Is it time to develop an “Agile authoring” methodology? Also, if we want to move away from a hand-crafted approach to developing content and towards a more engineering-like approach, what can we learn from the latest techniques being applied in manufacturing?

Such a method needs to complement Agile programming, but it may be a mistake to take Agile programming as the starting point for developing it. The developers of Agile drew upon the principles of Lean manufacturing, and perhaps technical authors should do the same.

In this webinar, we will explain how the principles of Lean manufacturing can be applied to developing and managing content. It’s a way of writing that focuses on maximizing the value to the user and minimizing waste. It involves measuring the processes and value of what has been delivered so that iterative improvements can be made over time.

This webinar will be hosted by the Society for Technical Communication.

Promo code: WS030513

Register for Towards an Agile Authoring Methodology – Learning From Lean

New design models for providing end user Help

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Ray Gallon has recently completed a series of webinars looking at new models for providing end user Help (A Cognitive Design for User Assistance).

In the third webinar, Ray looked at how people learn today and he suggested a new approach for the future. He used The Common European Framework of Reference for Language‘s description of people’s levels of competences to outline the different ways organisations help people to learn.
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Webinar: Planning User Documentation When You Are a Startup Business

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In conjunction with The Society for Technical Communication, we’ll be presenting the webinar Planning User Documentation When You Are a Startup Business on Tuesday, 19th February.

In this presentation, we’ll look at how to plan a user documentation project when you’re working for a startup technology company. Working in this environment gives you the opportunity to work “from a clean sheet,” but it also has its own challenges of working in a dynamic and rapidly changing environment.
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Webinar – Planning user documentation when you’re a startup business

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We’re currently working on 40 minute webinar on:

  • Planning user documentation when you’re a startup business

If you have any questions on this topic, you can email these to us prior to the event. We’ll do our best to make sure we address them in the webinar.

Send us an email with your question

Details on the date for this webinar will be published in the Events section of the Cherryleaf Web site.

 

How can you tell if it’s only beginners reading your user guides and online Help?

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One way of checking to see if only new users are using the technical documentation for a product is to check if there a correlation between the number of users reading the user documentation and the sales of the product.

For example, if the product is following the classic “Bell curve”, and users only need help at a certain moment in time, then the number of users should follow the same pattern. You should see a rise and fall in the number of readers:

Rogers' technology adoption curve

Rogers' technology adoption curve

You can use analytics (and Web analytics in particular), to measure the number of users of any online documentation that you may have. If you don’t currently use Web analytics to measure your user documentation, then an alternative is to use Google Trends to see if there is a correlation between the number of people searching for help for your product and the number of product sales.

User documentation from an accountant’s perspective

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My first job out of college was in financial auditing, and I’ve often found the time I spent learning the ways of the accountant useful in understanding business fundamentals.

So how does User Assistance (user documentation) appear through the prism of accountancy?

Accountant (image wikipedia)

Is it an asset? Assets are things you buy that have a value and could generate or be converted into cash. Some Content Strategists see content as “Intellectual Property”, an asset that can be re-used many times to maximise its value. Could this also be the case for User Assistance?

Is it an expense? An expense is something you buy that has a value, but that value gets used up within a short space of time. Expenses can be train tickets, telephone bills etc. For major expenses, a business may treat the item in a similar way to an asset – making sure they get the best value out of it before it runs out.

Is it income? Income is money that comes in from selling things. If you charge for user manuals, access to online Help or support, then it could be treated as something that generates an income.

Is it a liability? In the accounting sense, a liability is an obligation to pay someone for something you bought in the past. A bank overdraft is an example of a liability.

In most cases, an accountant would see User Assistance as an expense. However, there may be opportunities for it to be an asset, particularly in the future. However it is viewed, if you focus on maximising the value from User Assistance, then your accountant should be happy.

Brand authenticity and the role of the Technical Author

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The current edition of Autocar (14/12/11) contains an interview with David Woodhouse, head of Ford’s London Strategy Concept Group, a semi-secret team that looks at emerging consumer trends.

From the article:

Woodhouse said “One of the rising trends is the search for authenticity. How does it (the product) tell you what it is?” Woodhouse points towards the trend for simple, but beautifully engineered, fixed-wheel bikes….He believes every component on such bikes is an example of the authenticity that will mark the tastes of future customers.

If Woodhouse is correct, then how do you ensure a product has authenticity, and what role does the Technical Author play in all of this?

Essentially, the ‘customer experience’ (every situation where the customer uses the product or engages with the company) needs to be consistent, credible and communicate the ‘message’ the company wants to send out. The values of the product need to be also reflected in the post-sales experience, and the User Assistance in particular.

This is more than making sure the ‘look and feel’ of the documentation matches other forms of company communication. It could mean the user guides need to speak in the same ‘voice’ as the rest of the organisation. It could mean it needs to function (act/react) in a manner consistent with rest of the organisation.

If Woodhouse is correct in predicting the increase in the importance of product authenticity, then ensuring User Assistance is at the same level of quality as other ‘customer experiences’  may become a bigger and bigger issue for technology companies.

 

Help us design our new strategy workshop for leaders of documentation projects

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We’d love your input in developing the course outline for our new workshop for documentation managers and leaders of documentation projects who want to do more than just provide a traditional user manual/Help file.

We’ve developed a course outline, but we’d like to know your opinion regarding what topics you think a workshop like this should cover. Your feedback will help us assess whether we’ve got the course topics right or not.

Audience: People in companies setting the strategy and planning how to assist their users via Help and user documentation. As well as public seminars, these would also be on site courses, comprising Documentation team and perhaps some people from UI, Support and Training.

Purpose: To Help them identify what’s needed, understand the different approaches available, identify the best approach to them, and to start planning how to develop the solution.

Duration: 1/2 day or 1 day

Please email us your thoughts

Help is broken?

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Are we at the point when we need to acknowledge that classic online Help files are not working as well as they should – that is, as the primary source of information to assist users when they get stuck?

This is not a Don Draper “why I’m quitting tobacco” moment, and this is not a criticism of the Help Authoring Tool vendors. Instead, it’s a proposal that, in some situations, what is delivered as online Help needs to be substantially modified to meet the needs of many modern technologies and users.

What’s wrong with Help? Help is often a “walled garden” in an Internet-era built on knowledge sharing and collaboration. Usability in relation to the user interface can be poor at times. It’s hard to measure its value and the ROI. Even its purpose can be vague to some project managers. Unfortunately, there’s often just not enough time to make significant improvements. We could go on.

Many users still get stuck, and many products still fail to work when they’re linked to another. Words still are a key way of communicating and teaching users. We still need to assist users and we still need some form of Help. It could be a useful tool in “evangelism marketing”. It could do so much more. This is why we’re suggesting it’s time to take a strategic look at what and how we can provide Help for when users get stuck.

What do you think?

What’s your software Help strategy?

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Whether for new business generation, enabling users to get the job done or simply to reduce support costs, Help is a vital tool for software businesses. Yet so few people take a strategic approach to it.

Today, all of the resources you need are at your disposal for you to enable users to achieve their best. The question is do you understand how?

We’re introducing strategy workshops for Documentation Managers and leaders of documentation projects who want to do more than just provide a traditional user manual/Help file.

These interactive strategy seminar workshops will look at the key issues concerning leaders of documentation projects.

Sessions can be developed on a bespoke basis depending on each individual client’s needs.

Contact us if this is of interest.