From the Doc Side : STC

Society for Technical Communication Summit 2008 Reviews

Lindsey Robbins — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 20:25:00 GMT

Thought I'd give the rest of my reviews for the STC 2008 Summit now instead of putting it off for another day. I've already given a review on the Trends in User Research panel and discussed my session on Writing as an Asynchronous Conversation. If you'd like to hear more about what I learned in these sessions, leave a comment about which one and I'll write up a separate post detailing what I learned.

Getting Real-World Feedback on Your Information: A Case Study by Kori Bevis, IBM
The only negative about this presentation was the overwhelming hotness of this room which caused everyone to be sleepy. Otherwise, it was full of useful information especially as we consider how to involve more users in our documentation usability projects. Kori did a great job explaining how they implemented a client council in evaluating their new information repository web application.

XML the Easy Way: Moving Your Unstructured Content (Word / FrameMaker) to DITA by Todd Aldous
Wanted to see a presentation on Asessing Accessibility of Websites for Users with Disabilities but the session was canceled because of the sporadic internet connectivity. Totally bummed. Showed up in this session a few minutes late and quickly realized that moving unstructured content is easy if you build a bunch of custom plug-ins for FrameMaker. One of only two sessions I regretted going to at the conference.

Guidelines for Effective Captivate Movies by David S. Locke, Wordsmith
Since we're now using Adobe Captivate to create our video tutorials, I thought it would be good to see what other people in the field had to say about what makes a good captivate movie. The foundation of his message was good but thought some of his time estimates might be exaggerated. I definitely think when you first start creating short videos you can spend a lot of time editing, but after you create a few and set a style you spend less time on the details and more on the content. His core issues of context and control, content, communication, focus, and synchronization were spot on. If more people are interested, I'm sure I could co-write a post with Nikki on what we think are important guidelines for video tutorials and screencasts.

So, You Can Write. But Can you Think? by Dawn Maxson, Dell and Deborah Doyle, Sun Microsystems
I really try to be a nice person so let me just say that this session was a complete waste of time. Nothing valuable learned. Would expound but I'd rather not talk badly about a presentation on a blog. I'm sure they had excellent intentions for this presentation. Better luck next time ladies.

Stop Wasting Time: Ten Things You Can Do to Make Yourself More Efficient by Scott Abel, The Content Wrangler
Scott really is one of those people best seen live, in person. Funny, on the edge, and willing to call anyone out on any topic. This was a fun presentation full of some great tips, resources, and websites. My favorite of the 10 tips were #7 - tag and share, #4 mashups, and #3 project management tools. You can see his full presentation on slideshare.net, although as I said above, he really is worth the price of admission.

Mining Web 2.0 Content for Enterprise Gold by Michael Priestley, IBM
Do I wish I were as genius as Michael? Yes, yes I do. Michael did a nice job of talking about the relevance of web 2.0 and DITA and making a case for open standard support for web 2.0. I especially appreciated his discussion on how it's getting easier to get content in but harder to get content out because information becomes silo'd, redundant, and harder to reuse. My favorite thing he said in the whole presentation centered on separating the content from the application of which I am a strong advocate. No matter what application you end up using, your content needs to be solid. In this case, advocating more standards for web 2.0 would enable us to create more flexible, powerful content. Definitely had a lot to think about after his presentation and not the least was how I could someday be as super smart as Michael.

Agile Technical Documentation by Jean-Luc Mazet, Hewlett-Packard
Probably my favorite presentation at the conference. Great balance of humor and bursting full of useful information about the hot topic in software development - agile! He did a great job with overview for those newer to this style of content development and yet also gave advice on things to avoid. For example, as technical writers getting away from "owning" pieces of documentation. The team owns the document and together you write content. When you reuse, content becomes stronger. The most encouraging part of the talk was about how writing in agile really empowers writers and when someone struggles, agile enables coaching until improvement happens. I like that idea much better than the sink or swim method. Jean-Luc wrote a great conference paper summarizing his responses. You can find it on the stc.org website.

Engaging Diverse Audiences using Screencasts, Wikis, and Blogs by Gail Chappell and Cindy Church, Sun Microsystems
Theme of this session? Lots of great examples. Because the project Gail and Cindy worked on for Sun Microsystems was under open source, we were able to visually see examples of every part of their project. I particularly liked the information on the screencasts and blogs because those are both things we are doing and will need to evaluate effectiveness soon. Plus, it's nice to hear other companies discussing their integrated approach to help authoring. It's not all about silos of information and user guides. I like thinking about all the ways content can mix and mash and output in different formats depending upon clients needs. And, I heart examples but I think I already mentioned that above. :-)

Secret Social Session (S3) on new Social Media & Networking by Robert Armstrong
An unofficial, underground STC session was published last minute on twitter and a message board and had a pretty good turnout. It was nice to see my other conference twitterers and have some fun talking about the tools. While what we do is not about the tools, it's still fun to learn and hear about what might be coming next. And, I liked the whole underground movement of the social networking at the conference.

Editing Modular Documentation by Michelle Corbin, IBM and Yoel Strimling, Comverse
Last session ended on a good note. One reason to instantly like this session is we were talking about the content (modular documentation) and not about the tool (DITA). One surprise from the session was the number of hands that shot up at the beginning of the presentation of people whose sole job function was a technical editor. Ouch! Wonder if those people see the future coming or not? I don't know if everyone agrees with me but seems like technical communicators need more skills and flexibility in job function than one that puts you in a small box (especially if mainstream documentation goes the way of agile, then I don't see how you can make your job function only editing). Okay, off the soapbox and back to the presentation. The nice thing about the presentation was that it was well organized, provided some overview but not exhausting, and they had advice not just "we did this, then that". It's nice when people can provide best practices because it shows that they've not only done this type of work but thought through the pluses and minuses. Favorite takeaway - edit for usability not reusability. While reusability is key for technical communicator's work efficiency, that doesn't mean it's important for clients. Usability still needs a central role in evaluating technical communication.

All in all, the conference will definitely be a highlight of my 2008 work year. Thanks to Blackbaud for empowering us through training!!!

Trends in User Research Review

Lindsey Robbins — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 14:59:00 GMT

Conference: STC Summit 2008
Session: Trends in User Research
Panel: Jean Anderson, Todd Zaki Warfel, Ginny Redish, Whitney Quesenbery, Karen Bachmann (moderator)

I heard four main questions during the Q&A panel session:

1. How do I show value?
Answer – Back up your desire to do research with examples of past success. Fresh in the field with no past successes (yet), find examples of success from your colleagues in the field.

2. People in company use usability terms but don't know what they mean.
Answer – Don’t use your usability terms. Instead, use your process terms. Explain what you will be doing. For example, explain what an ethnography is and what you hope to gain by doing it. Then you won’t be discussing terms and wondering if the people in your company really understand what you will be doing.

3. How long do your usability projects take?
Answer – Doesn’t necessarily need to take a long time. Panel responded that they are able to get to what client needs and complete research very quickly. In order to do that, they go quickly to the questions:

Why?
What Do They Hope to Change?
What are the issues?
What are customer support, professional services, etc hearing?

4. What's New or BIG in the field?
Answer – Agile (scrum teams), Prototypes, Ethnographic based methods (but not strict), One-on-One interviews (because surveys tell you “what” but one-on-one tell you “why”), be flexible & combine techniques, use user forums, and remote usability tools.

Impressions of the Session:

Go and do usability testing, don’t worry about the details.
The value of any Q&A depends on the questions being asked. I can tell people are still relatively new to usability based on the first half of the questions in the session.
Don’t waste time. Go straight to the “why?” and then figure out what you need to do user research on.
One of the great values of listening to a panel is hearing some of their success stories. It’s then not as much about takeaways but rather hearing how other user research is successful. It’s encouraging.
It’s the same for user research as it is for fundraising. Just ask. Ask people if they want to participate in your research. Don’t make it more complicated.
Formal is not necessary. I think I could have a whole discussion on whether user research needs to be formal but I like the idea that you uncover the problem, figure out the best combination of user research required, and then go complete it. There isn’t any wasted time or dragging feet.

Also, they shared a great resource they found helpful on slideshare.net. It’s a presentation on How to Be a UX Team of One by Leah Buley at the 2008 IA Summit in Miami, Florida.
http://www.slideshare.net/ugleah/how-to-be-a-ux-team-of-one

Society for Technical Communication's Annual Conference

Lindsey Robbins — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 17:49:00 GMT

I recently (6/2 - 6/4) attended the Society for Technical Communication's 55th Annual Conference in Philadelphia. (And yes, we have been around for at least that long trying to help users make sense of technology.)

Over the next several weeks I plan on sharing my impressions of the conference sessions, the experience, and all the new questions I have about the emerging trends in the field. To give you an idea of what is to come, I thought I'd share the sessions I attended.

Monday

Getting Real-World Feedback on Your Information: A Case Study
    - Korin Bevis, IBM
Trends in User Research
    - Karen L. Backhmann, Seascape Consulting
    - Jean Anderson, Siemens Medical Solutions
    - Whitney Quesenbery, Whitney Interactive Design
    - Ginny Redish, Redish & Associates
    - Todd Zaki Warfel, Messagefirst
XML the Easy Way: Moving Your Unstructured Content (Word / FrameMaker) to DITA
    - Todd Aldous

Tuesday

Writing as an Asynchronous Conversation
    - Ginny Redish, Redish & Associates
Guidelines for Effective Captivate Movies
    - David S. Locke, Wordsmith
So, You Can Write. But Can you Think?
- Dawn Maxson, Dell
- Deborah Doyle, Sun Microsystems
Stop Wasting Time: Ten Things You Can Do to Make Yourself More Efficient
    - Scott Abel, The Content Wrangler
Mining Web 2.0 Content for Enterprise Gold
    - Michael Priestley, IBM

Wednesday

Agile Technical Documentation
    - Jean-Luc Mazet, Hewlett-Packard
Engaging Diverse Audiences using Screencasts, Wikis, and Blogs
    - Gail Chappell, Sun Microsystems
    - Cindy Church, Sun Microsystems
Secret Social Session (S3) on new Social Media & Networking
    - Robert Armstrong
Editing Modular Documentation
    - Michelle Corbin, IBM
    - Yoel Strimling, Comverse

Overall, the conference was a great opportunity to network, learn, and think critically about how this new information can be applied to my team. Only two sessions ended up being disappointments but you can't be happy with everything, right? Either way, the future of technical communication is exciting and varied. I wouldn't want to be anywhere else than in the middle of progress.