A pericopē is the smallest possible unit of a story. Our training is designed to teach the smallest possible unit of technical documentation, a minimum viable document.
1-day developer writing workshop
A hands-on workshop intensive for 10-20 developers.
Summary
Why are writing skills critical for developers?
- Developers and users are more satisfied with a product or system when they can spend time using it, not resolving issues. Targeted writing is key to providing the right information at the right time to speed resolution time and get people back to productive work.
- Resilience is when a company has known patterns of work and repositories of information that make it possible to continue efficiently in the wake of large organizational or personnel changes. Company resilience is essential to helping small companies scale and keeping large companies from being bogged down in bureaucracy.
Topics addressed
- Writing for search
- Targeted writing for maximum impact
- Writing bugs for understanding and replication
- Writing consistent and actionable error messages
- Improving onboarding for developers
- Increasing company resilience with small workflow changes
Expectations
- Developers will leave with templates to write bugs, errors, and onboarding steps
- Developers will also have tools for explaining to their peers why documentation saves time and effort for everyone
- Instructor will guide the workshop using lecture and hands-on experimentation
- Some group work required
Return on investment
- Significant reduction in the time it takes a senior developer to onboard someone new
- Incremental improvements in bug solution time due to templated bug reports
- More accurate documentation in case of sudden employee turnover
3-day company documentation refurbishment
Includes the 1-day developer writing PLUS
One day of research on existing documentation and projected documentation needs with a written inventory and advisory report
A guided one-day documentation sprint to update commonly-used documents and remove old or inaccurate documents.
Topics addressed
- Document inventory or audit
- Document retention
- Generalized documentation plan
- Documentation disposal
Expectations
- Companies will receive a documentation inventory of known documents
- Companies will receive a generalized report on their current documentation maturity and next steps
- Consultant will have temporary access to all documentation repositories
- Companies will receive general guidance on documentation retention policies
- Consultant will conduct a one-day sprint to organize and confirm existing documents by engaging the group that uses them
Return on investment
- Documentation inventory and maturity assessment allows targeted improvements
- Documentation sprint engages the team in document maintenance and allows for rapid changes
- Removing outdated documents eliminates costly errors when people follow the wrong procedure
Junior writer screening and mentoring
We work with your company to help conduct a job search for a writer, help screen them for writing skills, investigative skills, and other important aspects of the job, and then mentor them in their new position. Frequently, there is no one in a company who understands the work a writer is trying to do. Like software development, technical writing has its own industry-specific standards and expectations. Mentoring a new writer prevents the writer from re-inventing the wheel or going down known dead-ends.
Expectations
- Collaboratively-written job ad to attract the widest variety of qualified candidates
- Candidate application screening
- Candidate interview and evaluation in collaboration with co-workers
- Mentoring for the first 1/3/6 months of employment, depending on negotiated retainer
Return on investment
- Increased chance of hiring a productive and reliable employee
- Better employee retention due to support
- Faster return on potential documentation
Documentation architecture
A detailed analysis of your existing documentation and a roadmap for creating, updating, or improving it. This analysis takes into account your company’s business maturity, target markets, existing documentation and upcoming goals. We will get you to minimum viable documentation in the shortest time possible. Services might include templating, tools selection, documentation retention and disposal policies, and plans for localization, conversion, and accessibility changes.
Expectations
- Documentation roadmap tuned to business needs
- Consultation on tools and services to promote fast, easy documentation
- Written report on current documentation status and inventory
Return on investment
- Separate high-level design from implementation — it’s easier to hire implementation
- Have a strategy for documentation that feeds into the release cycle for buyer confidence
If you are interested in any of these services,