RE: Necessity of Doc Plans for a Single Chapter or Section

["Mike Starr" <writstar -at- wi -dot- net>]

Bruce brings up a great point. I've worked without doc plans for so long
that it's second nature to me. I don't doubt that there are many who might
need or benefit from them. I have to agree when he says that it's not a
good thing to try to shoehorn others into my own methods. At the same time,
it's when someone's tried to shoehorn me into the doc plan methodology that
I've ended up alienating management and found myself blinking and
scratching on the pavement after being given the heave-ho. 

I can produce good results without a doc plan. I can do it as fast or
faster than any writer I've worked with. I can't produce a doc plan. Every
time I've tried, I've failed miserably. I've always felt that the amount of
time and effort it took me to create and maintain a doc plan only kept me
from the real work at hand.

As I've participated in this discussion one of the things that comes to
mind is the relationship between doc plans and metrics. Doc plans seem to
me to be much more important in shops where metrics are important. I've
primarily been associated with shops that don't get into either metrics or
doc plans. The standards have been much more subjective... does the writer
do good work? does the writer seem to be producing at a reasonable pace?
can we count on the writer to give us what we need approximately when we
need it? 

I spent six months on a project where the powers-that-be were very focussed
on doc plans and reporting. I outpaced all of the other writers in the
group (we all started at the same time), spearheaded the design of the
deliverables, solved some thorny technical problems that the programming
team couldn't fathom and delivered my project well before any of the others
was going to be ready. My output for six months work... over 700 PDF pages,
the project template and some programming as well as overhaul of graphics
used in the template. The day I submitted the final revision of my
deliverable for release to manufacturing was my last day there. The next
day I was summarily dismissed. The reason? I wouldn't/couldn't do a doc
plan. At one point when I'd been given a stern lecture the account manager
for the consulting firm I actually worked for told me that I should expect
to devote 25% of my time to meetings, doc plans and paperwork. I told her
that it was unconscionable to expect the client company to pay that much of
the contract for those sorts of things. They got a much better deliverable
than they expected to and much sooner than most other writers would have
completed it but because they were so fixated on the doc plan and metrics
they didn't see the forest for the trees.

Does it bother me that I got pitched out? Nah; not a bit. That was over two
years ago and I've been doing just fine ever since.

Which would you rather have?? A doc plan or good docs? I vote for good docs.

Mike

---
Mike Starr                            WriteStarr Information Services
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-----------------------Original Message-----------------------
>From:  Bruce Byfield [mailto:bbyfield -at- axionet -dot- com]
>To:  Mike Starr [mailto:writstar -at- wi -dot- net]
>Cc:  TECHWR-L [mailto:techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com]
>Date:  11/18/01 10:42:00 PM
>Subject:  Re: Necessity of Doc Plans for a Single Chapter or Section
>
>Most of all, I've observed that the ultimate answer to the question is: 
>whatever works. My preferred work methods are probably close to Andrew 
>Plato's or Mike Starr's. But I've noticed that my methods don't work for 
>everyone, so I would never try to shoehorn anyone into them. If a 
>meticulous doc planner can produce good results, who cares how they get 
>them?


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