RE: Need feedback

["Sharon Burton-Hardin" <sharon -at- anthrobytes -dot- com>]

And it may be there is nothing to be done.

I worked for a place once with a QA group that was out of control. They had
final responsibility to sign off on the accuracy of the docs. One QA person
apparently wanted to be a writer more than anything - I am guessing here -
and she had definite things she wanted to see and not see.

Like the word MUST. She didn't like it. And in the manuals and help, it had
to go. She would take a clear sentence - Before you upload the file, you
must be logged in as a Manager. - and insist it be rewritten to get rid of
the word must. And half the stuff we were writing was programmers constructs
where the word must is terrible useful.

I am not kidding that she would hold up signing off on the docs until all
her parameters were met. And then blame the pubs group in meetings as the
reason the product had not made it out of QA yet.

I took this insanity as far up management as a contractor could. The end
statement - QA had the final responsibility. So I would give her a draft and
let her tell me what words she wanted this time. And then I would do it.
They spent a lot of money to have me scribe her words. The end result of her
rework was that all clear simple direct sentences were muddy and wordy. She
did not like to order people to do things, she told me.

sharon

Sharon Burton-Hardin
CEO, Anthrobytes Consulting
909-369-8590
www.anthrobytes.com

-----Original Message-----
From: bounce-techwr-l-71429 -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com
[mailto:bounce-techwr-l-71429 -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com]On Behalf Of Giordano,
Connie
Sent: Friday, March 28, 2003 6:25 AM
To: TECHWR-L
Subject: RE: Need feedback



Carol,

You might want to start to resolve this situation by defining what QA can do
in testing a help system.  My QA folks (who are about the best in the biz),
may make suggestions as to style or content, but they know that part of the
project is my area to determine.  What they do for me is to make sure the
topics appear when they are supposed to, check links and graphics, and look
for holes that I might have missed, and identify errors in content.  They
don't tell me how to write or structure it, they do like asking how I do
this, though, and that's cool with me.

In other gigs, I have had to put together a "checklist" to remind the
reviewers what they are and are not responsible for.  I attempt to couch it
terms of making their lives easier... And that seems to work better than a
defensive "stay out of my area" approach that I have seen other folks take
(and not just writers...programmers, project managers and QA folks can be
just as territorial as we are.)

As heavy-handed and inappropriate as the tactics may be, be grateful that
they care enough to even look at it, many shops don't have that luxury.
I've found it best to address the tactics first... There are too many
unknown variables in the situation, to risk attacking agendas, roles or the
power structure.  Make it a win-win by showing that it's a better use of
their resources to QA the system, and less effective when they begin QA'ing
content.



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