Re: Asking SMEs (was Seeking counsel - yet another)

["Mike O." <obie1121 -at- yahoo -dot- com>]

Bruce Byfield wrote:
> Unfortunately, it's even less cost effective to have 
> people constantly helping out the tech-writer. 

Well, organizations that say they believe in teamwork sometimes need to
put their money where their mouth is. 

I guess it depends on what you mean by "constantly helping out." If a
TW is constantly asking for help with basic concepts, or easily
learnable or Google-able technology, agreed - that's a waste of time. 

But if an SME is pursuing some complex new activity in isolation, and
the TW has been assigned to document it, management needs to make sure
teamwork happens. If management fails to, maybe the TW can overcome the
isolation through clever tactics or sheer force of personality - or
maybe not. 

Lots of middle managers are fond of telling their people have to wear
many hats. So sometimes an SME just has to put on the
work-with-the-techwriter hat. And if they won't, management needs to
slam that hat on their head, hard.

Mike O.




		
__________________________________ 
Do you Yahoo!? 
Yahoo! Mail - Helps protect you from nasty viruses. 
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

ROBOHELP X5 - SEE THE ALL NEW ROBOHELP X5 IN ACTION!

RoboHelp X5 is a giant leap forward in Help authoring technology, featuring all new Word 2003 support, Content Management, Multi-Author support, PDF and XML support and much more! View an online demo: http://www.macromedia.com/go/techwrldemo

---
You are currently subscribed to techwr-l as:
archiver -at- techwr-l -dot- com
To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-techwr-l-obscured -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Send administrative questions to lisa -at- techwr-l -dot- com -dot-  Visit
http://www.techwr-l.com/techwhirl/ for more resources and info.