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Subject:Re: A technique to get on development's good side From:"Poster" <Poster -at- aurora -dot- cotse -dot- net> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Fri, 13 May 2005 12:31:01 -0400 (EDT)
Gene Kim-Eng said:
> I work hard to squash this assumption whenever it arises, especially
> from any of my writers. Documentation is part of the product, and
> the person producing it is part of the product development team,
> with the responsibility of working to accomplish the product's goals,
> on time to support the product release schedule and within budget.
> All of these things are established by the product's managers, usually
> from Marketing or Marketing and R&D together. The tech writer's
> role is not to serve as a "user advocate," pushing to provide users
> with the information they think the users will want, but to research
> and deliver the information *that the company wants the users to
> have and has determined they need to use the product in a manner
> that will satisfy the product's goals.*
This is quite confusing to me. I always view myself as a user
advocate, and I expect that everyone at every level to think of
themselves as the same. Why? Without the user, there would be no
company. If the tech writer (and others) are not interested in seeking
to better the product by fulfilling more of the user's needs, then the
company is out of synch with its audience.
> If you are a tech writer and a company you work for or are
> considering working for tells you that they don't know what
> information they need to provide to their products' prospective
> customers and that it will be your job to tell them, my advice to
> you is to run, as fast and as far away as you can..
Why, I thought that market research was part of the TW experience!
Seriously, in some companies I realize that MR is a separate position,
but it's never been the case in any TW position that I've had.
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