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I suggest that you speak with your Help Desk. They are on the front line for
complaints. Ask them what your customers are complaining about and then
create a metric based upon that.
Then go on to address those concerns in the documentation.
Hope this helps,
Will
=============================
Will Husa
Technical Writer
Will Husa Documentation Solutions
Phone: 708.927.3569
Skype ID: william.husa
will -dot- husa -at- 4techwriter -dot- com
-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+will -dot- husa=4techwriter -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+will -dot- husa=4techwriter -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On
Behalf Of Jelus, Susan C.
Sent: Thursday, September 10, 2015 3:39 PM
To: techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: Metrics used to evaluate Technical Writing/Publications
Hi Everyone,
Technical Writing is part of the Research and Development department at my
company. My manager, the Director, wants me to set up some ways to measure
the effectiveness of the tech writing function. He says this will help us
identify problem areas. Other functions, such as Engineering and
Operations, measure things like turn-around time, on-time delivery, and
number of backorders.
I'm hard-pressed to find something easily measureable for tech writing. We
produce mostly documents that are more than 100 pages, such as user manuals,
and we usually do it over a 3-6 month time period. Of course, we have
dependencies on Engineering and other SMEs, who all have major priorities in
other areas.
I've thought of measuring things like on time responses to requests for
information or reviews, errors reported in publications, change requests
received/implemented, product development changes requiring documentation
rework... But it seems like it will be difficult to track and evaluate many
of these items.
Do any of you out there use metrics? If so, what are you measuring and how
is it working?
Thanks for your help.
Susan Jelus
Thermo Fisher Scientific
Logan, Utah
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