Congratulations, You Have ADD!  

The author describes his history after being diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), including a brief discussion of what the disorder is, how he came to be diagnosed as having it, and how he has come to live in harmony with, and even embrace, ADD. Murray concludes by offering helpful hints for accommodating the disorder that have helped him lead a fulfilling and successful career in technical communications.

Murray, Mike. STC Proceedings (2005). Articles>Scientific Communication>Biomedical

Considering Product Usability Along with Information Usability  

In this progression we will examine ways that technical communicators can improve both information usability and product usability. The presentation will center around two major points.

Grice, Roger A. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Usability>Information Design

Consistently Leading A Successful Community  

Boston, one of the founding chapters of STC, has a distinguished 50-year record of accomplishments. Boston recently won its third consecutive Chapter of Achievement award. We strive to consistently provide an outstanding level and value of services to our members.

Sztaimberg, Ilana. STC Proceedings (2005). Articles>TC>Community Building>STC

Constructing a One-Stop "Answer Station" for Software Users  

The web allows us to easily provide updated documentation to our users, but why stop there? There is more to making users successful quickly than just providing documentation. By creating a complete "Answer Station" that is accessible from the application or product, we can not only direct users to that updated documentation, but we can also provide information about technical support, consulting, training, sales, etc. This paper discusses writing a proposal for an Answer Station, determining content, working with other departments to gather information, designing the site, making that design work with an existing corporate website, dealing with tool issues, and finally, going live.

Bleiel, Nicoletta A. and Beth A. Williams. STC Proceedings (2004). Articles>Documentation>Help>Online

Consulting and Independent Contracting  

The Consulting and Independent Contracting progression will focus on both beginning and advanced topics relating to independent work. Independent work requires attention to two main areas: maintaining professional standards and practices; and building a successful contracting or consulting business. As the role of contractors and consultants continues to evolve practitioners face issues articulated in the topics below. Individual topics addressed are: choosing between contracting and consulting, marketing a business, and addressing legal issues. For those already established we look at ways to expand the consultant’s personal resource network and issues of incorporation as a growth alternative.

Barker, Thomas. STC Proceedings (2001). Careers>Freelance>Consulting

Consulting With Panache  

Consultants, like Life Savers®, come in flavors. Some are sweet and cloying, some area little too tart, some are bitter, some are too hot and spicy, and some like baby bear’s porridge taste just right. Clients may put up with the flavor of the month, but will he or she recommend or select it the next time around. Since referrals and repeat business are the life-blood of consulting, maintaining an excellent working relationship with a client is critical. Learning how to work with a client is the key to consulting with panache and knowing the rules helps open the door.

Burrer, Donna J., Faye Lepp and Curtis C. Stokes. STC Proceedings (1994). Careers>Consulting

A Contemporary Work Alternative: When Contracting is No Longer Something that You Do Between “Real” Jobs  

In the 90’s, contingency staffing (also called temporary staffing) has become a way of life for businesses that have had to streamline operations and reduce fixed costs in order to compete. Consequently, contract employment and independent contracting have become a way of life for many technical communicators who can’t — or prefer not to — find a full-time job.

Cheirrett, Peg A. STC Proceedings (1995). Careers>Freelance>Consulting

Content Management for Single Sourcing  

Content management is becoming a critical component of single sourcing. It provides a method for managing our single source materials and ensuring that information can be easily retrieved for reuse. This session explains what a content management system will do for you and how to use it effectively.

Rockley, Ann. STC Proceedings (2001). Presentations>Content Management>Single Sourcing

Content Management from the Trenches  

Moving your company to a content management system requires intense commitment and planning by everyone: management, writers, and vendors. Allow at least a year to define and develop the necessary tools, and provide training and support for the writers on an ongoing basis. As a writer, documentation department, or vendor, you should participate in the planning, development, and implementation. To ensure success, conduct rigorous testing, do a pilot project, and encourage teams to share information freely.

Pierce, Kathleen and Erin Martin. STC Proceedings (2004). Articles>Content Management

Content Re-Use with the Tools at Hand  

Frequent updates for a swarm of modular plug-ins were interrupting work on larger, higher-value projects. Worse, development was happening in a time zone 12 hours away, making communication a major bottleneck. Faced with fixed resources and growing commitments, our writing group extended existing tools to automate information gathering and rough draft creation, thereby halving the writer time each module required. This paper describes the user interface, tool extensions, and reusable information approach we used to solve the problem.

Carpenter, Cory, Samantha Lizak and Jeffrey Young. STC Proceedings (2005). Articles>Content Management>Collaboration

Content: What is it and Why Should You Manage It?

A unified content strategy can help your organization to avoid the Content Silo Trap, reducing the cost of creating, managing, and distributing content, and ensuring that content effectively supports your organizational and customer needs. A unified content strategy is a repeatable method of identifying all content requirements up front, creating consistently structured content for reuse, managing that content in a definitive source, and assembling content on demand to meet your customers' needs.

Kostur, Pamela. STC Chicago (2005). Articles>Content Management>Content Strategy

Contextual Inquiry: Listening and Questioning to Improve Information Design  

Contextual Inquiry is a field research technique that focuses on interviewing users in their own context as they do actual work. As a basis for effective design, Contextual Inquiry can contribute to the requirements and structure of systems and information. This half-day workshop presents a practical introduction to Contextual Inquiry as a step in designing information that supports and extends users' work.

Beabes, Minette A., Mary E. Raven, and Karen Holtzblatt. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Information Design>Methods>Contextual Inquiry

Contracting and Consulting for Policies and Procedures Engagements  

As the number of persons employed by some U.S. organizations declined since the late 1980s, so have employment opportunities for Policies & Procedures (P&P) practitioners. During this period, the number of contractors and consultants has increased to meet the needs of newly changed organizations. A useful way for P&P practitioners to learn how they can provide contracting and consulting services is to understand three roles in leveraging such services: an extra pair of hands, expert, and collaborator.

Urgo, Raymond E. STC Proceedings (1999). Articles>Business Communication>Policies and Procedures>Technical Writing

Contracting Experiences From Hell

So you've got a contract. The client seems reasonably well heeled and reliable (or you have an agency that can run interference for you). All you have to do is produce and collect, right? Not necessarily! As the following anecdotes show, having a good contract and having your professional ducks in a row are important at all stages of your client relationship.

Hilp, Robin. STC Williamette Valley (2002). Careers>Freelance>Contracts

Contracting: Is It For You?

In an economy that is constantly changing, many technical writers are (or have thought about being) contractors. Being your own boss certainly does have a certain cachet. But is it for you?

Turner, Gordon. STC Williamette Valley (2002). Careers>Freelance>Contracts

Contracts that Don’t Bite: Contracting for Technical Writing Services in the Real World  

The presenters examine all aspects of contracting from the viewpoint of both the contractor and the employer/client. The focus will be on the contract itself which provides a clear starting point for maneuvering through the critical issues, including what constitutes a legal contract and topics a contract should cover. The ensuing discussion will cover the different ways that writers work and are paid, managing the inevitable changes to a project, and a closer look at the pros and cons of working on an hourly or term contract compared to fixed price contracts, or contracts with an upset limit.

Forsyth, Diane and Duncan A. Kent. STC Proceedings (1995). Careers>Freelance>Consulting

Control Charts, Quality Assurance, and Information Development  

The purpose of this paper is to explore a method that allows information developers to measure the quality assurance being invested in the products they create. A successful project achieves a balance between the time it takes to produce information, the associated cost, and the quality of the end product.

Murphy, Stephen W. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Information Design>Assessment

Control Your Destiny  

This paper describes the differences between an employee, an independent contractor, and a consultant and why it is important to understand these distinctions. It also mentions why it is important that independent contractors set effective goals and describes the difference between static goals and dynamic goals. An approach for taking up assignments as an independent contractor is provided. This approach describes activities that need to be done prior to starting an assignment, while working on the assignment, and after the assignment is completed.

Alexander, Susan M. STC Proceedings (2003). Careers>Freelance

Controlling Quality, Controlling Costs  

By developing a strategic plan, finding out if we are producing the right learning products in the most efficient way, and changing to a minimalist document design, we can meet the challenges of the present business environment. Since many of us are now expected to produce more with less while maintaining or improving the quality of the products we produce, we need to manage our function better. By following the suggestions in this paper, you will be able to: communicate the importance of your function; get control of your function; demonstrate how you add value to your companies' products.

Mattingly, William A. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Management>Quality>Assessment

Converting and Delivering 750,000 Pages on CD-ROM  

The SIS Conversion Team and Electronic Media Development Team support the Service Information System development by providing data on CD-ROM for Caterpillar customers. This unique project covers eighteen different publication types, requires conversion of 750,000 pages and more than a million gray scale and line art images. The targetted data includes Parts Manuals and a variety of technical documents that were written to cover all Caterpillar machines and engines built since 1977. The conversion to electronic images and SGML-tagged text, and subsequent EMD processing and distribution via CD-ROM required extensive development efforts and a significant investment in leading edge technologies.

Bennington, Roger. STC Proceedings (1993). Articles>Documentation>CD ROM

Converting Documentation to Multimedia  

Multimedia has proven its ability to sell products and educate users. But can it also perform tasks traditionally done with conventional paper documents? Yes. This demonstration shows how several hardware and software documents were converted to multimedia and provides a plan for converting your documents. You learn whether to display, speak, or just eliminate existing text. You see how to replace action words, descriptions of motion, and arrows with animation. YOU see how sound can guide rather than distract the user. You also learn to use interactivity to give control to the user. Along the way you see the compromises needed to keep the project on schedule, within budget, and down to size.

Horton, Katherine W. and William K. Horton III. STC Proceedings (1995). Articles>Documentation>Multimedia

Converting FrameMaker to HTML  

Many FrameMaker users need to publish their documents on the World Wide Web. The best approach is to use a converter, which preserves the format and organization of the original FrameMaker document. Good converters can handle long, complex documents that contain elements such as table of contents, index, line drawings, bitmap graphics, tables, footnotes, and equations. We discuss the benefits of having a single source document for paper and Web, the techniques for creating documents that can be converted easily, and the powerful conversion tools available today.

Jackson, Ken and Sonya E. Keene. STC Proceedings (1999). Articles>Web Design>Software>Adobe FrameMaker

Converting from Paper to Online  

This demonstration describes the process and pitfalls encountered during the conversion of paper documents to online, CD-ROM documents that occurred at Cisco Systems, Inc.

Altemus, Desiree L. STC Proceedings (1994). Articles>Content Management>Single Sourcing

Converting to Information Mapping: A Case Study  

Cisco Systems, Inc., uses electronic media as the primary delivery means for customer documentation and training. Information Mapping® techniques are being developed as a methodology for creating and linking modules of customer information. After selecting the Information Mapping methodology, we found it necessary to customize it for our needs. To implement Information Mapping methodology, we defined a system architecture consisting of three main subsystems: a document management subsystem, an authoring environment, and a publishing or delivery subsystem, In parallel with the customization and development of a system architecture, several writers began to implement the Information Mapping techniques to provide content to be put into the system being developed.

Garrett, Aviva, Haggai Mark and Jan Johnston-Tyler. STC Proceedings (1996). Articles>Documentation>Writing>Technical Writing