Information Development in Design, with Scott Abel – Part 1 (A Chat with Cross-Functional Experts)

Dianna Deeney interviews Scott Abel about information development management, a discipline concerned with best practices for managing and coordinating all activities related to the development, production, and distribution of information. He shares ideas, strategies, and best practices for unifying all product information – technical documentation, product specifications, customer support, training, and on-boarding – in a single online knowledge center.

This is Part 1 of 2 episodes with Scott. In Part 1 (this episode) we talk about information development management. In Part 2 (next episode), we talk about technical communication as part of product design success.

This interview is part of our series, “A Chat with Cross Functional Experts”. Our focus is speaking with people that are typically part of a cross-functional team within engineering projects. We discuss their viewpoints and perspectives regarding new products, the values they bring to new product development, and how they’re involved and work with product design engineering teammates.

About Scott

Scott Abel serves as Content Strategy Evangelist at Heretto. He also runs a consultancy called The Content Wrangler, which helps companies improve how they author, maintain, manage, and deliver technical product information to those who need it, when, where, and how they prefer it. He writes regularly for content industry publications, produces a series of content strategy-focused books for XML Press, and is a dynamic presenter often featured at content industry events worldwide.

In Part 1, Scott and Dianna talk about:

• Why technical documentation is more important than it’s generally treated: it relates to the success of existing customers, the loyalty of customers to a brand, attracts new customers, and provides confidence to perspective customers.
• How technical documentation affects regulated products, and why “future fear of noncompliance” is a trap that leads to a loss of information management advancements and their benefits.
• What object-oriented technical communication management is and COPE (create once, publish everywhere).

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Crafting Effective Technical Documents for the Engineering Field

Ready to hone your technical writing skills as an engineer? This episode of the Quality During Design podcast is a must-listen! We delve into the critical role of technical communication in engineering, and why written communication skills are non-negotiable for engineers. Join me, Dianna Deeney, as we consider different perspectives to make your technical writing the best it can be.

Our chat takes us on a journey through the past, present, and future of technical writing, as we root ourselves in the realities of presenting findings, interpreting data, and making actionable decisions. In the spirit of past, present, and future, we discuss techniques to ensure that your writing is effective and reaches your audience – be it your project team, auditors, or a future engineer referencing your work. Grab your pen and paper or open your word document as we together make strides in improving our technical communication skills.

This Quality during Design Redux episode was originally “The Spirits of Technical Writing Past, Present, and Future”. Visit the podcast blog, here.

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How to use FMEA for Complaint Investigation

FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) is a tool we can use to help us investigate complaints from the field. The FMEA is a matrix of the collective team knowledge about the risks of this product, so it’s a valuable source in our investigation about what’s going on in the field.

We talk through how to go about using FMEA for complaint investigation and what we can do with the information.

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