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WorkingWithYourManager.rst

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Working with your manager:

How to swim in the deep water - A lone writer’s guide to survival

How to Establish A Positive Relationship from the Start

  • Ask a lot of questions
  • Have them define what they value in "good writing"
  • Ask someone how they see your role working, including how you will function, who you will talk to, and what you will deliver
  • Tread lightly when performing an extensive edit or overhaul right out of the gate
  • Establish your own competency and knowledge early on (this can be especially important for female-identifying writers)
  • Ask for the information you want and need, instead of being general
  • Do your best to identify the correct person to ask a question - be intentional
  • Find an ally, even outside of your organizational group
  • There's a need for written materials that's never going to go away
  • Cite studies that prove the value of documentation
  • Talk about your own documentation successes, as well as those of others
  • Talk to your support or services organization, someone that talks to customers. They should be your ally. Develop this relationship.
  • Explain what happens when you _don't_ have documentation that is that good
  • Utilize analytics - wouldn't you want a website to be good if it has so many views?
  • Lone writers can easily bring things to light - they might later think, "how could I have missed this?" (After this happens, reassure them!)
  • Remind everyone that you are there to represent the users' needs.
  • ACCEPT CRITICISM
  • Do good work in ways that others can see.
  • Market yourself as a service within your organization.
  • To show the value of your own best practices, tell them that these principles exist, and you're improving their content. Then they'll see how the content improved and recognize it.
  • Developers will see what you've done with their work, and then start to imitate you! They'll see what it means to apply standards.
  • Have genuine enthusiasm for the work of developers, and your own work as well

How to get quality doc reviews from a non-writing-savvy manager:

Frequently, managers who haven't managed a writer before do not know the type of feedback that we need. For example, a manager might lightly copyedit your work, when what you truly need is a technical review, or their thoughts about a new structure. Here are some suggestions for getting quality docs reviews:

  • Create a mini-training on how to review documentation
  • Specifically call out the "type" of review that you're looking for, be it technical, developmental, etc.
  • Reinforce good reviewing behaviors
  • Create a review checklist of what you'd like them to read for