ISTC Meets

Meeting Details

When: 19th December 2024, 13:00 (London)

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Discussion: surviving and thriving as a lone technical author

Technical writing can be a solitary profession. Even in large companies it’s not unusual to be the only writer. What does that mean for your career development, workload, working relationships and mental health?

In this session we’ll be discussing the challenges but also the joys of being a lone writer. It’s an open session where all contributions are welcome – we’d love to hear what you have to say.

This session is suitable for… anyone who’s ever worked solo, either through circumstance or preference.

Sorry, no recording available this time.

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Working with developers

Robert Delwood is a programmer-writer specializing in API and developer documentation. That means he’s a developer and a writer, covering both sides of the aisle. He stresses upping everyone’s developer documentation game, aiming for “great documentation.” He defines “great documentation” as documentation so clear and precise that it defies misunderstanding. There are many aspects constituting what that is. Some material can be changed by the writer, some can’t.

But there’s a gray area that the writer might able to be change. This is the focus of Robert’s talk. Writers can push back against developers. We might be able to even trump developers in instances. Keeping in mind the writer’s ultimate goal of clearly communicating concepts, we have an obligation to make sure that’s the case. Being on the front line of clarity, we can advocate changes on developers. It may even be easier done than said.

This session is suitable for anyone working in or alongside software development.

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Meeting Details

When: 1 p.m. BST on Tuesday 22nd October 2024

Register on zoom

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Autumn round-table and updates from ISTC HQ

We’re kick-starting the new season of ISTC Meets with a more informal discussion session, hosted by Rachel Johnston with guests from across the ISTC. You’re invited to bring any questions, come for a chat, or simply listen in to the conversation.

There will be a short section where our guests, all ISTC Members who volunteer within the organisation, share information on recent happenings, as well as time for questions and interaction among the group.

• General update and AGM news – Linda Robins, ISTC President
• The new ISTC Mentoring Scheme – Carol Leahy, ISTC Council Member
• Local groups round-up – Darren Mitcham, Thames-Valley Area Group Lead

Join us for an informal discussion and catch up on news from around the ISTC.

This session is suitable for anyone with questions about the ISTC or who would like to chat with fellow Technical Communicators about the current state of the world!

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Tech writing and accessibility

Judith will share tips on creating accessible content from a user research perspective. She’ll then talk about persuasive tactics to encourage stakeholders towards greater inclusivity. There will be time for questions at the end.

This session is suitable for tech writers interested in how to make digital services that work for everyone in society.

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Judith Fellowes

Judith Fellowes is a user researcher with over 20 years experience, most recently working across government. Judith is also an associate trainer for Sunsurfer https://sunsurfer.co.uk and develops and delivers training on disability, equality and mental health.

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Fireside chat – all things ContentOps

Sorry – we don’t have a recording of this session.

Rahel Bailie shares wisdom from her decades of experience as a content strategist. If you have a question about how to use content to solve business problems and further organisational goals, or about the tools and processes that deliver greater automation and efficiency, send it to meets@istc.org.uk

This session is suitable for anyone struggling to deliver complex multi-channel technical content, or who’s thinking ‘there must be a better way to do this…’

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Rahel Anne Bailie

Rahel has an international reputation as a content strategist and expert on the tools and processes that deliver operational efficiency to content teams. She recently joined TWi as Content Solutions Director but also teaches at FH Joanneum in Graz, Austria. She is the author (with Noz Urbina) of Content strategy, connecting the dots between business, brand and benefits – soon to be in its second edition.

Meeting Details

When: 22nd May 2024, 12.30 UK time

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Beyond “The Cathedral and the Bazaar”: How to navigate open-source software documentation as a writer

This presentation is an introduction to the world of open source documentation from the perspective of a technical writer. It opens with a definition of open-source documentation and introduces associated trends such as docs-as-code. You’ll then get up-to-speed on the basics: lexicon, stakeholders, processes, and challenges. Jo offers some guidance for those writers starting in an open-source project (setting it up from scratch, or joining an existing team). You’ll learn about open-source community contributions and issues of quality and consistency and finally, explore a case study.

If you’ve worked on or contributed to an open-source docs project, you’ll probably find solace. If you’ve not yet done so, but wondered how it works, you should get some answers. Bring your lunch and learn how to navigate the open-source docs bazaar!

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Jo Stichbury

Jo Stichbury is a technical writer with almost 30 years’ experience in the software industry. She works for QuantumBlack, AI by McKinsey, and writes about open-source tools for data scientists. She holds an MA and a PhD in Natural Sciences from the University of Cambridge, but considers her greatest achievement to be the flock of chickens, turkeys, and geese that reside with her family in South Wales.

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Ghosts in the machine: the impact of AI technologies on instructional design methodology in regulated industries.

AI is a transformative technology which has already had significant impact across multiple domains with diverse applications; from autonomous cars and build simulations to facial recognition and navigational aids.

In the world of training content creation, AI offers efficiencies across the entire ADDIE instructional design model and the opportunity to construct personalized learning experiences. In this talk, we examine the current impact that these technologies have on the ADDIE instructional design methodology, particularly in the realm of heavily regulated industries such as pharmaceutical manufacturing which bring challenges of their own.

What gains do the application of AI bring to the instructional design process in this context? How do we realign our traditional model to embrace this new paradigm? What does the future look like? What challenges and concerns; real or imagined, do we face? Are we afraid of the “ghost in the machine”?!

This session is suitable for anyone working in highly regulated industries (pharma, healthcare, finance) wondering what the AI revolution means for them.

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Lorcan Ryan

I am a learning professional currently working as Principal eLearning Specialist in Regeneron Pharmaceuticals. I have over 20 years’ experience working in different learning roles across the medical, software, and educational industries. During this time, I have developed learning content, delivered face-to-face training sessions, and managed international accounts.

I hold a BBS Degree in Business and Marketing, an MA in Technical Communication, and a PhD in Computer Science. My doctoral thesis won the Microsoft-sponsored “Thesis of the Year” award in 2015, and I am a published author, regular journal contributor, and conference presenter. I have a lifelong love of learning and I enjoy running and playing and listening to music.

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Stories of structured authoring tools

Joaquim Baptista will share his professional experience with structured writing tools since 1996, in the context of small writing teams in need of sophisticated tools:

• LaTeX and LinuxDoc SGML for a University job (1996-1998), the learning opportunities that paved the way for what came next.
• Custom XML and DITA XML for Altitude Software (2000-2014), including the generation of DITA topics, localization, and training materials.
• DITA and Open API for Farfetch (2017-2024), including automated modular builds, two developer websites, and the curation at scale of references written by developers.

This session is suitable for anyone interested in structured content and the tooling that supports it.

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Joaquim Baptista

Joaquim is a principal technical writer and manager that worked at Farfetch and Altitude Software. He has documented large and evolving software products that require industrial writing instead of just writing craftsmanship since 1997. Before tackling documentation, Joaquim worked as trainer, programmer, system administrator, and academic researcher. He is a member of IEEE PCS, and a leader at ISTC, APCOMTEC, and EuroSIGDOC.

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Career Planning and Recruitment Trends

2023 was a difficult year for many in the technical writing community – mass layoffs, precarious operating conditions and the existential threat from AI.

So let’s face 2024 with optimism and a career pep-talk from an experienced recruiter. We’ll reflect on current job market trends, what companies are looking for, and why it’s still a great time to be a tech writer.

This session is suitable for technical writers from all disciplines who have been laid off recently, are looking for a new job or just want to future-proof their career.

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Michelle Shoubridge

Michelle is a resourcing manager at Edissero, and has been working with technical writers, and the companies that need them, for over 13 years.

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How to create content that users can find

As content consumption moves from more traditional methods to digital formats, writers need to change the way they approach content creation. More users are finding content through search engines and clicking the topics they think will help them.

You can’t just create good content anymore. Now you must ensure your content appears in the first search result.

To compete in the online content sphere, writers must create content that users can find.

This session is suitable for anyone creating content online that users may need to search for, or search through.

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Carl deBeer

Carl DeBeer is a Tech Docs manager at VMware. He leads his team in creating data-driven content. (He maintains it’s only quality documentation if it’s got the usage statistics to prove it.) His passions include science fiction, Lego sets, and the Oxford comma.

A video recording of this event is not available.

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Making Sense of Conversational AI: Navigating the Ambiguity and Identifying Use Cases

The term ‘chatbot’ has become ambiguous in 2023 following the release of ChatGPT by Open AI and competing generative AI solutions. Is ChatGPT a chatbot? What’s the difference? Which should your organization use? And how?

In this ISTC Meets session, we look at the recent evolution of conversational AI options, clarify the ambiguity, make distinctions, and discuss use cases peculiar to each.

This session is suitable for technical writers, UX writers and conversational designers – and anyone wondering what developments in AI mean for content professionals.

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Toni Byrd-Ressaire

Toni Byrd-Ressaire is Director of Innovation and serves on the senior leadership team at Technically Write IT (TWi). She teaches Advanced Technical Writing in the MSc program at Munster Technological University (MTU) in Ireland. Toni has worked as a consultant, trainer, and educator in tech comm. 

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How to engage a technical audience with an eLearning training format.

As accredited trainers for data systems in the Smart Buildings industry, we have faced many challenges designing globally accessible eLearning. In my presentation, I would like to explain how we overcame these to be able to remotely qualify real understanding of the technical material, and perhaps more importantly – to make it enjoyable.

This presentation is suitable for technical writers, but also for trainers, UX writers and instructional designers.

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Emma Eynon

Emma Eynon is the CEO of Fantom Factory Ltd, an IT support company for environmental technologies. Fantom Factory works at the leading edge of new web and data systems providing consultancy, software development, and training services for the Smart Buildings and Energy Management industries.

As an experienced technical support engineer, writer, and group trainer, Emma leads the business efforts on accredited eLearning training and development. As a British Army veteran, an Armed Forces community champion, (and as a Mars Society and STEM UK ambassador) she contributes a strong focus on helping people from all backgrounds to access new careers and advanced technologies.

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Wrangling Subject Matter Experts

In my experience as a technical writer, I’ve always addressed Subject Matter Expertise by becoming the expert, rather than interviewing the expert. Most of the questions I asked were small, discrete, and easy to manage.

Later, I wrote an application to help technical writers conduct better SME Interviews, but it was accidentally based on the flawed assumption that other technical writers would mirror my approach.

Now, I’m writing about a suite of applications for which it simply isn’t feasible to become the expert, and it’s made me realize the root of the problem: taking large sets of unstructured text data transcribed from interviews and turning it into structured documentation.

Come and hear my story and see how I’m applying NLP and the GPT model to a transcript of an interview, and using it to plan topics, outlines, and ultimately write a first draft of a document.

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John Davenport

John is a technical writer, engineer and entrepreneur with an interest in how writers can use innovative technologies like LLMs (large language models) to work smarter and solve problems.

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Working with product managers: if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em

It’s notoriously difficult to pin down what product management actually is, which makes it an equally hard function to work with or draw clear lines of responsibility around. It doesn’t help that it shifts from organisation to organisation, or even product to product. Most product managers would agree that it always involves working out who your customers are, what they need, and how to give it to them. And if those sound suspiciously like technical communication skills, it’s because they are.

Reflecting on my own journey from technical writing to product management, I’ll try to give a perspective on what product managers care about, how to work with them, and what a career track might look like between the two disciplines.

This presentation is for anyone who’s worked (and possibly argued) with a product manager. It’s suitable for all levels of experience.

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Roger Hart

As a product manager, Roger’s spent the last decade or so trying to help companies build the right things, for the right people. He started his tech career as a technical author, moving to content strategy, product marketing and eventually product management, working in start-ups, scale-ups, the 3rd sector, and now at Microsoft.

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Writing is designing: Use words to build better experiences

Without words, apps would be an unusable jumble of shapes and icons, while voice interfaces and chatbots wouldn’t even exist. Words make digital experiences human-centred and require just as much thought as the branding and code. See how interfaces rely on language, and how writing can make or break an experience, and learn principles for UX writing that anyone who works on digital products can apply to their own work.

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Andy Welfle

When Andy was eight, he wanted to be a poet and a paleontologist. Twenty-seven years later, he is neither, but uses those skills in his day job as a content strategist on Adobe’s product design team – writing under huge constraints and uncovering artifacts from big, old software interfaces. When he’s not working, he’s creating podcasts and zines about one of his favorite topics: wooden pencils. Find him in San Francisco with his wife and two very large cats, or online at andy.wtf

Michael J. Metts

Michael J. Metts helps teams build great products and services by putting people first. With a background in journalism, he frequently finds himself talking about the role words play in designing useful, usable digital products. He has given talks and taught workshops at industry conferences around the world. He lives with his wife two children and a very small dog just outside Chicago.

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Brain the size of a planet: what should we be discussing with ChatGPT?

ChatGPT, OpenAI’s wildly successful AI, is happy to take on the role of Marvin from Hitchhiker’s Guide and ironically complain about the uninteresting requests it usually receives. In this talk, I show examples of more exciting topics taken from philosophy and ethics, and give advice, based on my own experience, of how to interact with ChatGPT when talking about these issues. In particular, I contrast the rather dull answers typically produced in response to direct questions, and the more surprising ones that can be produced when Chat is given indirect requests for essays, stories and the like.

This presentation is for anyone who’s wondering if their job will be taken by bots. It’s suitable for writers at any stage of their career.

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Manny Rayner has worked in Artificial Intelligence, computational linguistics, language technology and related subjects since the 80s, and has over 200 peer-reviewed publications. He has held positions at SRI International and NASA Ames Research Center, and is currently working at the University of Geneva. He has been an enthusiastic early adopter of ChatGPT. His paper “ChatGPT acts as though it has strong ethical intuitions, even though it says it hasn’t any” has logged over 500 reads since being posted on the ResearchGate site in mid-January.

Visualising data for effective communication

Technical writing isn’t just about words – we also use tables, charts and diagrams to explain concepts and guide users. In this session, Jon will explore the art and science of data visualisation and give some pointers on how writers can use visual techniques to make complex information easier for users to understand.

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I began my career in data analytics and came to data visualisation through a passion for design and User Experience. I act as a consultant within the dunnhumby data science community, helping analysts, product managers and UX designers to tell compelling stories with data.

Master storyteller, Anne Dougherty, gives a 33 minute presentation about why stories matter and how people consume stories, and shows how to use UX tools you are already familiar with to be a more effective storyteller yourself.

References mentioned in the video are included below.

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Stories are the way humans shape our world. From how we cope with family gatherings to evaluating sales pitches and proposals at work, stories are the basis of everything human beings do and experience.

Too often when UX professionals tell the story of our work to stakeholders and decision makers, we focus on things they don’t need or can’t use, which makes it harder for us to motivate them.

After my talk Story or Die: How to Use UX Methods to Tell More Effective Stories and Increase Team Success, attendees will understand how they can apply UX methods they already know and use every day to craft stories that will win over their audience no matter who that audience might be.

This presentation is for anyone looking to spruce up their storytelling skills. Folks who are early to mid-career may benefit most.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

I am a Content Strategist with more than 20 years’ experience telling stories in non-profit, government, and corporate spaces. You can check out my portfolio and other bona fides on my website – www.annedougherty.com 

References

For fiction storytellers:

• Wired for Story by Lisa Cron (2012)
• Story Genius by Lisa Cron (2016)
• Damn Fine Story by Chuck Wendig (2017)
• Kick-Ass Writer by Chuck Wendig (2013)

For business storytellers:

• Story or Die by Lisa Cron (2021)
• Harvard Business Review (2017)
  • “The Science Behind The Art Of Storytelling”- tinyurl.com/istchbr1
  • “What Makes Storytelling So Effective For Learning?” – tinyurl.com/istchbr2

YouTube Resources: https://bit.ly/StorytellingYouTubePlaylist

Copy of the deck: https://bit.ly/deckStoryorDieISTC

Paul Bakker gives a fantastic 40-minute primer on key legal terms and information for technical communicators, with examples and explanations. An educational and easy-to-understand talk about this important topic, it is suitable for any technical communicators who deal with products, systems or services that have the potential to harm.

Download the slides from Paul Bakker’s presentation.

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• Do communicators need to worry about the law?
• Law of torts – negligence
• Product safety & product liability
• Three brief case studies
• Liability of the professional communicator

This presentation would be suitable for any technical communicators who deal with products, systems or services that have the potential to harm.

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Paul has worked as a technical communicator, trainer and consultant for 30 years. He is a former Vice-President of the UK’s Institute of Scientific and Technical Communicators and was the visiting lecturer in Technical writing and editing at the University of Twente from 2003 – 2018. He has also taught at Eindhoven University of Technology and within many commercial organisations. Paul has also acted as an expert witness in legal proceedings and arbitrations in several jurisdictions when the efficacy and accuracy of instructions have been relevant factors when injury has been allegedly caused by products or processes.

A 39-minute presentation by Tana Franko on the Content Operations team that she leads at Cisco. She talks about the team, the skills, tools and practices they use, and the services they provide. Full of useful reflections that can be taken and applied to many contexts, as well as an overview of a successful global, remote team working in 2022.

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In 2021, a group of seasoned content pros with diverse skillsets came together to form a Content Operations team supporting an organization of 80+ tech writers providing help content for Webex. We’ve been exploring Agile, trying to figure out how to become more data-driven, migrating content between CMSes, dreaming about the future of content delivery, and building a close-knit (and fully remote, global) culture along the way. I’ll talk about some of the ups and downs of our journey so far.

This presentation is intended for audiences with any level of experience in the field.

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Tana Franko is a Data Analysis Manager in Collaboration at Cisco Systems. Although a technical writer for most of her 20+ year career at Cisco, she also held a multitude of other roles (under an even greater multitude of managers) including hardware and software testing, automation, system administration, and management. She believes strongly in the power of communication and collaboration to advance both one’s own growth and the strength of one’s team.

A 28-minute video packed with great advice and some hot takes to get you thinking about your work, our profession, and your career path, whether you describe yourself as working in UX content, content design, content strategy, or, as you’ll see, any other of the many job titles that relate to technical communication.

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Finding your place in a field that’s always evolving can be disorienting. And feeling like your own skills and experience get overlooked in favour of trendy new disciplines can be disheartening. In this session, Scott will try to both orient and enhearten by working through five uncomfortable — but important — truths about this moment in UX content.

He’ll explore ideas like why letting non-experts write can be a good thing, the accidental gatekeeping that’s all-too-easy for technical writers to engage in, why new job titles and terms of art are in fact a good thing, and other thoughts that are sure to ruffle some feathers, cause some harrumphing, and maybe, hopefully, inspire a dynamic and useful discussion.

Scott will deliver a brief, get-you-thinking talk followed by an open Q&A, so bring your questions about content strategy, content design, UX writing, and the role that UX content plays in our organizations.

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A leading voice in UX content, Scott Kubie trains product teams and leaders how to improve customer experience through content strategy, content design, and information architecture. He’s the author of Writing for Designers from A Book Apart, publishes the UX Writing Events newsletter, hosts UX Content Office Hours, runs the Content Career Accelerator, and writes regularly about content and digital strategy on his site, kubie.co. Scott has led over 100 talks and workshops for international audiences, as well as dozens of on-site workshops for clients including Harvard, The Getty, and the IRS.

A 37-minute video that covers mental models, and how we can think about our communication to ensure that users understand us correctly. Featuring examples of how things go wrong and a clear framework of what goes on in a users mind, you’ll go away with your own mental model to help you understand your users better, as well as a list of key points to address in your communication.

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One problem faced by technical communicators today is the fact that users often misunderstand or reject the information they find in user assistance and, consequentially, may dismiss the usefulness of the information entirely.

This presentation will explore research indicating that users shape a mental model of a product while using it. If the model does not match how a product works, the user will not be able to use the product or understand what they are reading in the manual. In this presentation, you will learn why this is happening and how technical communicators can design information in order to reduce misunderstandings and make it easier for users to shape a relevant mental model. The presentation draws upon sociocultural theory about how individuals learn and develop knowledge to accomplish tasks.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Jonatan is a senior information architect within the technical communication field, currently employed at Excosoft in Sweden. He received his PhD, which deals with the design of manuals, in 2020 from Mälardalen University. He has more than 25 years of experience of working as a technical communicator, mostly from a position as an information architect. As a frequent speaker at technical communication conferences, such as SIGDOC, ISDOC, tcworld, NORDIC Techkomm, STVY, FTI, DITA Europe, STC India etc, he thrives when discussing design challenges with fellow technical communicators.

A 46-minute presentation by content strategist and author, Margot Bloomstein. Margot discusses why trust is such an important topic for communicators today and how to go about gaining trust and building confidence in your audience. Filled with examples from business, journalism and government, Margot’s talk will leave you feeling inspired and empowered to bring about positive change.

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In today’s economy, businesses need a new strategy to earn trust and help consumers and citizens make confident decisions. Undermining confidence is cynicism: it erodes trust in the media, government, public institutions, and consumer brands. To regain trust, we talk about empathy, transparency, and authenticity. But how do we get beyond those buzzwords in copy—and what is the responsibility and opportunity for content developers and content strategists to lead the way? The secret is in how we use content to empower our audiences: when we give more control to users, they put more trust in us.

Examining what works among teams of all stripes and sizes, Margot Bloomstein will share examples from retail, publishing, government, software, and other industries to detail what you can do to meet new challenges in information consumption. Learn how voice, volume, and vulnerability can inform your work to regain trust and lead your audience and organization from cynicism toward something far more productive: action and hope.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Margot Bloomstein is one of the most prominent voices in the content strategy industry. She is the author of Trustworthy: How the Smartest Brands Beat Cynicism and Bridge the Trust Gap and Content Strategy at Work: Real-World Stories to Strengthen Every Interactive Project and is the principal of Appropriate, Inc., a brand and content strategy consultancy based in Boston. As a speaker and strategic adviser, she has worked with marketing teams in a range of organizations over the past two decades, including the American Montessori Society, Fidelity, Harvard University, Lovehoney, Mailchimp, and Sallie Mae. The creator of BrandSort, she developed the popular message architecture-driven approach to content strategy. Margot advises Women Talk Design and teaches in the content strategy graduate program at FH Joanneum University in Graz, Austria. She also lectures around the world about brand-driven content strategy and designing for trust. Find her on Twitter at @mbloomstein.

A 39-minute presentation by John Kearney about the interplay between technical communication and cyber security. In this engaging and informative presentation, John takes a user-centred approach to the issue of cyber security, and looks at how an awareness of security can inform our work as technical communicators. Highly recommended to all working in tech comms (and even those not)!

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Cyber security is not just about hacking or coming up with technical tools and tricks to counter hackers. The ability to clearly communicate complex information is vital in the ongoing effort to help people be more secure.

In my talk, I hope to cover ways in which writers can help cyber professionals, and also what we can learn from them to produce better and safer content in other areas.

Audience:
Anyone in technical communication, from entry level to advanced.
No prior knowledge of cyber security is required, but curiosity is welcome!

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

John is a technical communication consultant with over 20 years of experience. He worked in cyber security early in his career, returning in 2018. Since then he has worked alongside security specialists to produce user-centred content in the public and private sectors. His pronouns are he/him.

A 33-minute presentation by Dr Anu Singh about what are disruptions and how do we adapt to them as technical communicators. Touching on what it means to be a technical communicator, and how we go about our role, the talk has something for both those new to the profession and those seeking to think about their established processes.

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With the latest technology trends, intuitive products and smart devices, it has become critical to create content that is credible, concise and intelligent for enhancing client experiences for the products and services. At the same time, in this ever evolving uncertain times, it has become vital to create content that instil a feeling of safety and success in the users.

This session will attempt to explore strategies for creating content with respect to platform and delivery, and processes and tools for content development in disruptive times. Additionally, considerations for using technology like AI enabled Bots, micro-content and micro-learning that can address various information needs of targeted audiences for personalized experiences, enhanced efficiencies, discoverability, accessibility etc., at the same time.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Dr Anu Singh is a creative disrupter who believes in the enormity of the human mind, its thoughts, feelings and the social paradigm it creates and coexists in. Anu’s mission is to close the gap between experiential learning of a user on products they use for the first time through content. She can help you connect the dots between a great product experience and a successful product adoption for customers.

Anu possesses numerous degrees and certifications, and years of progressive experiences in varied technical and non-technical areas like content operations and strategy, structured and unstructured content development, client experience, project management including Agile, employee engagement and career development, management and leadership with a focus on empowering clients and enabling their success through adaptive predictive information around their needs.

Anu is passionate about technical communication and has presented at multiple platforms like CIDM Summer Ideas conference, ConVEx, STC India Annual and Regional conferences, tcWorld, Technical Writer’s Tribe and various forums within her organization.  She is a life-long learner and volunteers for non-profit organizations like Society of Technical Communicators (STC) India as a learning manager, Technical Writer’s Tribe as an instructor, Mentor Together as a life-skill mentor for young adults.

Anu has earned a Ph.D. in English Literature for her studies about American Literature and Indian Writing in English, and she loves reading about culture, new technologies and stories in the novel or short-story format.

A recording for this event is not available.

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In tech comms, quality documentation has an impact: it can reduce support, training, and development costs and increase conversions and sales. The content we produce can also help to attract and retain customers, minimize risks and liabilities, and increase compliance with regulatory bodies.But as we continue to create and update content, what happens to the content we leave behind? What is the impact of unused or outdated content on our teams and our customers? And, more importantly, on our environment?In this session, Chris will talk about the concept of content debt and how lowering it can be an initial step to developing environmentally conscious content. She’ll talk about how to recognize and reduce content debt and provide tips for starting a content debt management plan of your own.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Chris Hester is the founder of Red Desk Studio, a consultancy that specializes in content strategy, taxonomy, and knowledge management solutions. She has presented at the TCUK conference and other events.

A 43-minute presentation by Chui Chui Tan, Director of Beyo Global about the impact of cultural differences when communicating to global audiences. Full of insight, stories, and helpful reference information, this is sure to be of interest to anyone in communication, sales or marketing, whether technical or not. Worth listening to for insight in communicating with your home audience too!

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

In this hour, Chui Chui will talk about why, when designing and communicating with your global customers or users in different countries with different cultural backgrounds, it is important to have a clear holistic understanding of them and their context. Examples will be given to show what to look out for when setting design and business directions to provide an as best and localised experience for your global audiences as possible. The session will also include time for the audience to raise any questions they might have and for us to discuss as a group.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Chui Chui Tan, Founder of Beyō Global, is a culturalisation strategist and customer experience (CX/UX) consultant. She helps companies create products and services which provide the experience their global customers need, desire and expect.

With a PhD in Human-Computer Interaction, Chui Chui takes a holistic approach to fully understanding customers/users with different cultural backgrounds, to help businesses define their (product, marketing, design, business, new market launch) strategies and grow their international reach and markets.

Her clients include names such as Spotify, Netflix, Asana, Babylon Health, Marriott, and Clarks, as well as start-ups, preparing for their launch and advising their global strategy. Chui Chui is the author of International User Research, and frequently speaks and runs online/offline workshops on Culturalisation and International UX.

A 37-minute talk by translation professional Catherine Rushton giving us a great insight into the world of translation for technical writing. With demonstration of the processes and software involved, you will learn about the different ways to get translation done, and how to set yourself and your translator up for success, as well as see how the information you provide a translator is used. Invaluable for anyone involved in writing for, or being responsible for, translation.

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

So. You need to translate your documentation. How do you find the right translator(s)? What exactly is the sorcery that turns your files from  language A into language B? And what can you as the customer do to ensure  fit-for-purpose translations while obtaining value for money? This talk will help you distinguish the good from the mediocre, walk you through translation tools, processes and practices, and set you up for success and sanity.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Cat Rushton is a freelance translator and reviser working from French, German and Spanish into English. She specialises in technical documentation and industrial marketing content.

Before setting up her business in 2011, she spent 20-plus years running the gamut of international B2B marketing, market research, consultancy and business analysis. Alongside a Modern Languages degree she has an MA in European Management from Cranfield and is a qualified member of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting (ITI).

Cat is a closet nerd with a creative streak, which may explain why she builds her own computers but is also a published songwriter.

We are not able to share the video from this talk on the website.

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

Our teams are facing requests for more, better content – faster. Governance frameworks codify the policies, processes, roles and responsibilities that enable consistent content production and can help Tech Comms teams deliver on those requests. This session will look at what a governance framework is and how to start defining one for your team.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Chris Hester is the founder of Red Desk Studio, a consultancy that specializes in content strategy, taxonomy, and knowledge management solutions. She has presented at the TCUK conference and other events.

A 34-minute presentation by graphic designer Bjørn Smalbro about his work with Adobe creating some new templates for Adobe FrameMaker. He goes through the thinking behind them and how they might be used, as well as how templates in general work in FrameMaker.

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

Bjørn works with all sorts of graphic design. Lately he has taken up developing templates for Adobe FrameMaker. It was in that capacity that Adobe reached out to him, about creating new templates for Adobe FrameMaker 2020.Adobe FrameMaker, which is the main part of the Adobe Technical Communication Suite, is mostly used for long document publishing like end users guides, product manuals and reference works. This is an area where graphic innovation can be a bit conservative, so Bjørn was chosen to create some fresh designs. Being a sample manual, there are some considerations to do and design decisions to contemplate. Bjørn will talk about the design process, the thinking behind it and show the samples. He will also demonstrate how FrameMaker’s templates can be used for working with the aesthetics of publications.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Bjørn lives in Copenhagen, Denmark with his wife and daughter in a crumbling old bungalow. In his sparetime he likes tinkering with woodwork and and enjoys reading most everything from sci-fi over russian novels to graphic novels.

Bjørn also owns and runs Tequila.dk and TequilaList.com. Tequila.dk is a webshop specializing in highend Tequila and Mezcal and TequilaList.com is a europe oriented tequila blog.

A 38-minute video by Mike Ingeldew about technical publications, and the systems & technology we now have to support them, with a focus on S1000D and the Aerospace, Space and Defence industry.

Please note that the video sadly recorded at a low frame rate and this affects it throughout, however there are some great, detailed slides worth seeing.

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

The aerospace, defence and space technical publication is changing and at a rapid rate. The adoption of domain focused standards and specifications coupled with external influences like the Internet of Things and a continuous OEM ambition for a deeper integrated product, all mean the authors role is evolving and how the technical publication itself has changed on many projects.In this webinar, Michael Ingledew, Managing Director of Tech Data World, will present on how the modern technical publication is being used today to support complex products and platforms in the aerospace, defence and space domains. Where the publication is going and why the author today is more than a traditional writer.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ingledew/

A 20-min presentation by Amanda Maher about the UK Technical Communication Awards, which are now open for 2021. Focused on how Amanda prepared and entered her winning entry in 2020, it offers great ideas for anyone interested in entering in the future.

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

As a small business owner and freelancer, Amanda will be talking about how the UK TC Awards are open to projects of all sizes, and to encourage you to think about the impact of celebrating your work both for yourself and your clients.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

At the TCUK 2020 online conference, Amanda Maher received a UK Technical Communications (TC) Merit Award for the iHASCO Knowledge Base. Amanda is an active member of the ISTC, and hosts our monthly podcast at http://istctechcomm.podbean.com/

Vera Gergely is the Chair of the International Plain Language Federation and spoke for 35 minutes about Plain Language: what it is, how to use it, the organisations involved in its adoption, and the new ISO standard being produced as an International framework for plain language across the globe!

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

We are very pleased to announce that Vera Gergely, the Chair of the International Plain Language Federation (IPLF), is going to be joining us for our March TCUK online.

If you’re not sure what plain language is, the chances are you’ll immediately recognise it when you hear about it. We’re very excited to have Vera come and speak.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

In 2014 Vera embarked on the ambitious task of introducing plain language in Hungary. Since then, they have worked as a freelancer, offering plain language editing and training to companies. Vera also wrote a comprehensive guide on how to write clearly in Hungarian.
Vera also leads the Drafting Committee of the ISO Working Group for international plain language standards, is the chair of the International Plain language Federation, and a Board member of PLAIN (Plain Language Association International).

A 30-minute presentation by Ciaran Dodd about how to work with ASD-STE100 Simplified Technical English (STE) with examples of correcting text to fit the STE rules, words, and philosophy.

A 30-minute presentation by Mike Unwalla on Simplified Technical English, what it is, what it is for, and the pros and cons for its use. PLEASE NOTE: Presentation slides are only used for about the middle 10 minutes, this is intentional. Some visual aids were also used that were not recorded, but are described verbally.

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

Human failures cause accidents. A typical cause of human failure is unclear instructions. ASD-STE100 Simplified Technical English (STE) helps to make instructions clear, and thus STE decreases the risk of human failure.

Standard English can be difficult for people who read English as a second language. Phrasal verbs (multi-word verbs) such as ‘carry out’, ‘put up with’, and ‘work out’ are a special problem. STE helps to make text clear to people who read English as a second language.

STE is a controlled language. This presentation gives examples of rules from STE. The examples show how STE makes text as clear as possible.

The implementation of STE in an organization is not easy. The implementation must include terminology management. Input from subject-matter experts is necessary. Possibly, technical communicators will resist the use of STE, because they do not like to conform to a controlled language. Technical communicators must be trained to write STE.

You can read most of what I will say in ‘The case for ASD-STE100 Simplified Technical English’ in ‘Current Practices and Trends in Technical and Professional Communication’ (https://istc.org.uk/publications-and-resources/istc-books/current-practices-and-trends-in-technical-and-professional-communication/). Come to this presentation ready to ask questions, argue, disagree, and discuss. Thank you.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Many years ago, Mike taught English as a foreign language. Now, he is a freelance technical writer. At the ISTC conference (now TCUK) in 2001, someone showed him a software checker for AECMA Simplified English, which is now ASD-STE10 Simplified Technical English (STE) (www.asd-ste100.org). Since then, he has been interested in STE. He was a temporary UK representative of the Simplified Technical English Maintenance Group (STEMG) at the May 2019 meeting. He is a member of the UK Simplified Technical English Working Group.

A 30-minute update to David’s 2019 TCUK (Technical Communication UK) conference presentation “10 Minutes to Midnight”. David talks about his experience moving the documentation from after development to alongside development using the CI/CD (Continuous Integration & Continuous Delivery) model.

ABOUT THE PRESENTATION

Documentation is often written right before the midnight deadline. It’s a classic release-based documentation problem: we think we can’t start to write content until the software is stable, tested and ready for release. But that’s the worst time to access SMEs, do the research, and write good-quality content. We write in a rush, or we release documentation late. It’s a lose-lose scenario for both writers and readers.
However, if we look at practices in code development, we see that “Continuous Integration” (CI) and “Continuous Delivery” (CD) is increasingly being used to solve a similar problem in software, combined with a “Shift left” approach. David will describe how he is adopting a CI/CD solution for documentation, and how you can apply a similar solution yourselves, by both “shifting down” to turn everyone into writers, and by “shifting left” to write documentation earlier.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

David is the Information Architect at Snyk, a software company selling developer-first tools based around the Snyk platform.
David has worked in technical communications for nearly 30 years, including information architecture, technical writing and content development, working on a range of documentation: from product descriptions, to user guides, to detailed API documentation. David has worked for multiple companies in the software sector, including ServiceNow and White Clarke Group.

A 35-minute presentation by Matthew Ellison, launching the ISTC’s monthly “TCUK online” series. Matthew discusses what featured snippets and micro content are, how they are useful, and how to set them up in MadCap Flare.

About the presenter