Further information on entries and winners appears in the Winter issue of Communicator of the same year. Online issues of Communicator are available to ISTC members only after logging in.
UK Technical Communication Awards
The winners were announced on Tuesday 29th September at TCUK Metro, a virtual conference hosted by the ISTC. Six companies, with contributors from several countries, were recognised for the quality of their entries, five receiving Merit Awards and one received the trophy as Overall Winner.
Georgie Jones and Tom Wardak accepted the trophy for the BTL Group and gave some insights into the work that went into their entry, the Surpass Help Site.
UKTC 2020 Winner
Surpass Help Site (BTL Group)
Overall feedback from the judges
“This is a very impressive entry; it was ambitious in scope creating an online document suite providing task-based content specifically for online use. This was approached as a page-one re-structure and re-write of existing content. This involved extensive research, much cross-team work and usability testing throughout the project. The entry is engaging and evidently user-focused. The look and feel is inviting; use of text and graphics is appropriate and consistent. The user can be confident in the quality of the information provided. The judges declared this to be an outstanding end product for an exceptional team effort. “
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Merit Award (Judges’ Commendation)
Kedro Technical Documentation (QuantumBlack Labs)
Overall feedback from the judges
“The judges singled out this Merit Award winner for commendation since it is so successful in meeting its objective. It is designed to help new users assess the suitability of the Kedro product for their purposes. The entry is so readily usable and consistently informative; it includes good features such as links to relevant external documentation, the ability to copy and paste example code, and direct writing style to match the product framework. One judge without knowledge of Python wrote, ‘I started reading and I got hooked!’”
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Merit Award
Distitch (Assia Brill, James Bartley)
Overall feedback from the judges
“Distitch is a very attractive and engaging entry with clear instructions and excellent clear graphics. The professional appearance of the samples with real word images using the same colour thread as the hand-drawn images impressed the judges especially. The structure is appropriate for the subject matter and consistently applied; a very accomplished piece.”
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Merit Award
Cognidox Online Help (Martin Ley, Em-Dash Publications)
Overall feedback from the judges
“Cognidox Online Help is an impressive entry and a great example of effective writing by a sole technical author. There was significant work in managing the migration of material and post-migration. The author collaborated on the dashboard style for the front page; this is effective and good use is made of Flare’s features. The author also liaised extensively in integration of high quality video tutorials into the online help. The delivery of the content and the use of language are impressive.”
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Merit Award
Mobile LPG Filling Truck Sales Brochure
(Koslan Crisplant Lanka(Pvt) Ltd)
Overall feedback from the judges
“The brochure has a very professional feel; the graphics are very well designed and do a good job of explaining the system. The key information is provided in a very easy-to-digest form. The images and annotations complement each other well.”
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Merit Award
iHASCO Knowledge Base
(Spirit Software Ltd & iHASCO Ltd)
Overall feedback from the judges
“iHASCO Knowledge Base is an accomplished entry providing information for three user types: learner, administrator and technical support staff. The entry is organised such that it is always who the text is intended for. There is a good ‘look and feel’ and the navigation is clear and consistent. Extensive and effective background work really shows through in the end product.”
Communicator Awards
Communicator Article of the Year Winner
Helen Hill for her series of articles on elearning.
Katherine Judge, ISTC Communicator editor introduced the Award (Communicator Article of the Year as voted by the readers. She presented the Award to Helen Hill for her series of articles on elearning. Helen was present to accept the Award and give some background to her series.