Technical Writing Chapter 4

What does monitor the project mean?

-By regularly tracking the progress of the project, the team can learn what has already been accomplished, whether the project is on schedule, and if any unexpected challenges exist

What does arrange for tech support at each site mean?

-Participants can quickly become impatient or lose interest when someone is fumbling to make the technology work. Each site should have a person who can set up the equipment and troubleshoot if problems arise.

Listening effectively

-Participating in a meeting involves listening and speaking. If you listen carefully to other people, you will understand what they are thinking and you will be able to speak knowledgeably and constructively. Unlike hearing, which involves receiving and processing sound waves, listening involves understanding what the speaker is saying and interpreting the information

What does plan your project mean?

-Planning allows collaborators to develop an effective approach and reach agreement before investing a lot of time and resources. Planning prevents small problems from becoming big problems with a deadline looming. Effective project managers use planning documents such as needs analyses, information plans, specifications, and project plans.

Word Processing Tools

-The comment feature lets readers add electronic comments to a file. -The revision feature lets readers mark up a text by deleting, revising, and adding words and indicates who made which suggested changes. -The highlighting feature lets readers use one of about a dozen "highlighting pens" to call the writer's attention to a particular passage.

Pulling your Weight on Collaborative Projects

-Collaboration involves an ethical dimension. If you work hard and well, you help the other members of the team. If you don't, you hurt them. -You can't be held responsible for knowing and doing everything, and sometimes unexpected problems arise in other courses or in your private life that prevent you from participating as actively and effectively as you otherwise could. When problems occur, inform the other team members as soon as possible. For instance, call the team leader as soon as you realize you will have to miss a meeting. Be honest about what happened. Suggest ways you might make up for missing a task. If you communicate clearly, the other team members are likely to cooperate with you. -If you are a member of a team that includes someone who is not participating fully, keep records of your attempts to get in touch with that person. When you do make contact, you owe it to that person to try to find out what the problem is and suggest ways to resolve it. Your goal is to treat that person fairly and to help him or her do better work, so that the team will function more smoothly and more effectively.

Conducting Meetings

-Collaboration involves meetings. Whether you are meeting live in a room or using videoconferencing tools

What are the Advantages of Collaboration?

- Survey shows more than 75% said that collaboration is critical to their success on the job -90% say collaboration makes them more productive -Writers who collaborate can create a better document and improve the way an organization functions -Collaboration draws on a wider knowledge base. Therefore, a collaborative document can be more comprehensive and more accurate than a single-author document. -Collaboration draws on a wider skills base. No one person can be an expert manager, writer, editor, graphic artist, and production person. -Collaboration provides a better idea of how the audience will read the document. Because each collaborator acts as an audience, working with collaborators produces more questions and suggestions than one person could while writing alone. -Collaboration improves communication among employees. Because you and your collaborators share a goal, you learn about each other's jobs, responsibilities, and frustrations. -Collaboration helps acclimate new employees to an organization. New employees learn how things work — which people to see, which forms to fill out, and so forth — as well as what the organization values, such as ethical conduct and the willingness to work hard and sacrifice for an important initiative. -Collaboration motivates employees to help an organization grow. New employees bring new skills, knowledge, and attitudes that can help the organization develop. More experienced employees mentor the new employees as they learn. Everyone teaches and learns from everyone else, and the organization benefits.

What does distribute and act on information quickly mean?

-Acting fast to get collaborators the information they need helps ensure that the team makes effective decisions and steady progress toward completing the project.

What does be flexible regarding schedule and responsibilities mean?

-Adjust your plan and methods when new information becomes available or problems arise. When tasks are held up because earlier tasks have been delayed or need reworking, the team should consider revising responsibilities to keep the project moving forward.

Maintaining a Professional Presence Online

-Although the law has not always kept pace with recent technological innovations, a few things are clear. You and your organization can be held liable if you make defamatory statements (statements that are untrue and damaging) about people or organizations, publish private information (such as trade secrets) or something that publicly places an individual "in a false light," publish personnel information, harass others, or participate in criminal activity. In addition, follow these guidelines to avoid important ethical pitfalls: -Don't waste company time using social media for nonbusiness purposes. You owe your employer diligence (hard work). -Don't divulge secure information, such as a login and password that expose your organization to unauthorized access, and don't reveal information about products that have not yet been released. -Don't divulge private information about anyone. Private information relates to such issues as religion, politics, and sexual orientation. -Don't make racist or sexist comments or post pictures of people drinking. If your organization has a written policy on the use of social media, study it carefully. Ask questions if anything in it is unclear. If the policy is incomplete, work to make it complete. If there is no policy, work to create one. (According to a report from Cisco Systems (2010), half of the surveyed employees claim to routinely ignore company guidelines that prohibit the use of social media for non-work-related activities during company time. If you use your organization's social media at work, be sure to act professionally so that your actions reflect positively on you and your organization. Be aware of several important legal and ethical issues related to social media.)

What does create and maintain an accurate schedule mean?

-An accurate schedule helps collaborators plan ahead, allocate their time, and meet deadlines. Update your schedule when changes are made, and either place the up-to-date schedule in an easily accessible location (for example, on a project website) or send the schedule to each team member. If the team misses a deadline, immediately create a new deadline. Team members should always know when tasks must be completed.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Collaboration

-As a professional, you will work collaboratively on many more projects. In the workplace, the stakes might be higher. Effective collaboration can make you look like a star, but ineffective collaboration can ruin an important project — and hurt your reputation. The best way to start thinking about collaboration is to understand its main advantages and disadvantages.

Managing Projects

-At some point in your career, you will likely collaborate on a project that is just too big, too technical, too complex, and too difficult for your team to complete successfully without some advance planning and careful oversight. Often, collaborative projects last several weeks or months, and the efforts of several people are required at scheduled times for the project to proceed. For this reason, collaborators need to spend time managing the project to ensure that it not only meets the needs of the audience but also is completed on time and, if relevant, within budget.

Communicating Diplomatically

-Because collaborating can be stressful, it can lead to interpersonal conflict. People can become frustrated and angry with one another because of personality clashes or because of disputes about the project. If the project is to succeed, however, team members have to work together productively. When you speak in a team meeting, you want to appear helpful, not critical or overbearing.

What are the seven suggestions that can help you keep your project on track?

-Break down a large project into several smaller tasks -Plan your project -Create and maintain an accurate schedule -Put your decisions in writing -Monitor the project -Distribute and act on information quickly -Be flexible regarding schedule and responsibilities

How does this type of collaboration work?

-Sometimes you and your teammates will use social media primarily to gather information that you will use in your research -You then bring this information back to your team and start drafting, revising, and proofreading your document -In a more complex collaboration pattern, you and other members of your team might use social media to gather information from sources around the globe and then reach out to others in your organization to see what they think of your new ideas. (Create your outline of the document in a wiki, and assign everyone different sections to work on, pose questions and comments, and even edit what others have written. -You can collaborate with any number of people at one or at several stages of the writing process

Disadvantages of Collaboration

-Collaboration takes more time than individual writing. It takes longer because of the time needed for the collaborators to communicate. In addition, meetings — whether they are live or remote — can be difficult to schedule. -Collaboration can lead to groupthink. When collaborators value getting along more than thinking critically about the project, they are prone to groupthink. Groupthink, which promotes conformity, can result in an inferior document, because no one wants to cause a scene by asking tough questions. -Collaboration can yield a disjointed document. Sections can contradict or repeat each other or be written in different styles. To prevent these problems, writers need to plan and edit the document carefully. -Collaboration can lead to inequitable workloads. Despite the project leader's best efforts, some people will end up doing more work than others. -Collaboration can reduce a person's motivation to work hard on the document. A collaborator who feels alienated from the team can lose motivation to make the extra effort. -Collaboration can lead to interpersonal conflict. People can disagree about the best way to create the document or about the document itself. Such disagreements can hurt working relationships during the project and long after.

How do you start your teams agenda?

-Define the team's task. Every team member has to agree on the task, the deadline, and the approximate length of the document. You also need to agree on more conceptual points, including the document's audience, purpose, and scope. -Choose a team leader. This person serves as the link between the team and management. (In an academic setting, the team leader represents the team in communicating with the instructor.) The team leader also keeps the team on track, leads the meetings, and coordinates communication among team members. -Define tasks for each team member. There are three main ways to divide the tasks: according to technical expertise (for example, one team member, an engineer, is responsible for the information about engineering), according to stages of the writing process (one team member contributes to all stages, whereas another participates only during the planning stage), or according to sections of the document (several team members work on the whole document but others work only on, say, the appendixes). People will likely assume informal roles, too. One person might be good at clarifying what others have said, another at preventing arguments, and another at asking questions that force the team to reevaluate its decisions. -Establish working procedures. Before starting to work, collaborators need answers—in writing, if possible—to the following questions: — When and where will we meet? — What procedures will we follow in the meetings? — What tools will we use to communicate with other team members, including the leader, and how often will we communicate? -Establish a procedure for resolving conflict productively. Disagreements about the project can lead to a better product. Give collaborators a chance to express ideas fully and find areas of agreement, and then resolve the conflict with a vote. -Create a style sheet. A style sheet defines the characteristics of the document's writing style. For instance, a style sheet states how many levels of headings the document will have, whether it will have lists, whether it will have an informal tone (for example, using "you" and contractions), and so forth. If all collaborators draft using a similar writing style, the document will need less revision. And be sure to use styles, to ensure a consistent design for headings and other textual features. -Establish a work schedule. For example, for a proposal to be submitted on February 10, you might aim to complete the outline by January 25, the draft by February 1, and the revision by February 8. These dates are called milestones. -Create evaluation materials. Team members have a right to know how their work will be evaluated. In college, students often evaluate themselves and other team members. In the working world, managers are more likely to do the evaluations.

Gender and Collaboration

-Effective collaboration involves two related challenges: maintaining the team as a productive, friendly working unit and accomplishing the task. Scholars of gender and collaboration see these two challenges as representing the feminine and the masculine perspectives. -This discussion should begin with a qualifier: in discussing gender, we are generalizing. The differences in behavior between two men or between two women are likely to be greater than the differences between men and women in general. -The differences in how the genders communicate and work in teams have been traced to every culture's traditional family structure. Because women were traditionally the primary caregivers in American culture, they learned to value nurturing, connection, growth, and cooperation; because men were the primary breadwinners, they learned to value separateness, competition, debate, and even conflict (Karten, 2002). In collaborative teams, women appear to value consensus and relationships more than men do, to show more empathy, and to demonstrate superior listening skills. Women talk more about topics unrelated to the task (Duin, Jorn, & DeBower, 1991), but this talk is central to maintaining team coherence. Men appear to be more competitive than women and more likely to assume leadership roles. Scholars of gender recommend that all professionals strive to achieve an androgynous mix of the skills and aptitudes commonly associated with both women and men.

Unique Collaboration

-Every document is unique so therefore it will call for a unique collaboration -Challenge is to think creatively about how you can work effectively with others to make your document as good as it can be. -Be aware of the strengths and limitations of collaborative tools

What does make eye contact with the camera mean?

-Eye contact is an important element of establishing your professional persona. The physical setup of some videoconferencing systems means you will likely spend most of your time looking at your monitor and not directly into the camera. However, this might give your viewers the impression that you are avoiding eye contact. Make a conscious effort periodically to look directly into the camera when speaking

What does practice using the technology mean?

-For many people, being on camera is uncomfortable, especially the first time. Before participating in a high-stakes videoconference, become accustomed to the camera by participating in a few informal videoconferences.

How to conduct efficient meetings?

-Human communication is largely nonverbal. That is, although people communicate through words and through the tone, rate, and volume of their speech, they also communicate through body language. For this reason, meetings provide the most information about what a person is thinking and feeling — and the best opportunity for team members to understand one another. -To help make meetings effective and efficient, team members should arrive on time and stick to the agenda. One team member should serve as secretary, recording the important decisions made at the meeting. At the end of the meeting, the team leader should summarize the team's accomplishments and state the tasks each team member is to perform before the next meeting. If possible, the secretary should give each team member this informal set of meeting minutes.

What does organize the room to encourage participation mean?

-If there is more than one person at the site, arrange the chairs so that they face the monitor and camera. Each person should be near a microphone. Before beginning the conference, check that each location has adequate audio and video as well as access to other relevant technology such as computer monitors. Finally, remember to introduce everyone in the room, even those off camera, to everyone participating in the conference.

Critiquing a Team Member's Work

-In your college classes, you probably have critiqued other students' writing. In the workplace, you will do the same sort of critiquing of notes and drafts written by other team members. Knowing how to do it without offending the writer is a valuable skill.

How to Communicate Diplomatically

-Listen carefully, without interrupting. -Give everyone a chance to speak. Don't dominate the discussion. -Avoid personal remarks and insults. Be tolerant and respectful of other people's views and working methods. Doing so is right—and smart: if you anger people, they will go out of their way to oppose you. -Don't overstate your position. A modest qualifier such as "I think" or "it seems to me" is an effective signal to your listeners that you realize that everyone might not share your views. -OVERBEARING: My plan is a sure thing; there's no way we're not going to kill Allied next quarter. -DIPLOMATIC: I think this plan has a good chance of success: we're playing off our strengths and Allied's weaknesses. -Note that in the diplomatic version, the speaker says "this plan," not "my plan." -Don't get emotionally attached to your own ideas. When people oppose you, try to understand why. Digging in is usually unwise—unless it's a matter of principle—because, although it's possible that you are right and everyone else is wrong, it's not likely. -Ask pertinent questions. Bright people ask questions to understand what they hear and to connect it to other ideas. Asking questions also encourages other team members to examine what they hear. -Pay attention to nonverbal communication. Bob might say that he understands a point, but his facial expression might show that he doesn't. If a team member looks confused, ask him or her about it. A direct question is likely to elicit a statement that will help the team clarify its discussion.

Culture and Collaboration

-Most collaborative teams in industry and in the classroom include people from other cultures. The challenge for all team members is to understand the ways in which cultural differences can affect team behavior. People from other cultures -might find it difficult to assert themselves in collaborative teams -might be unwilling to respond with a definite "no" -might be reluctant to admit when they are confused or to ask for clarification -might avoid criticizing others -might avoid initiating new tasks or performing creatively -Even the most benign gesture of friendship on the part of a U.S. student can cause confusion. If a U.S. student casually asks a Japanese student about her major and the courses she is taking, the Japanese student might find the question too personal — yet she might consider it perfectly appropriate to talk about her family and her religious beliefs (Lustig & Koester, 2012). Therefore, you should remain open to encounters with people from other cultures without jumping to conclusions about what their actions might or might not mean.

Virtual Worlds

-Organizations are using virtual worlds, such as Second Life, to conduct meetings and conferences. Participants create avatars and visit different locations in the virtual world to view displays, watch product demonstrations, hold meetings, participate in job interviews, and talk with others. Many people think that entering a three-dimensional virtual world, in which you can talk with others through a headset connected to a computer, creates a more realistic experience than merely visiting a website, watching a video, or talking on the phone. Companies such as IBM, Cisco, and Intel use virtual worlds such as Second Life and Open Sim for day-to-day activities and special events. Holding a conference for 200 employees on Second Life saved IBM some $320,000 in transportation, food, and lodging expenses (Avatars of prospective customers are examining a model created by a design firm. The avatars can walk around and view the model from any perspective. The design firm even has full-scale models of houses. Avatars can enter a house, examine the interior, and then sit down in a virtual room with the firm's representatives to discuss the design. The firm can change the design in real time in response to customers' questions and suggestions) -Although this section has discussed various collaboration tools as separate technologies, software companies are bundling programs in commercial products such as IBM Sametime, Adobe Creative Cloud, and Skype for Business, which are suites of voice, data, and video services. These services usually share four characteristics: -They are cloud based. That is, organizations lease the services and access them over the Internet. They do not have to acquire and maintain special hardware. This model is sometimes called software as a service. -They are integrated across desktop and mobile devices. Because employees can access these services from their desktops or mobile devices, they are free to collaborate in real time even if they are not at their desks. Some services provide presence awareness, the ability to determine a person's online status, availability, and geographic location. -They are customizable. Organizations can choose whichever services they wish and then customize them to work effectively with the rest of the organization's electronic infrastructure, such as computer software and telephone systems. -They are secure. Organizations store the software behind a firewall, providing security: only authorized employees have access to the services.

How to listen effectively and improve your effectiveness as a listener

-Pay attention to the speaker. Look at the speaker, and don't let your mind wander. -Listen for main ideas. Pay attention to phrases that signal important information, such as "What I'm saying is ..." or "The point I'm trying to make is ...." -Don't get emotionally involved with the speaker's ideas. Even if you disagree, continue to listen. Keep an open mind. Don't stop listening in order to plan what you are going to say next. -Ask questions to clarify what the speaker said. After the speaker finishes, ask questions to make sure you understand. For instance, "When you said that each journal recommends different protocols, did you mean that each journal recommends several protocols or that each journal recommends a different protocol?" -Provide appropriate feedback. The most important feedback is to look into the speaker's eyes. You can nod your approval to signal that you understand what he or she is saying. Appropriate feedback helps assure the speaker that he or she is communicating effectively.

What are the 6 suggestions for participating effectively in a videoconference?

-Practice using the technology -Arrange for tech support at each site -Organize the room to encourage participation -Make eye contact with the camera -Dress as you would for a fact to face meeting -Minimize distracting noises and movements

Using Social Media and Other Electronic Tools in Collaboration

-Professionals use many types of electronic tools to exchange information and ideas as they collaborate. The following discussion highlights the major technologies that enable collaboration: word-processing tools, messaging technologies, videoconferencing, wikis and shared document workspaces, and virtual worlds.

What does minimize distracting noises and movements mean?

-Sensitive microphones can magnify the sound of shuffling papers, fingers tapping on tables, and whispering. Likewise, depending on your position in the picture frame, excessive movements can be distracting.

The Explosive Growth

-Social media has expanded in growth reducing barriers of time and space for workplace collaborations -People are starting to branch out in whom they collaborate with its not just members of their project team but outside their organization -Using social media (messaging technologies, video conferencing, shared document workplaces, and wikis)

How to Critique a Colleague's Work?

-Start with a positive comment. Even if the work is weak, say, "You've obviously put a lot of work into this, Joanne. Thanks." Or, "This is a really good start. Thanks, Joanne." -Discuss the larger issues first. Begin with the big issues, such as organization, development, logic, design, and graphics. Then work on smaller issues, such as paragraph development, sentence-level matters, and word choice. Leave editing and proofreading until the end of the process. -Talk about the document, not the writer: RUDE: You don't explain clearly why this criterion is relevant. BETTER: I'm having trouble understanding how this criterion relates to the topic. Your goal is to improve the quality of the document you will submit, not to evaluate the writer or the draft. Offer constructive suggestions. RUDE: Why didn't you include the price comparisons here, as you said you would? BETTER: I wonder if the report would be stronger if we included the price comparisons here. In the better version, the speaker focuses on the goal (to create an effective report) rather than on the writer's draft. Also, the speaker qualifies his recommendation by saying, "I wonder if ...." This approach sounds constructive rather than boastful or annoyed.

Wiki and Shared Document Workspaces

-Today, two new technologies — wikis and shared document workspaces — make collaborating on a document much simpler and more convenient. -A wiki is a web-based document that authorized users can write and edit. The best-known wiki is Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia that contains some four million articles written and edited by people around the world. In the working world, people use software such as Jive and Socialtext to host wikis used for creating many kinds of documents, such as instructions, manuals, lists of frequently asked questions, and policy documents. For instance, many organizations create their policies on using social media by setting up wikis and inviting employees to write and edit what others have written. The concept is that a wiki draws on the expertise and insights of people throughout the organization and, sometimes, outside the organization -A shared document workspace makes it convenient for a team of users to edit a file, such as a Prezi or PowerPoint slide set or a Word document. A shared document workspace such as Microsoft SharePoint or Google Drive archives all the revisions made by each of the team members, so that the team can create a single document that incorporates selected revisions. Some shared document workspaces enable a user to download the document, revise it on his or her computer, and then upload it again. This feature is extremely convenient because the user does not need to be connected to the Internet to work on the document.

Messaging Technologies

-Two messaging technologies that have been around for decades are instant messaging and email. Instant messaging (IM) is real-time, text-based communication between two or more people. In the working world, IM enables people in different locations to communicate textual information at the same time. Email is an asynchronous medium for sending brief textual messages and for transferring files such as documents, spreadsheets, images, and videos. -For use on mobile devices such as phones, the two most popular messaging technologies are text messaging and microblogging. -Text messaging enables people to use mobile devices to send messages that can include text, audio, images, and video. Texting is the fastest-growing technology for exchanging messages electronically because most people keep their phones nearby. Organizations use text messaging for such purposes as sending a quick update or alerting people that an item has been delivered or a task completed. On your campus, the administration might use a texting system to remind students of an upcoming registration deadline or to alert people about a campus emergency. -Microblogging is a way of sending very brief textual messages to your personal network. You probably use the world's most popular microblog, Twitter, which now has more than 300 million users (SocialTimes, 2016). Although some organizations use Twitter, many use Twitter-like microblogs such as Yammer, which includes a search function and other features and which can be administered from within an organization.

Videoconferencing

-Videoconferencing technology allows two or more people at different locations to simultaneously see and hear one another as well as exchange documents, share data on computer displays, and use electronic whiteboards. Systems such as Skype are simple and inexpensive, requiring only a webcam and some free software. However, there are also large, dedicated systems that require extensive electronics, including cameras, servers, and a fiber-optic network or high-speed telephone lines (Videoconferencing systems range from sophisticated ones like this to inexpensive cameras attached to individual workstations to systems that work on smartphones. Most videoconferencing systems can display more than one window to accommodate several sets of participants.)

What does dress as you would for a fact to fact meeting mean?

-Wearing inappropriate clothing can distract participants and damage your credibility.

What does break down a large project into smaller tasks mean?

-Working backward from what you must deliver to your client or manager, partition your project into its component parts, making a list of what steps your team must take to complete the project. This task is not only the foundation of project management but also a good strategy for determining the resources you will need to complete the project successfully and on time. After you have a list of tasks to complete, you can begin to plan your project, assign responsibilities, and set deadlines.

What does put your decisions in writing mean?

-Writing down your decisions, and communicating them to all collaborators, helps the team remember what happened. In addition, if questions arise, the team can refer easily to the document and, if necessary, update it.