Technical Writing: Procedures and Manuals

Have you been asked to write a set of pro­ce­dures, a man­u­al, or a user’s guide? Does this task seem daunt­ing because you don’t con­sid­er your­self a tech­ni­cal writer? This course is intend­ed for any­one who must write pro­ce­dures or man­u­als for oth­ers, or for any­one explor­ing the tech­ni­cal writ­ing pro­fes­sion. Exam­ine the tasks, process­es and tech­niques for writ­ing instruc­tions and guides that are use­ful and easy to read. Learn how to con­duct ​“audi­ence analy­sis” and how to use this analy­sis to guide your writ­ing. Exper­i­ment with doc­u­ment design and appre­ci­ate how design plays an impor­tant role in the writ­ing process. Learn how to esti­mate the cost and sched­ule for pro­duc­ing your guides. Cre­ate an out­line for a guide, write pro­ce­dures and con­duct feed­back test­ing to improve the usabil­i­ty of your guide. This course pro­vides an overview of tech­ni­cal writ­ing process­es and prac­ti­cal hands-on exer­cis­es; no tech­ni­cal writ­ing expe­ri­ence is required.