Technical Communication in a Nutshell
Have you ever wondered what technical communication or documentation is and what technical writers do?
At Zeta, our fledgling Information Development teams are working tirelessly towards effective content creation and practices. Watch this video to learn about the various roles and responsibilities a Technical Communication or Information Development team may undertake.
[00:05] In engineering, technical communication refers to creating and distributing any type of organized content, including technical documentation, that describes the architecture, design, functionality, and usage of an existing product or a product under development.
[00:25] Technical communication aims to provide sufficient information for a user to understand end-to-end aspects of the product, including but not limited to, internal and external processes, dependencies, input/output, data handling, and data security.
[00:59] The content type and documentation format that the audience will consume is chosen using various content design principles by identifying and triaging between the domain, audience, and purpose of the content.
[01:15] Nowadays, for most industries, it is primarily in electronic format but can be in printed or written formats as well.
[01:25] The content can be distributed as long-form guides and manuals; visual aids such as videos, diagrams, and flowcharts; blogs, technical papers, white papers, research papers; how-to manuals, tutorials, training materials, and more.
[01:49] Technical Communicators go by many names — technical writers, technical communicators, information developers, information engineers, content writers, content creators, and many more!
[02:02] Technology companies employ technical writers to address all technical communication specific needs.
[02:07] Their job is to translate the usually unstructured or abbreviated technical content received from developers, product owners, and miscellaneous Subject Matter Experts, into more readable, user-friendly prose.
[02:19] Typically, this involves creating content under the Developer Documentation, UI Documentation, Implementation or Deployment Documentation, and Customization Documentation categories.
[02:32] What’s more, technical writers are so awesome that they also ensure that these documents abide by industry style guides and internal company branding standards!
[02:41] There you go… Now, you know the reason why you will witness the Information Development, Engineering, and Product Teams work in tandem at all those companies that make these fabulous products with excellent and sustained adoption!
[02:55] That was technical communication in a nutshell.
Video: Sumon Mondal
Author: Monami Bhattacharya
