Introduction To Technical Writing

Course Content

Getting the reader into focus:

• Understanding all the forces at play in the communications arena
• The first principle of effective communicating
• Profiling the reader
• Persuading the reader

Effective writing skills:

• The TAB3C channel to effective writing
• Timing is important!
• How to ensure that your reports are accurate and complete
• Common enemies of brevity and how to beat them
• The four steps to writing concisely
• How to structure sentences
• How to avoid ambiguity and vagueness
• The danger of double negatives
• Common enemies of clarity and how to beat them
• Using correct punctuation
• The wisdom of courtesy
• How and when to use jargon, abbreviations and shortenings
• When to use the active or passive voice in writing

Planning, preparing and editing reports

• Identifying the right structure
• Preparing your document – a five step process
• Drafting and polishing
• Editing and checking

Specific Technical Reports:

• Knowing your end user
• Interviewing Subject Matter Experts
• Explaining jargon
• Maintaining styles and consistency
• Making sure it works – smart testing
• Deviation and incident reports
• SOPs and user guides

Data Visualisation & Presentations

How to interest and persuade your audience with:

• Clear simple charts
• Well-designed tables
• Simple dashboards
• Effective delivery

Getting the best out of MS Word:

• Embedding videos and objects
• Editing a PDF
• Building and navigating documents
• Working with tables
• Tips and techniques
• Short-cuts in MS Word and the Quick Access Toolbar

The Writers’ Miscellany:

• Lists – vertical and in-sentence
• Numbers
• Values and dates
• Fonts
• Abbreviations
• When to use capital letters
• Future developments
• Writing emails