Strategies for Technical

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Strategies for Technical Professional
CommunicationWinter 2005

• Amanda Goldrick-Jones
• Centre for Academic Writing
• Fri. Jan. 7, 2005

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About technical professional comm . . .

• First, please see Fig. 1 in our text TC, p. 7,
  for an explanation of the nine characteristics of
  technical communication content, context,
  purpose, audience, organization, visuals,
  document design, usability, language conventions.
• Now, here is some additional info about what it
  means to write technically, scientifically, or
  professionally

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About technical professional comm . . .

• Technical communication applied communication
  that makes technical information available to
  those readers, viewers, users, and listeners who
  need it
• For professional perspectives, visit
• the Institute of Scientific and Technical
  Communicators
• The Milwaukee School of Engineering,
• and of course
• The Society for Technical Communication

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About technical professional comm . . .

• Communicating about science presents an informed
  lay audience with information about the physical
  world
• Scientific communication presents specialized or
  scholarly information primarily to peers

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About technical professional comm . . .

• Communicating about science presents an informed
  lay audience with information about the physical
  world. My favorite examples include
• Brian Greenes The Elegant Universe
• Dr. Oliver Sacks writings, including Awakenings
• Dr. Tatianas Sex Advice to All Creation, by
  Olivia Judson

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About technical professional comm . . .

• On the other hand, scientific communication
  presents specialized or scholarly information to
  fellow scientists primarily. . .

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About technical professional comm . . .

• . . . And to the lay public secondarily.
• Click the picture to see the SFN guidelines for
  communicating scientific knowledge to the lay
  public.

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About technical professional comm . . .

• Computer mediated communication is the process
  by which people create, exchange, and perceive
  information using networked telecommunications
  systems (or non-networked computers) that
  facilitate encoding, transmitting, and decoding
  messages (from John December, 2004).
• Also see Decembers CMC FAQ.

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About technical professional comm . . .

• John December is a pioneer researcher/
  practitioner in the field of computer-mediated
  communication and publisher of CMC Magazine.
• See the latest issue

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About technical professional comm . . .

• Common processes for developing and producing
  tech prof documents are described in TC Ch. 2
  and include
• Inventing and researching
• Planning and organizing
• Drafting
• Revising and editing

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About technical professional comm . . .

• Rhetorical constraints decisions you as a
  technical communicator must make about purpose,
  audience, medium, genre, context (or
  appropriateness) for each communication task. We
  will cover this further in TC, Ch. 3, Writing
  for Readers.

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About technical professional comm . . .

• Specific communication strategies, however, apply
  to particular documents. For ex., decisions
  about layout and design are vitally important for
  brochures and web pages less so for memos, which
  tend to be boilerplate. We will explore these
  strategies throughout the course.

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About technical professional comm . . .

• Thats it for now . . . the next lecture will be
  posted on Jan. 14. Any questions? Email me.