Accessibility

Last week I talked about Markel's measures of excellence, and how they apply to your technical writing. This week, I am going to focus on the measure of accessibility.

As you have probably noticed, the measures are interdependent, and the quality of one measure affects the others. On the surface, accessibility is mainly about navigation and ease of reading for the benefit of the reader. However, imagine a service website that has instructions for multiple products on one screen. That may hinder both accessibility and conciseness. It may also hinder clarity, since the user may be unsure what product he or she is researching.

Accessibility in technical writing, particularly in writing for the web, is fraught with issues, particularly in regards to the disabled. While solutions such as alt-text and cascading style sheets (CSS) make browsing the web easier, they don't address the underlying problem of accessibility.

Assignment

Take a look at the following websites.

The W3C - the World Wide Web Consortium, put in place the standards and practices of the web. Check out their Accessibility page .
Also, check out the Society for Technical Communication's AccessAbility SIG (Special Interest Group)

Now, armed with some knowledge about accessibility, pick three websites to visit on your own. Tell me four things about EACH of these sites:

• What is accessible about the website? What is not?

• How does the accessibility or inaccessability affect the viewing of the site?

• Does the accessibility or inaccessibility affect the credibility of the site or the content's author?

• What could be done to improve the accessibility of the site?

Exploring Markel's Measures of Excellence

In today's increasingly technological world, technical writing (or technical communication) has become more nuanced and multi-dimensional. No longer is the technical writer relegated to writing memos or composing indexes, although these are certainly legitimate aspects of the job. Today, a technical writer may be asked to do anything from updating and maintaining a website to preparing and publishing an RFP (request for proposal).

Technical communication is designed to be read by technical professionals and technical communicators. Tech professionals are those who are considered subject-matter experts (SMEs). Tech communicators are the writers to create what tech professionals read. SMEs may be experts that use writing such as email and proposals every day, but they are not professional writers. Therefore, a tech communicator's main job is to convey information in a way that addresses the tech professionals appropriately, that is easy to understand, and that still conveys the information clearly and directly.

Markel's Measures of Excellence

Mike Markel, the author of Technical Communication, summarizes how to communicate effectively with his "Measures of Excellence." The measures address common issues in technical communication. Below is a list and summary of the measures of excellence, adapted from the following:
Markel, Mike. Technical Communication. 8th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2006.

Honesty
First and foremost, your writing must be honest. It is your ethical responsibility not to midlead the reader. Markel gives the following reasons why:

• It is the right thing to do.
• If you are dishonest, readers can get hurt.
• If you are dishonest, you and your organization could face serious legal charges (10).

This measure also applies to plagiarism. Writing has no chance of being honest is it is not yours from the start!

Clarity
"Your goal is to produce a document that conveys a single meaning the reader can understand easily" (10). Why is this so important? Markel gives the following reasons:

• Unclear technical communication can be dangerous.
• Unclear technical communication is expensive (10).
  

For instance, think about how expensive it is to operate a customer-support line. If the manual for a product is clear, then calls to help lines can be reduced.

Accuracy
Your facts must be correct. One error can be confusing, annoying, or downright dangerous.

Comprehensiveness
"A good technical document provides all the information readers need. ... It contains sufficient detail so that readers can follow the discussion and carry out any required tasks" (11).

Accessibility
Few people will read an entire document from beginning to end. Small, easy navigable sections make the document easier to read.

Conciseness
"A document must be concise enough to be useful to a busy read. You can shorten most writing by 10 to 20 percent simply by eliminating unnecessary phrases. ... Your job is to figure out how to convey a lot of information economically" (11).

Professional Appearance
Sloppy, haphazard documents will simply not be taken seriously. That is a fact. Documents should adhere to the style of the organization (in this case, your class and your teacher), and they should be well-designed, proofread, and neatly printed.

Correctness
"A correct document is one that adheres to the conventions of grammar, punctuation, spelling, and usage" (11). Incorrect writing can confuse the reader, but it also can make you look unprofessional. An error-filled document may make you appear as if you were haphazard in gathering and analyzing your sources. Of course, you may not have been, but that could be the

Assignment

Now, you will explore the measures of excellence by looking for concrete examples.
Find a user manual at http://www.usersmanualguide.com/.
Tell me what measures it adheres to, and to which ones it does not. How could the manual be better for both the user and the organization?

Identifying Bias in Tech Writing

One of the main goals of technical writing is objectivity. Tech writers often struggle with the decision between writing to make the audience happy, and telling the audience the whole truth. Like journalists, tech writers are expected to write transparently and free of bias.

What exactly is bias? Merriam-Webster defines it as a "bent" or "tendency." Another way to describe it is an "inclination of temperament or outlook; especially a personal and sometimes unreasoned judgment." A not-so-pretty synonym is "prejudice." These definitions imply that a writer can be either purposefully biased, like when a writer speaks unfavorably of a rival product, or unintentionally biased, like when a writer may unconsciously downplay the lesser aspects of a product.

A good way to learn to identify bias in writing is by reading newspapers. Newspaper writing is, ideally, a prime mode of technical writing, because the writing must be concise, comprehensive, objective, and informative.

Take a look at the local papers in north Louisiana. Read a few articles, and in the comment section, discuss any instances of biased writing you may have found. Is the author favoring one viewpoint over another? If he or she not telling the "whole story?" Remember to copy-and-paste the link to the story at the top of your entry, so that I can look at it too.

Here are some local newspapers for you to investigate. Feel free to use other newspapers if you choose.
The News-Star (Monroe, LA)
The Daily Leader (Ruston, LA)