October - Center for Information-Development Management

WHAT IF WRITERS LOVED THEIR WORK?“Establishingan openenvironmentwhere it isokay to expressideas isessential. Thecorrectenvironmenthas a lot to dowith new ideasand how theygrow.”do with new ideas and how they grow. Kelleyalso makes it quite clear that fun has to be akey element. Whatever seemingly silly orabsurd event you use to have fun, it will mostlikely be a success. When we are having fun,we revert back to younger days when discoverywas something that wasn’t work at all. Fun canre-create the intellectual innocence of seekingout new ways of doing things because it isenjoyable to do so.Brainstorming as a method of stimulatinginnovative ideas has been called the “wonderfulinfection.” Once an openforum is established, barriersdrop and the ideas start flowing.A writer here at CadenceDesign Systems noted “…it’slike playtime at work.” Opendiscussions instead of specificagendas are based on the conceptthat no idea is a bad idea.At Cadence, so many ideashave come out of our brainstormingsessions that we havecreated an idea bank of newthings to try after we haveexplored the ones that made itto the top of the list.For example, the Cadencegroup was asked to describe,and then plan for, the directionof information delivery in thenear future. In the process ofidentifying the next generationof technical communicationtrends, the group came to an interesting conclusion.All documentation will evolve intofour categories: check lists, examples, animatedvideos, and links to other source material.Whether you agree with that prediction ornot, it was the first joint statement of wherethis team wanted to go. It also said that theyhad ownership of the future and realized thatadditional training would be required to makeit a reality.Being ValuedAfter the first success, the possible innovationsthat wait in the idea bank create an opportunityfor the group to have a steady stream ofhits. The trouble is that even though our teamhas gained much visibility within the organization,many still have no idea what we do. Theneed to gain notoriety at the upper level ofmanagement is key. To do this, we have tochange the mentality of the group. The “wehave friends in very low places” attitude isunfortunately a common trait of technicalcommunicators. The nature of the job, theintroverted personality stereotype of the trade,and the lack of respect technical communicatorsare often shown all add to this problem.The solution falls on the technical communicationmanager’s shoulders. He or she must bethe advocate and PR representative to all managementlayers. By generating internal pressreleases, strategically sendingemails, and engaging in good oldhallway chats, the technical communicationmanager spreads thenews of innovations being investigatedand carried out in the group.The result is a new, gung-ho attitudein your team, which increasestheir feeling of self worth.Recognition should not beundervalued. The old adage, “… aslong as you spell my name correctly”applies. We need to recognizethat although innovation ispart of our job, the extra efforttaken to lead in a new direction isalways critical to our success. Weemploy the “awards ceremony”technique to recognize not onlyimportant contributions to theteam’s success, but also the moresilly events along the way. Onewriter, who received many awardsand letters of praise from R&D, marketing,customer support, and other writing teams onan almost daily basis, was awarded the“Thanks For Coming To Work Award,” in“appreciation of you coming to work even on aday on which you were not receiving anaward.”As the manager of extremely talentedindividuals, you need to set the group goal.You need to grab their attention and the attentionof supporting functions. The sense ofurgency to share the goal with others in theorganization as often as possible keeps thegroup’s value high within the organization. Ifyou set a direction to follow, such as establishingthe goal of increasing customer satisfaction,you must be sure everyone, not just yourwriters, knows what that means and that your128 BEST PRACTICES • OCTOBER 2003