Understanding Technical Communication?
Technical communications are created and distributed by
most employees in service organizations today, especially by professional staff and
management. Writing well is difficult and time-consuming, and writing in a technical way
and about technical subjects compounds the difficulties.
The entire point of communications is to disseminate
useful information. To be useful, information must be understood and acted upon.
Fortunately, tools and techniques are available to make writing more accessible and easy
to understand.
Definitions of Technical Communication?
Effective communications require quality content,
language, format, and more. The entire point of communications is to disseminate
information; this is where written content comes in. To present the appropriate content,
it is imperative to understand one s audience and writing purpose. If a document does not communicate the
information that the writer intends and what he or she wants the reader to understand,
then the communication is meaningless.
The writer has a self-interest in making the extra
effort: Looking credible is as important as being credible and getting results in
business.
Respect and credibility of the writer/speaker are
integral to effective communications. Readers will not trust the information from an
author if they do not believe that author is a valuable source of information or the
purveyor of worthwhile ideas. Furthermore, being respected is essential to being
persuasive, a key ingredient in business.
"Technical writing is the presentation of
information that helps the reader solve a particular problem. Technical communicators
write, design, and/or edit proposals, manuals, web pages, lab reports, newsletters, and
many other kinds of professional documents.¡±
It is interesting to note that outside the U.S. the
definition of technical writing tends to stay very consistent. A [U.K.-based
firm] persists that ¡°technical
writing is the presentation of information on any scientific, engineering, or
technological topic in the form most suited to its user.¡±
This article is licensed under the GNU Free
Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Technical
Writing.
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I'm Ivan Walsh, the person behind this site. I help people improve how they write, publish and extend their business assets.