Campbell Chapter 9
This chapter talks about notifying users of the implemenation of policies and procedures. Notification can be done in writing, in person, or by e-mail. All of these choices have their own pros and cons.
As the book states:
Written notices are the best when audience is very large.
Personal notices are best when the subject is sensitive to users.
E-mail is best of the new policy is online.
The thing that stood out for me was how Campbell said that Managers need to be notified first. I find that to hold very true. Without notifying management first, many problems could arise:
1. With a written notice, the manager might be asked about the policy before they have even had a chance to read it.
2. Personal notices could be a problem if the management acts surprised or upset about the policy/procedure.
3. E-mail would also be bad because if an employee has a question, they are more likely to send an e-mail to their manager - and the manager might not have any other information to answer their questions.
posted by Jordan @ 7:40 AM
6 Comments:
I agree with Jordan's point that contacting management must be done before sending out any information. Managers are the ones who almost always field the questions of employees, not technical writers, so it is important for them to have all the information, as well as time for clarification before everyone else is given the notices.
Oooo...I want to take this chapter, copy it and send it out to everyone who sets up meetings. I usually get invited to a meeting with a room number and time...that's it. It would be nice to have the details mentioned in the Meeting Work Plan added to these invitations. Follow up meetings or summaries of meetings would also be helpful.
This chapter was refreshingly short - only 7 pages! I could get used to that. Anyway, this chapter discussed, ever so briefly, the methods of informing users about new policies or procedures. I’ve noticed a problem that the university has about getting information out to students. Not so much policies or procedures as events. I usually don’t discover events that I’d like to attend until after they are done. Of course it would be quite difficult if not impossible to inform students in person or even in writing. But more e-mail notification would be nice.
I've found that e-mail notices work best for me at my job. When I get a written notice, it just gets placed in a tray on my desk, and sometimes I don't even notice them. When I get a new e-mail notice, the "mail" tab shows up bright red and sticks out like a sore thumb on my computer screeen. It all depends on the situation when deciding what form of notice would be best.
This is a pretty important topic, because writing your notices to the wrong people can be very detrimental to your career. I know I've heard of more than one situation where someone has accidentally sent messages to the wrong people. One example is that a relative of mine recieved an email in which the writer referred to the office as a "sinking ship". This could have turned out to be pretty bad for the person.
This reminds me of where a I work. Communication is lax and I often have some one from upper management get all angry about a new policy that our department was supposed to carry out, but had not. Then I end up finding out the manager directly above recieved a notice and never gave a notice to the rest of the department.
Post a Comment
<< Home