Can someone learn details, take II

Subject: Can someone learn details, take II
From: Geoff Hart <Geoff-h -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA>
Date: Wed, 18 Aug 1999 08:17:27 -0400

Jill Burgchardt continued by providing more detail on her
question:

<<...the specific task involves writing and editing standards
FOR standards. My attitude towards pickiness is irrelevant;
the client has zero tolerance for errors.>>

That suggests a modification to what I'd proposed earlier:
work with the newcomer to create a two-pass system you
both can live with. Initially, let the new person do the grunt
work, with you following behind to edit the result and
provide your edited copy so the person can see what got
missed. Emphasize that this is a learning experience, _not_
your attempts to rub the person's nose in how superior you
are at the job.

How to do this? As the person gets better (don't wait too long-
-maybe two or three manuscripts, and make this limit clear up
front), let them start editing you. Nobody's perfect, and once
they start finding (hopefully small) glitches in your work,
they'll feel a lot more comfortable with the process. It can be
awfully embarassing to have your junior catch you in an
error, but try to be honestly thankful for this; even the best of
us make mistakes. (Me? Don't ask! <g>) With luck and skill,
you can end up in a "I'll watch your back and you watch
mine, friend" relationship.

<<My take is that our new manager here recognizes the past
failure to manage as a contributing factor to problems. Active
management may allow the new person to succeed.>>

Perhaps you should propose what I've suggested to the
manager and have the manager implement the two-pass
system. That sort of thing is easier to take if it's handed down
from above than if your "peer" assumes a position of
superiority and imposes it on you. Of course, the problem is
that you don't want to be seen as having someone do your
hatchet work for you, particularly since that isn't the point
here: the point is to implement a system that provides checks
and balances, quality control, and a spirit of "us against the
standards" teamwork. It might be best to meet (you, the
newcomer, and the manager) to discuss the system that you
propose, and work together to define the details.

<<... we've been trying to identify what it takes to succeed in
this environment--our client has expressed very strong
comments on (need for/lack of) attention to detail.>>

If that's the case, you need to develop your own equivalent to
the JPL "Levels of Edit" approach, but with a twist: rather
than defining how much editing is required, develop a multi-
pass system in which each pass looks for a particular type of
problem. If you're great at memorizing regulation numbers,
and the newcomer is far better at the spelling of obscure
names, perhaps each of you should stick to your own
strengths? Another example: when I edit, my first pass is
almost exclusively for substantive issues such as logic,
correctness, support of ideas, and correctness of calculations.
I fix obvious glitches such as typos along the way (knee-jerk
editorial reflex!), but don't get hung up on micromanaging
sentence structure. In the second pass, I do the polishing that
didn't get done in the first pass. Repeat as necessary, since the
authors and reviewers are generally making changes along
the way. Can you see a parallel in your situation? Checklists
often help.

<<The new employee has limited experience as a tech
writer... She has said herself that assessing, conceptualizing,
and synthesizing a manual from resource materials (big
picture stuff) is beyond her current skill level.>>

Sounds like you'll be doing a lot of mentoring/nurturing,
quite independent of whatever managing your manager does.

<<If I let this new person "find ways to use her creative
talents," before she masters the client's requirements, I'll be
helping her find the unemployment line.>>

It might be a good idea to start thinking how you can harness
those creative energies rather than suppressing them entirely.
For example, though I've suggested a fairly rigid "you are the
one who corrects her work and tells her how its done"
approach, she may have other thoughts. Perhaps she can
suggest how to achieve the same result, but in a different
way. Perhaps she may see something you don't, since we all
develop blindspots towards our job by the time we've gotten
good at it. Even the simple act of asking for her opinion can
be beneficial, since it suggests (correctly) that her opinion is
worth listening too and that you're part of a culture of
empowerment. This is obviously tricky to do, since her
suggestions may not be very good, but in that case, you can
explain why her suggestions aren't good and simultaneously
teach her more about the job. If you disagree on something,
look for a third person's opinion; sometimes it's hard to see
the errors in your own logic because you're too close to the
situation to be truly objective.

<<This brings me back to my simple questions.>>

Yes, someone can learn... but you're going to have to figure
out their learning style (everyone's a bit different) and adopt
an approach that suits that style. Some people may benefit
from rigorous drills to practice each concept, whereas others
would rather die than practice something this exhaustively.
Some people may require periodic chocolate chip cookies as
a reward! What's the situation here? Work with the person to
find the method or methods that work in your specific
context. The results can be impressive; I've learned to be a
decent editor this way.

--Geoff Hart @8^{)} Pointe-Claire, Quebec
geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca

"Perhaps there is something deep and profound behind all those sevens,
something just calling out for us to discover it. But I
suspect that it is only a pernicious, Pythagorean coincidence." George
Miller, "The Magical Number Seven" (1956)

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