Learning Success Stories
The Writer's Guide to Surviving a Merger: Demonstrating Your Value with the Information Mapping Method
The Information Mapping method, used by Technical Publications Group (TPG) for over 15 years, had proved invaluable in developing hundreds of effective documents for CSW's internal business units. Because TPG used this method, they were confident they provided a valuable, measurable service to their customers and the corporation.
Usability Study
TPG developed, administered and calculated the results of a usability study that quantified the writing team's impact on the bottom line. "We were convinced the results of the survey would speak for themselves," said Joe Schell, the technical writer who implemented the study.
Employees throughout the company participated in the study. The results were expected to answer whether TPG:
- Added value to the company
- Saved the company money
- Saved readers' time, and
- Reduced the errors encountered by readers.
Christina Richards, the coordinator of the Technical Publications Group said, "We expected to see a difference. We knew that a professional technical writing team that develops, publishes, and maintains documents using a proven writing method can save time, reduce workload, cut costs, and improve operations. We just did not expect the magnitude of the difference we made."
Results
The study revealed the following:
- TPG saved the corporation $1.5 million each year by increasing employee productivity and reducing errors.
- Readers could find information 35% faster in TPG-developed documents.
- TPG-developed documents increased accuracy by 139%.
Conclusion
When the merger completed in June 2000, the study's amazing results helped convince the new AEP to continue the use of CSW's technical writing team and even grow this group. The team is convinced that the study was a key factor in saving the department. Without quantifiable results showing the benefits of using trained technical writers, this success story's outcome would surely have been quite different.
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