Back to Basics: Writing Best Practices for Everyone and Repurposing Presentations

Everyone writes to some degrees in their jobs. You don’t have to be a technical writer or instructional designer to write in your job. Sales people write statements of work or contracts. Mangers write project plans. Executives write business plans and goals. Everyone writes thousands of emails a year.

Understanding and following writing best practices helps insure your communications are clear, concise, and consistent.

I recently gave a talk called “If you’re not a secret agent … why do you write in code?” I provided writing best practices for non-writers. I thought it would make a good refresher for those of us who do write and a good reference to provide to our colleagues who do not write. It also provided me with an opportunity to practice repurposing material that I spent time creating for a new audience.

I created the presentation using a new tool called PowToons. It took some time getting acquainted with the features, but once I did I was able to create a great presentation. Afterward, I tweaked the scripted and recorded it. Using Powtoons, I was able to load and synch the audio with my presentation and then publish it to my Vimeo account. This allowed me to open up the presentation to an entirely new audience.

Hat Tip:Brandon Hall Report

Brandon Hall’s latest survey revealed that exploring new learning technologies is the number one priority for most Learning and Development teams.

Check out the full survey for details about the survey including the types of technologies and what this survey means to you.

Hat Tip: 10 Must Know Features for Articulate Storyline 2

The hot eLearning development tool, Articulate Storyline, has a ton of features to make your online courses interactive and engaging. eLearning Brothers highlighted the top 10 features:

1. Motion Paths
2. Move Trigger
3. Slider Interaction
4. Object Animations
5. Character Spacing
6. Read-Only Seekbar
7. Custom Bullets
8. Hide Next Player Button Trigger
9. Dockable Panels
10. AutoRecovery

Get the details on these features here. Try Articulate Storyline 2 free for 14 days here.

Busting LMS Myths

Learning Management Systems (LMS’s) seem like large, mysterious infostructures that are impossible for the lowly instructional designer to comprehend or set-up, or so people have come to believe. LMS’s are having difficulty shedding the enigmatic reputation even though they have become more user-friendly since their inception.

Adobe recently released a free, recorded webinar discussing the five myths that still surround LMS’s. The webinar focuses on Adobe’s Captivate Prime LMS, but much of the information can be applied to other Learning Management Systems.

The five myths that are addressed are:

• Myth 1: An LMS is hard to use, hard to set up, and hard to live with
• Myth 2: An LMS is an operational expense, not an investment in success
• Myth 3: An LMS is exclusively for eLearning courses
• Myth 4: LMS administration is painful, cumbersome, and ineffective
• Myth 5: An LMS doesn’t meet the needs of rich interactivity, streaming video, and learner engagement

The webinar is one hour and available here.

The Future is Here – Mixed Reality

We’ve all watched science fiction movies and shows where people are surrounded by and interact with holograms. I never really expected to see it in the average person’s everyday life during my lifetime. However, it looks like it will be her sooner than I ever thought.

Microsoft has introduced HoloLens. Microsoft describes HoloLens as “the first fully untethered, see-through holographic computer. It enables high-definition holograms to come to life in your world, seamlessly integrating with your physical places, spaces, and things. We call this experience mixed reality. Holograms mixed with your real world will unlock all new ways to create, communicate, work, and play.”

Mixed reality. Having holograms integrated with your real world. Does that have your wheels turning? If it doesn’t watch the video demonstrating its uses.

Here is what caught my attention as an instructional designer and technical writer:

• Training can happen anywhere in real-time. From their desk, employees can learn about and interact with new company products.
• Employees can learn how to operate equipment and learn new skills by practicing on a hologram.
• User manuals can be supplemented with real-time, step-by-step instructions.
• Field technicians can get help from supervisors who can see what they see.

Mixed reality can be and exciting new chapter in the instructional design and technical documentation world. Support and training are going to be more visual and hands-on instead of word and paper driven. We will need to adjust how we deliver information to our audience, but if we adapt there is still a place for us in mixed reality.

Ubiquitous Computing in Our World

Ubiquitous computing is where computers are everywhere and integrated into our daily lives. Watch this video for a great example:

Having computers everywhere can be a scary thought. It brings to mind George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, the younger generation does not necessarily see ubiquitous computing the same way that my generation does. It is this openness to computers and technology that will create an entirely new world of transferring knowledge, whether it is user manuals or sales training.

I first saw the A Day Made of Glass video in a presentation, and we discussed the shopping scene. The woman walked into the store and she was shown what clothes would look like on her. In order for the computers to show her this, the database would need personal information about the woman, such as her tastes in clothing styles, her size, and color preferences.

The presenter pointed out that younger generations are not as hesitant to supply personal information as long as they feel they are receiving something in return. Now think of the information that Amazon has on you based on your shopping purchases. We supply personal information all the time.

Companies are already using this information and some of the technologies you saw in the video. Large buildings install equipment that pinpoint your location using your cell phone. They use this information to provide you with directions to get to places you request. They can also use this to send you push notifications about what is on sale in the area you are going or what the office hours are for the doctor you are visiting.

How can we as communicators, instructional designers, and technical writers use new technology to transfer knowledge?

• What if a technician can point his tablet at a machine and get immediate information about the machine, including a link to open the repair manual?
• What if a new employee receives a push notification on her phone when she walks in the building that welcomes her and provides her with a map to the training room?
• What if co-workers can share documents between computers simply by flicking a finger across the tablet screen like the doctors in the video shared information?

I would love to hear some of the ways you think we can use new technology in training, documentation, and communication – whether the technology exists now or not.