Technical Authoring and Documentation Services

At CIMPLEMENTATION we have specialised in ensuring that the documentation that supports your day-to-day business operations is as practical & thorough as possible.

We believe that you documentation is a key refection of the way your customers, and more importantly, potential customers, see your organisation.  Therefore our Technical Authoring services are geared to providing you with documention which is an asset to your products and services.

We also recognise that it is essential to accurately reflect the business process and requirements  not only in support of the design, selection and implementation of systems but also in support of accreditation of the quality processes that are essential in industry today.

We therefore provide a range of services that makes available to you the specialist skills essential in the production of such documentation.  However, all documentation services rely heavily on the knowledge of your stall - we are the catalysts to unlock and capture this knowledge.

The services we provide are:

• Technical Authoring
• Interactive Process Mapping
• Statements of User Requirements (SOUR's)
• Invitations To Tenders (ITT's)
• Function and Development Specification
• Self-help Documentation
  

Technical Authoring Services

We all know that Technical Author's produce documentation of some kind. This could be a book, manual, a set of specifications, web pages, script or whatever, with or without illustrations or multimedia enhancements.

What this means is that something technical is explained in words, diagrams pictures etc so that it can be understood and acted upon by others, particularly those who do not initially have the skill, knowledge or understanding of the product.

This may sound straight forward but the impact your documentation provides, both in the pre-sales environment and the on-going support functions, may be a key decider in how your customers, particularly potential customers, view your organisations products and services. Therefore the importance of your technical documentation should never be underestimated.

It is the technical author's skill in explaining something simply and clearly, and presenting it in an attractive and appreciative manner, that produces the final result which complements your organisations business objectives. This is what CIMPLEMENTATION's Technical Authoring Services provide.

However, before the documentation is delivered, very much more has to happen.

Our approach can be broken down into the following tasks.

• Assessing the audience for the documentation, and the nature of the documentation required.
• Agreement of the deliverable via a synopsis agreed by all parties.
• Collecting, sifting and structuring the information required.
• Organising the information to meet the requirements of the audience.
• Creating the physical documentation using text, graphics, photographs etc.
• Validation of the draft documentation.
• Publishing the final document to the agreed format.

These do not necessarily happen one after the other, of course. each task is composed of many smaller steps and one task may be begun while others are in progress. It is also important to consider who is to maintain the documentation after it is finished, and how version control is to be done.

If your documentation is important to you, and we do not believe it is not, don't cut corners  and entrust it to the professionals.

Contact us to discuss how we can support your Technical Authoring requirements.

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Interactive Process Mapping

We offer a specialist service not practised by other UK Consultancies.

Using specialist software tools we work with you staff to capture their day-to-day activities in the form a process flow charts. Designed to help teams of people work together smoothly and efficiently, our mapping process can be widely used for a variety of team-based process mapping applications, including Total Quality Management (TQM), ISO 9000 certification, and business process (re)engineering.

The process helps us to help you to map and document processes quickly and easily. The deployment flowchart clearly shows who is responsible for what part of the work, how information flows between team members, and which members need to work together to get things done. The process produces multiple nested flow-charts to the level of detail you require. The interactive nature of the process allows continued ratification and refinement of the documentation. The documentation is clear and easily understood by all parties involved.

Advantages of the approach:

• We involve the key players – the managers as well as the people who do the work.
• Removes the need to work with large sheets of butcher paper on the walls and colored post-it notes to map out the as-is process.
• Everything that used to go on the paper is now captured in electronic form
• Easily amended and updated through interactive sessions
• Produces a road map to follow
• It's very easy to introduce changes to the documentation produced
• The maps reconfigure automatically on-screen – just like a spreadsheet shows financial adjustments – so you can easily see the effects of a specific change.
• Gives a benchmark to measure the new process against the old, a graphic aid to show changes as they occur and something to measure them against.

Typical section of the output

Contact us to arrange a demonstration of this specialist service.

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Statements of User Requirements (SOUR's)

The starting point for any new process or systems will be a statement of user requirements.  Identifying what the process must achieve and what business needs must be met.  Key focus of this is to distinguish between the "Musts", "Wants" and "Nice to Have's". and to ensure that constraints of the existing systems & processes are not carried over to the new requirements as requirements.

Normally the SOW will be compiled through interviews with staff involved, production of drafts for revision leading to the presentation and sign off of the final document.

SOW's can vary in detail depending upon the requirement.  Therefore clear definition of the scope of the requirement via a Quality Plan is the essential first step.

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Invitations To Tenders (ITT's)

If a new business system is required it is essential to approach prospective suppliers with a clear specification of requirements.  This ensures that comparisons between supplier offerings can be compared on a logical like-for-like basis and an objective assessment of the completeness and suitability for purpose completed.

The ITT will normally incorporate the Statement of user Requirements (SOUR) and then be extended to include the Systems, Technical business and contractual elements essential for a successful partnership with your chosen supplier.

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Function and Development Specification

Where bespoke developments are required such as modifications to a standard package, then it is necessary to document these changes and gain agreement from all parties before any programming work is started.

Two documents will be required to do this.

A User facing functional specification will set out the business case for the change, the scope of the change and the functionality to be provided.  Once this has been agreed, a development specification (sometimes called the Design Specification), will translate the requirements into "computer speak" to enable technical staff to meet the requirements of the functional specification.

CIMPLEMENTATION consultants can aid the development of these essential documents through the following services:

• Collection of User Requirements
• Compilation of a Cost vs Benefit analysis
• Production of the Specifications
• Testing & implementation of the resultant code changes
• Project Management of the complete process

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Self-help Documentation

CIMPLEMENTATION has recognised that many organisations need advice and guidance on system selection and implementation but prefer to use in-house resources at their own pace.

At CIMPLEMENTATION we have distilled over 30 man-years of experience into a series of guide to support you.

These guides provide practical self-help workbooks to guide your staff and support them in the tasks that they have to execute. The Guides available are:

• System Specification and Selection

• Systems Implementation

• Education and Training Self-teach courses

These documents are available as printed manuals, Word Documents for you to reprint or as windows help files for on-line usage. Each document contains explanatory text, worked examples and boiler-plate template for you to use on your project.

Education and Training courses can be delivered by our professional staff or supplied on a "Train-the-trainers" basis for you to repeat as and when required.
 
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contact us by:

mail: 26 Newton Close, Oakenshaw South, Redditch, Worcestershire, UK, B98 7YR

telephone: +44 01527 403365

facsimile: +44 01527 465185

mobile: 07860 326582

e-mail: enquiries@cimplementation.co.uk