Technical documentation is almost always created by several people from different areas, and their work is clearly distributed:
- Specialised employees from various departments provide content and data, usually directly in Word or Excel – be it a product description, an instruction or a data sheet.
- The technical editors “refine” these texts, format, visualise and structure the content and ensure that the content is described in accordance with prevailing standards and norms and formulated in a way that is appropriate for the target group.
This allocation of roles is essential, as it ensures that all technical documents are both formally correct and consistent in terms of content – regardless of how many people were involved in their creation. Because everyone in the team works with Office products, the texts do not have to be transformed into XML structures, which means that the entire creation process remains completely coherent.
This also makes the correction run considerably easier and less error-prone. This is because texts that are sent back to the experts for checking can be easily checked and corrected using Microsoft Word’s on-board tools – for example, using the very powerful change function: it allows corrections from a large number of participants to flow back into the documentation without friction losses.
Collaboration in teams can be extended not only to large sections of documentation, but also to individual components. These can be outsourced at the touch of a button and very easily checked by an external proofreader and then imported again.
A dual control principle is essential, especially for the modules that are often used in different documentations, and is an important feature when dealing with OfficeForms documentations. Appropriate filters can be used to determine exactly who last edited which blocks and whether the respective blocks are finished and released or not.
Conclusion
Working in a team with Microsoft Word doesn’t have to end in formatting chaos or a flood of versions. With OfficeForms, the editing process is structured, comprehensible and based on a division of labour. Specialist authors can concentrate on the content, while the editor ensures editorial quality and formal consistency. The result is professional documentation – efficient, modular and the result of perfect teamwork.