Re: QMS (Quality Management System) Manual - The Boss Wants a 4 Page Manual - What to
The more concise and to the point it is, the more they will be prepared to actually read it and the easier they will understand it. "As much as necessary, as little as possible".
Absolutely agree. Something I've written about exhaustively in many posts.
Look, I think we're in strong agreement. But I stand by my statement of number of pages being irrelevant. Perhaps I confused by leaving out the all-important proviso '
provided it's as clear and usuable and short as possible' , then the number of pages is irrelevant.
I continue to argue against using number of pages
alone as a fully valid or useful measure.
I've seen 'short' documents of pages which were virtually unreadable. Not necessarily because of content, but achieved by squeezing stuff onto pages: they had tiny margins, used ALL CAPITALS WHICH ARE JUST ABOUT IMPOSSIBLE FOR THE HUMAN EYE TO READ EASILY, close-spaced type, tiny fonts, no spaces between paragraphs, etc, few headings.
Whereas the same document spread over perhaps twice as many pages - but using good graphic/ desktop principles like wide margins, plenty of white space, upper & lower case, suitable headings, tables instead of text perhaps, and so on - transformed the same document into something that people could actually pick up without their heart sinking into their boots.
Same thing for PowerPoint demos - short alone isn't an adequate metric.
I aim always but always for as short as possible - but taking the needs of the particular organisation, its people, its culture and principles of usability and good document design always into account also.
I want people to read & use the documents, yes.
Otherwise there's simply no point whatsover.
WAFTAM. (The polite version of which is: Waste of Flipping Time and Money)
