Updating Procedures because they are bland and wordy

J

JaneB

#11
Excellent advice.

Any time you write (or rewrite) a procedure document you need to consider several things:
  • Who are the intended users of the document, and what level of competence do they have?
  • What is the intended outcome of the process the document is controlling?
  • Do you understand the process enough to be able to draw a flow diagram of it? If not, don't even attempt it until you get the understanding, or maybe have a process owner write the document...
  • What information will be used most frequently?
  • What information doesn't need to be in the document? Cut out the fluff.
  • How can you give the user the information they need as quickly as possible so they can get back to work?
 
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Miner

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Admin
#12
All good information given.

One other way to reduce the wordiness: Most procedures tend to be written in passive voice. Changing from passive voice to active voice (verb - object) tends to significantly reduce the word count and make it easier to understand.
 
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