How can technical writers make their work easy for non-technical readers?

Technical writing is all about easy user experience & making complex stuff understandable. Following are two of my favorite ways to achieve this: 1. Walk in Their Shoes: When I write technical documents, I pretend like a complete beginner/non-technical user, someone who knows very little about the topic. That way i am able to pay attention to minute steps which are obvious to a subject matter experts and to long time user but are not so obvious to a non-technical user. 2. Visual Help: I use pictures/diagrams/animations to make things even clearer. It's like showing a story instead of just telling it, also its fun and easy to understand and also consumes less user time.

From the point of view of a person who does not enjoy reading technical and standard content. I wrote my technical book with a lot of real life examples, and even relate it to food who we all have some experience on. I found visuals materials really helps as most of us rely on the visuals than other senses in our body to make sense of things. Photos, figures, tables, graphs, and imagination. It’s important to write it for the people who reads it and not worrying about the normal written format, it’s all about delivering and sharing the knowledge, not challenges the reader’s ability to understand the content.

The primary responsibility of a technical writer is to translate complex technical information into easy and simple language. When you know your audience is non-technical, then to make your documents simpler for them to understand, you can follow these guidelines: - Understand your audience and their expectation of documents - Do not overwhelm the reader with unnecessary details. - Use simple language and small sentences; avoid complex sentences and technical jargon - Break down the technical content into chunks of logical information ensuring that each piece is complete in its entirety - Organise your information in a logical order because a well-structured document makes half of the job easier - Supplement your articles with examples

We generally tend to take for granted knowledge we have had for a long time, and especially, knowledge within our field. This makes us think that what is obvious for us, it must be obvious to everyone else, which limits greatly our ability to write clearly for non-expert audiences. Therefore, as a technical writer, the very first thing you need to do before writing for non-expert audiences is to remember that the vast majority of your expert knowledge is not going to be obvious to the vast majority of people.

I write and translate technical documentation. No matter which hat I'm wearing, these guidelines help both me and my readers: 1. Use simple sentences and the active voice. Don't be afraid to address readers directly. NOT: The purpose of this operation manual is to make readers familiar with the equipment. INSTEAD: Read this manual to familiarize yourself with the equipment. 2. Make sure you understand how the thing works yourself before you explain it to others. Do the research. Ask! 3. Have someone else read the documentation before publication. Always.

Use commonly understood words. Never use jargon. Use the same word or phrase consistently to describe the same item. Do not overuse acronyms or initialisms. Employ glossaries with easy-to-comprehend definitions that do not echo the term being defined.

The use of plain language is also essential when it comes to translating such documents. If the translator can easily understand the text, avoiding ambiguity and pitfalls, they will also be in a better position to make it accessible to their own language readers.

Start by reading your words aloud. You might think they sound the same in your head, but try it. You'll see. Use the first or second person if you can. "The authors discovered" conveys no more authority than "I learned" or "Our research shows." Which is easier to read? Clear thinking is clear writing. If a passage is murky, it might not be a writing problem. Think about what you really mean to say, and try again. Imagine your document must fit on a form with a limited word count—say, 25% fewer words than you have in your draft. Then replace long words with shorter ones that mean the same thing (such as "use" in place of "utilize"). Root out repetition, and remove unnecessary transitions. Scrap every word that's not doing useful work.

Two things: keep it simple and read your work out loud. Both really help to stop getting caught up in using complex and unnecessarily tortuous verbiage...

When using plain language be direct and avoid too long sentences with multiple ideas. Be consistence with the wording style and use glossaries when necessary. Add simple visuals to explain the complex ideas.

Consistency is the key. Have guidelines for your headings and sub headings for the users to easily comprehend. Highlight the key words. Ensure that the user can accomplish the task following the document.

Structure helps keep peoples attention where you want it to be; on your message. By using consistent formatting and keeping your main point at the front of your paragraphs and sections you give your readers a roadmap to the destination of your writing. They don't have to guess or wait in suspense and they can't be confused by an unexpected conclusion, because they already know where they're going.

One of the most important things to structure a document is to have a clear vision of how the user will interact with the document. This allows to set a flow for the document. Additionally, it is imperative to break the document into small topics. A clear heading reduces jargon by setting the expectations right. The user knows straight away what to expect out of the topic. Also, as a writer we should limit the nesting level to 3 or 4. This will also allow to structure a clean document

It is important taking an overall of the message we want to convey and explaining it in the Abstract then having a distribution of text that respects the rule 10/90, so that the Introduction and Conclusion form 10% of the text. The title should bring the most central idea in the text. The sources are important: if we want to target a non-technical audience, we should select popular sources. If we use technical lingo in such a text, we make it lightly and explain through notes or other resources what is meant in plain terms. The basic parts of a good text would be: 1) Title 2) Author and author's details (e-mail, institution and others) 3) Abstract 4) Key-words 5) Introduction 6) Development 7) Conclusion 8) References

The nature of the documentation being produced will determine if it needs to be structures. As certain types of documents, e.g. Project bids, or PID's need to have formal structure. User guides on a discrete topic may not need such a formal structure. It is recommended that you retain the same formatting styles, etc., across all of your documents. Irrespective of their structure. For example applying consistent Heading 1, Heading 2, Bullet indents, etc., across all your document types. This process can be simplified by the use of templates. Using the same formatting in all your documents acts as a branding style and provides a more professional finish. Some thought in the formatting style(s) you use will however be required.

This is where it is very important not to use slang, colloquialisms, and idioms. These speech patterns will be difficult to transfer into another language, both syntax and meaning.

You can also ask a technical translator instead of using some imperfect software to do the job. A native speaker will have the right technical concepts rather than translating without global understanding.

Rewriting a text and providing it with an array of sentential and textual pieces in an in-other-words fashion is a way to intra-lingually express the technical message of a scientific text. Too, providing certain neologistic items to fill the terminological gaps in translation is a working strategy to make the message of the technical text get-at-able for the target readership provided that each neoligistic item is given an explanatory note via the foot- or end-noting.

Two key areas to focus on: 1. Avoiding easily misconstrued words that might be mistranslated. Common examples? Once/after: Use "once" to mean "one time". Similarly, may/might: Use "may" to confer permission, and "might" to confer possibility. 2. Every good technical author must use consistent terminology, every time. That practice ensures that the reader knows what you mean every time. This consistency results in reduced translation costs, because each consistently used term or phrase is translated one time. Scan through your documentation set to locate commonly used terms. Locate similarly worded terms/phrases and see if you can streamline their wording to use your more consistent terms. With translation, consistency is key!

In case you are going to create more typical content for the same topic and the same client, it is better to use the same technical translator, who will take care of translation memory, glossary and develop specific style guide for the target language. Language service providers or translation agencies use professional CAT (Computer Assisted Translation) tools for ensuring consistency, correct terminology use and error-free translation. In case you don't have experience in translation, it will be impossible for you to provide high-quality translation, especially for the technical document. Keep it for professionals!

In my experience a technical document is never ready at the first try. Ideally, you can go back to SMEs for a review of the most technical aspects and find out if there’s any way you can make them clearer and also go through any follow up questions you may have. Apart from SMEs, I think the review of a less experienced user is even more valuable as they’ll help figure out if something isn’t clear enough or if any topics may be missing.

Being informed through the feedback provided by the target end-users of the technical text actually helps better tune the textual features of the text with expectations of the target community; yet one needs to be cautious that the readers' expectations should be reasonable and not compromise the scientic import of the technical text.

Have a peer who is unfamiliar with your content read through your document. If they have a general understanding of what you're explaining, you're doing well. Then ask your SME to review the document to make sure it is not too simplistic.

I agree it is important to get the document reviewed by the SMEs/Product owners who have knowledge on the subject plus they can provide their valuable feedback on the content at the same time.

Besides getting feedback from stakeholders, SMEs, or a UAT group, I think it's important the writer tries to accomplish the task and/or solve the problem the document is addressing. For software workflows, the writer should get access to the development environment to go through each step as if they are the end user or customer. While going through this process, questions may come up. These are great opportunities to a) understand audience pain points and b) provide feedback for development teams. When a writer tests a document themselves, they have put themselves in their audience's shoes, and they can provide a really strong draft that inherently understands the use case.

Use The Product. You can do this physically or mentally, but you have to experience the product before you can effectively write on it. I once wrote a simple step-by-step manual on LinkedIn account registration and profile setup, I decided to read and impliment only to find out I missed a minor action. If I'd not used the product, the error might have gone unnoticed. You write better when you understand the product, you understand the product better when you use it.

Technical writers can simplify work for non-technical readers by using clear and concise language, avoiding jargon, providing examples and analogies, employing visuals (diagrams, charts), creating a logical structure, spelling terms at first use and including a glossary.

Technical topics are complex by definition - why do so many manuals and guides assume that print and PDFs are the answer. By switching to an audio format (which can be done inexpensively through AI like Responsive Voice), the learner can listen WHILE they execute a task. Writing for audio also encourages clearer, step-by-step instructions. The writer must imagine executing the task. They will automatically use conversational language to describe the procedure. Audio is also great for proofreading. Use Word to read back your wording for flow and clarity.

In a single line, always try to write documents assuming you are the customer using that product. This way your customer will never have any confusion regarding any of the topics or content.

We have covered writing and text formatting in the above points. Another consideration, which relates to knowing your audience, is the challenges associated with visual disabilities. Considerations include colour blindness of various types, dyslexia, etc. Ways to help minimise the impact of these visual disabilities include: - Primarily use black text. - Limit the use of colour. Where colour is used, e.g. in a table add enter the name of the colour applied in the coloured cell. - If necessary look to invert coloured text entered in a coloured cell. For example, white text in a bright red cell is easier to read. Use simple font types. Use 11pt as the minimum primary font size. etc.