How can you use narrative to improve technical manuals?

1 Why narrative matters

Narrative is the art of creating and conveying a coherent sequence of events, characters, and emotions that engages the reader and makes sense of the information. Incorporating narrative into your technical manuals can help to capture the reader’s attention, provide context and relevance for the technical details, simplify complex concepts and processes, create a logical flow and structure, build trust and credibility with the reader, as well as enhance recall and retention of the information.

2 How to use narrative elements

Narrative elements can be used to enhance technical manuals by establishing the purpose, scope, and audience of the manual, outlining the main steps, actions, and outcomes of the manual, identifying the roles, responsibilities, and perspectives of the users, operators, and stakeholders of the manual, highlighting the risks, issues, and obstacles that the users might encounter, showing the results, impacts, and feedback of the successful completion of the manual, and communicating the main message, value, and goal of the manual. All of these elements work together to align with the user's needs and expectations.

3 How to use narrative techniques

Narrative techniques are the methods and tools that you use to craft and deliver your story, such as language, tone, style, format, and visuals. To improve your technical manuals, you can use clear, concise, and consistent words and phrases that suit your audience and purpose. Additionally, you should strive for a friendly, professional, and respectful voice that builds rapport with your reader. Moreover, active, imperative, and direct sentences should be used to convey instructions and information effectively. Furthermore, headings, subheadings, lists, tables, and other elements can be used to organize and highlight your content. Finally, images, diagrams, charts, and other graphics can illustrate and complement your text.

4 How to use narrative examples

Narrative examples are the scenarios, cases, and stories that you use to demonstrate and explain your technical manual in action. These examples can help you improve your technical manuals by showing the reader how to apply it in real-world situations, providing concrete details and data that support your claims, relating to the reader's experiences and goals, engaging their emotions and imagination, and encouraging them to explore and experiment with the manual.

5 How to use narrative feedback

Narrative feedback is the input, comments, and suggestions that you receive from your users, testers, and reviewers about your technical manual. This feedback can be used to identify the strengths, weaknesses, and gaps of your manual, as well as evaluate its effectiveness, usability, and satisfaction. Furthermore, you can learn from the user's perspectives, needs, and preferences to improve the accuracy, clarity, and relevance of your manual. Ultimately, narrative feedback can help you update and revise your manual accordingly.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?