Results of the documentation benchmarks survey

Over the past few months we have conducted a number of surveys asking people about documentation management in their organizations. The following is a summary of the results.

Respondents

The respondents were predominantly from private (45%) and listed (30%) companies, with the remainder divided fairly evenly between not-for-profits, government agencies, and educational and scientific institutions. Median organization size was 500 employees; the sample included a reasonable representation of both SMEs (20 - 100 employees) and large enterprises (5000+ employees).

In looking at the results below, bear in mind that the respondents were self-selected: this implies that they had at least a general interest in documentation in their organization.

Management system standards

Most responding organizations have documentation to comply with at least one management system standard.

Languages

Most respondents report that their documentation is in English. No doubt this is partly a consequence of the contexts in which the surveys were publicized (English language discussion forums, for the most part). However, 30 percent of respondents report that their documentation is in two languages, and 10 percent in more than two. One organization has documentation in 22 languages. The mind boggles.

Objectives

In order of priority, what are the main uses for your documentation?

Documentation management

Is there a formal procedure for creating, reviewing, and issuing documentation?
Yes: 90%
No: 10%

Does any one person have overall control of the documentation?
Yes: 49%
No: 51%

Does your organization have a Knowledge Manager?
Yes: 27%
No: 73%

Writing and approval

Does each item of documentation have a single manager who is accountable for the content?
Yes: 79%
No: 21%

Does your organization use external suppliers to prepare documentation?
Never: 53%
Sometimes: 39%
Regularly: 8%
Always: 0

Are documents routinely referred to subject matter experts during development?

How many people review each document before it is issued?
1: 16%
2 - 5: 64%
5+: 10%

On average, how long does it take to revise and re-issue a document?

A few organizations reported review cycles than can exceed 12 months; and one brave soul reported that the question was not applicable: their documentation was prepared in 2006, and has never been revised.

Physical management

Physically, how does your organization manage its documentation?

Is there a master register of all documentation?
Yes: 50%
No: 50%

Is there a master index, for searching the entire set of documentation?
Yes: 54%
No: 46%

Physical production

What is the usual finished form of the documentation?

Are different personnel responsible for writing and for formatting?
Yes (one person writes the content and someone else does the formatting): 45%
No (the writer does the formatting also): 55%

What software is normally used to create documentation?

What non-text elements are routinely included in the documentation?

When documentation is issued, how are affected personnel notified?

Documentation costs

Most organizations have no idea about the costs or value of their documentation. To some extent this is (presumably) because preparing documentation is considered, for many managers, to be 'part of the job' — and the costs are thus not isolated.

Does the organization track the costs of creating and maintaining documentation?
Yes: 26%
No: 74%

Is the value of the existing documentation shown in the organization's balance sheet?
Yes: 12%
No: 88%

Approximately how much does the organization spend, per year, creating and maintaining documentation (in USD)?

George Kesteven is the Phrontex lead consultant. Phrontex is a business management system for organizations that want to turn their documented knowledge into an intellectual property asset.