• Target your audience by identifying:
audience type, characteristics and level
of expertise.
• Determine your audience's needs by
assessing their expertise and their
purpose in reading the document.
• Determine Document Density
• People read technical documents for
different reasons, and readers have
varying levels of technical expertise.
• To be effective, technical writing must
target its audience or audiences.
Target your audience by identifying your:
audience type and level of expertise
your audience purpose in using the
document,
and your audience attitude towards
both you and the content of your
document
• Writing for Experts:
• Distinguish between two types of experts:
– general experts and
– specific experts.
• Both kinds are readers with extensive
technical knowledge
of the document's
subject matter.
Purposes in Using Document:
Experts read technical and scientific
documents for a variety of purposes:
To maintain and expand their own
general expertise
To obtain specific answers to their
own research and writing
To evaluate a document's technical or
scientific content
Writing for Experts:
Distinguish between two types of experts:
general experts and
specific experts.
Both kinds are readers with extensive
technical knowledge
of the document's
subject matter.
Strategies for Writing to Technicians:
Keep introductions and background
information brief.
Make information accessible
(explained in next slid e)
Provide short definitions or
explanations of any unfamiliar terms,
tools, devices, or procedures.
Purposes in Using Document:
Managers read technical and scientific
documents for a variety of purposes:
to aid in making decisions
to assess current situations
to maintain their general level of
expertise
to evaluate projects and employees
In general, managers read for the
bottom
lin e, a concise
summary of the present
situation and specific recommendations for
action.
Audience Use of Document:
Readers of technical and scientific writing,
whatever their level of expertise, read a
document for three general purposes:
to acquire information
to help make decisions
to learn how to do something
On the other hand, if the audience does not
know you or does not consider you an
expert, or if the reader has had past
negative experience with you or your
organization, the document should include
extensive explanations of your conclusions
and recommendations to create
trust
and
establish
credibility.
In this lecture you learnt to
• Target your audience by identifying
audience type, characteristics and level
of expertise.
• Determine your audience's needs by
assessing their expertise and their
purpose in reading the document.
• Determine Document Density
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