Benefits

• Subject-matter experts have more time to focus on core duties
• Testing, training, and documentation are completed quickly
• Everyone stays informed about changes in the system

Challenge

The mutual group of a large insurance and investment company was developing a new 401(k) application that required testing, documentation, and training. The traditional development approach is for testers to determine the key activities users perform and write scenarios for each, which they then use to create test scripts. Next, trainers create a similar inventory of user actions to help flesh out a class syllabus. Finally, documentation specialists repeat the same step while outlining procedures for user manuals.

In the course of one project, analysts from all three areas interview the same subject-matter experts, gathering roughly the same information for use in similar ways. This leads to redundant effort and makes a bottleneck of the subject-matter expert, who must brief each group independently.

Because different groups are maintaining the same information in three places, it is also hard to keep the materials synchronized. For example, Testing might hear about a change to a process, while Training and Documentation do not. This leads to errors and confusion or, at best, the omission of useful information.

Stratagem's Solution

Stratagem’s Writing Services group joined the project at its very start with an eye to identifying the core business processes that users would have to perform. A Writing Services analyst worked with subject-matter experts to map out ideal process flows and capture the key tasks associated with each procedure.

These generic procedures then became the foundation for test scripts, training sessions, and procedure-based documentation. Each group knew where to go for source information about how the system should work, saving time during the interviewing and fact-finding stage of the project.

Result

By developing a library of user procedures that served as a starting point for testers, trainers, and writers alike, Stratagem was able to pare the client’s costs. This solution also freed busy subject-matter experts to do more important project-leadership activities.

In addition, the shared task library kept the different groups up to date and ensured that everyone on the team was working from the same root assumptions about how things were supposed to work.