Latest / The Not-Boring Tech Writer / Kate sounds off on Write the Docs
Transcript
- Kate Mueller: [00:00:05] Welcome to The Not-Boring Tech Writer, a podcast sponsored by KnowledgeOwl. Together, we explore topics and hear from other writers to help inspire us, deepen our skills and foster our distinctly not-boring tech writing community. Kate Mueller: [00:00:20] Hello lovely, not-boring tech writers. I'm Kate Mueller, and this is one of our solo episodes where I share things I'm thinking about or working on. I'm recording this episode in mid-May, right after attending Write the Docs Portland. First, my docs project progress update. Since my last episode, I've updated another 50 articles, taking my grand total to 507. This month's velocity was a bit slower since I spent time prepping for and teaching KnowledgeOwl's 'Authoring 101' class, and of course, attending Write the Docs. My big achievement for the month was a massive update to our pricing and plan related documentation. I removed a lot of detailed pricing info to default to our marketing website, and I also rewrote pretty much every existing pricing related doc we had. Most of these docs hadn't been substantively updated in the last five years. And in that time, KnowledgeOwl has been transitioning most subscribers to a merchant of record. We also recently released a total rewrite to the in-app billing page. Nearly everything here needed major content updates. And, just to make it more fun, since most of these docs were written by someone else long before our current style guide, they also needed to be updated to align with our current style and tone. Kate Mueller: [00:01:45] This was one of those, "I thought this wasn't going to be a very big deal, and then it ended up being a lot more work than I thought". Have you sensed a trend? I think I'm just optimistic in thinking about docs work. Anyway, I did some major reorganization and was able to get a content review from Anne, our lead billing owl. She caught a number of small inconsistencies, as well as a few fun style and grammar suggestions. So not only are these docs much more up to date, but I also have far more confidence that they're consistent with our billing related support tickets. Normally, I like to reflect on our most recent guest episode during these solo episodes, and Sue Brandt's episode was full of good job hunting nuggets and tips, but I'm not sure there's as much for me to reflect on here other than to say, "Yes". Many of the things I like to do while job hunting are actually reasonably good ideas, but I did appreciate her constant reminder to ensure that all materials accurately reflect your skills as a writer. Having a resume and cover letter with sound structure and well-written content that doesn't get too stuck in the weeds while highlighting the things most relevant to both a first round recruiter and a final round hiring manager. I also found it encouraging that there are still hiring managers out there for whom demonstrated skills in writing and the ability to learn, combined with a depth of enthusiasm, far outweigh experience with specific tools or tech stacks. Kate Mueller: [00:03:19] The main thing I want to talk about in this episode is Write the Docs Portland, which Chad and I both just got back from. If you've been listening to this year's episodes, you've probably noticed the theme that Write the Docs comes up a lot. Either as a way I've met people or as a recommended resource from some of the guests. It's an excellent community, very supportive, and the conferences have been an important part of my journey as a documentarian and tech writer. A little background there, I attended my first conference in person in 2019, and it was the first time I realized that there were a lot of people who did work that I do. Work that I hadn't always felt sure how to describe, let alone felt like I was a part of a community around it. And that sense of community was really important to me. I presented virtually at the Portland 2022 conference. I gave a talk called 'Beating the Virginia Blues: Thru-Hiking Strategies to Help You Survive Your Next Big Project'. We'll link it in the show notes. In that talk, I tied my strategies to successfully hike the Appalachian Trail to strategies you can use for large docs or major code update projects. Since then, I've attended a couple conferences virtually, mostly Write the Docs Atlantic, but I haven't attended anything in person since 2019 until this year. Kate Mueller: [00:04:50] What I was reminded of, attending in person, was just how special and amazing this conference and community are. It was especially fun for me to attend with Chad, both because he'd never attended Write the Docs in person, but also because we had never met in real life. We've been remote virtual coworkers for the longest time, so it was really fun to get to hang out and have random non-work related conversations and eat meals together and be surprised at how tall he is. I'm always surprised by how tall or how short people are in real life. Is this just me? Thinking about the conference has gotten me reflecting on what I love about the community and what I love about the conference, so I decided that's what I would talk about for this solo episode. Here, in no particular order, are six things I most love about Write the Docs. Number one, you get to choose your own conference adventure. I really don't know how to say this other than to just say that, so I'm going to say it. First, there's the fact that there are events before the official conference talks ever begin. The Saturday before offers a long, unofficial kickoff hike, which I attend every time I go since I find it way easier to ease into socializing while hiking. And then writing day on Sunday provides a way for you to get experience and feedback with docs as code or other setups and tools, and maybe get your first open source contributions or PR submitted. Kate Mueller: [00:06:25] It can be a great way to get your feet wet and collaborate with others while also being kind of low key on the socializing front. Then there's the actual official conference, which still supports the 'choose your own conference' adventure. Some conferences force you into selecting a track for the talks you want to attend, or they only offer a single lineup. Write the Docs strikes a very nice balance between these. There are the mainstage talks we all know about well in advance because they're scheduled and accepted, but there are also a handful, maybe even up to 8 or 9, unconference sessions proposed and run by attendees at the same time as those main conference talks. They kind of happen ad hoc as a result of conversations that people have, talks that are given, you name it. These tend to be more informal gatherings, sometimes around specific subgroups. This year I saw some on neuro spiciness, queer identities, certain tools, I think there was even one on improv warm ups. Or they can be around common topics or problems that we all have. There were a lot of conversations around AI. I attended an unconference session about user feedback, that was a follow up to a talk that Rachel Rigdon gave. Just a lot of flexibility. Kate Mueller: [00:07:49] I really love the amount of freedom you have in choosing which topics you want to hear about or talk about. Each day is designated. Lightning talks also add a lot of variety into the mix. I love this 'choose your own adventure' aspect, because it encourages me to seek out the experiences and topics that I'm most interested in. My Write the Docs conference was a bit different than Chad's, which was a bit different than anybody else we knew just because of how we chose to spend our time. As a side note, as someone who lives with a chronic illness, I really love this flexibility because it gives me a lot of guilt-free ways to attend what I feel up to and not attend the stuff I don't have the energy for. Second on the list of things I love most about Write the Docs, the talk selections themselves. Write the Docs began pretty firmly in the software documentation space and, I would say, back in the day had a strong bias toward docs as code. One of the things I've enjoyed observing is how much it has grown and expanded to welcome ever more types of documentation as well as documentarians. They've made this very conscious choice to use the word 'documentarians', because it includes people from all kinds of different roles. Kate Mueller: [00:09:12] You do have tech writers there, you have developers who work on docs, you have community managers and marketers and support engineers. A huge range of job titles and descriptions, but all grouped together under that documentarian label. I would say that the talk selections generally support and reflect that choice. Every year it feels like the talks get a little bit more diverse, both on the main conference stage and the lightning talks, as well as some of the unconference sessions. For example, this year included mainstage talks about medical device documentation and knitting patterns as a form of technical writing. I absolutely loved that talk. With lightning talks about things like developer personas, applying game design to docs, surviving layoffs, you name it, there was probably something on it. The talks always leave me with a number of new ideas and a lot of inspiration, whether that's to try new tools and techniques, or just this feeling of not being alone in facing these problems or anxieties. Even the talks that aren't about tools or documentation types I work in give me good takeaways. For example, this year's final mainstage talk was about encouraging community contributions on a ‘docs as code’ setup. Now, I'm not currently working in a docs as code setup, and I'm not currently seeking community contributions to my docs, but I still found a lot of the guidance and lessons learned to be intriguing and potentially applicable to other areas of my work. Kate Mueller: [00:10:54] Even if the talks aren't directly applicable to the type of documentation or the role that you're doing, they're usually so well done that it's very easy to draw comparisons to work that you are currently engaged in, so that you still get something meaningful out of them. Third on my list of things I most love about Write the Docs, it's support for first time attendees. One of my concerns going to a new conference for the first time is whether it's going to feel cliquish. I don't know if this is just harping back to my high school days or what, but the first time I go to a conference, I often have this feeling of being left out because I don't know any of the big names, I don't have any friendly faces, I don't know how the conference works, I don't know what to expect. So it triggers a little bit of social anxiety for me. Write the Docs feels like a conference that was designed with this exact anxiety in mind. There are multiple Welcome Wagon tours during the Sunday before when writing day is held, as well as Monday morning so that you can get used to the venue, learn a little bit about the code of conduct, figure out where you might want to hang out, and a little bit about how the conference works. Then at the start of the conference, Eric always gives this great opening address where he lays out more about the code of conduct and some of the rules that we try to apply in the community. Kate Mueller: [00:12:26] I want to highlight the two big rules there, because I think they very much embody that new first time attendee attitude. The first is the Pac-Man rule. At most conferences, you'll see people naturally form a circle while they're talking to each other. And the thing about those circles is that they feel closed. As a newcomer, particularly, and if you're there alone without any coworkers, you have to be pretty brave to wander in. What Write the Docs explicitly encourages people to do is instead of forming a fully complete circle, you form a Pac-Man. Like the shape of a Pac-Man with its mouth open, and that opening should be large enough to let at least one person enter the group. And as people enter, the Pac-Man adjusts, and eventually it'll split into two different Pac-People once it gets too big. But that tiny little bit of thoughtfulness makes it far easier to just wander in and join a conversation without having to know anyone or even introduce yourself. To me, it's also just emblematic of what good documentation does, which is to take something that's really complicated and make it seem very simple. It's a super simple fix to what is, at its heart, a fairly complicated social problem. Kate Mueller: [00:13:48] The second rule that Eric mentions in this opening address, and that comes up frequently, is about introducing yourself to new people that you've never met before each day of the conference. The expectation is that each day you will meet the same number of new people as the number of years you've been attending the conference. So if you're brand new, like Chad was, he only had the expectation that he had to meet one new person. But experienced people like me have to meet maybe 3 or 4 or 5 new people, and some of the die hard organizers and folks who've been there forever had to meet 13 per day. I love this as a concept, because when you're new to a conference, often the burden to make those connections lies on you as the newcomer. This basically flips that expectation on its head and says, "Actually, the burden is not on the newbies, but is on the folks who've been here before". It's a way for you to pay forward how welcoming and supportive the community was for you the first time you were there. I loved this rule so much the first year I attended, because it made it easier for me to make introductions because it wasn't all on me. I was definitely overwhelmed. I found that I loved it even more this year because I was a lot more comfortable introducing myself and making those connections. I knew that it was a thing that was helping some of the newer folks check off the requirement that they met somebody. Also, for folks who'd actually listen to the podcast, it was kind of fun to get to meet in person. I also got to meet a couple of our previous guests and soon-to-be guests and guests whose episodes are currently in production in person, which was really fun for me. I did not count them as new people, just for the record. I had met them before. I love, in both of these cases, that it has taken something that is normally a little bit anxiety-producing for a first time attendee and turned it on its head so that if anxiety is being shouldered, it's being shouldered by people who have been there before and know what to expect, who are better prepared to shoulder it. Before I launch into the last three things I most love about Write the Docs, this feels like a good time to take a quick break. Kate Mueller: [00:16:23] This episode is sponsored by KnowledgeOwl, your team's next knowledge-based solution. You don't have to be a technical wizard to use KnowledgeOwl. Our intuitive, robust features empower teammates of all feathers to spend more time on content and less time on administration. Learn more and sign up for a free 30-day trial at knowledgeowl.com. Kate Mueller: [00:16:46] Continuing my list of six things I most love about Write the Docs conferences, we have number four, an inclusive mindset. In my life outside of tech writing conversations, outside this podcast and Write the Docs, I would describe myself as an introvert. I find small talk pretty exhausting and I also manage a chronic illness, so I have to be really aware of the stuff that makes me exhausted. One of the things I most appreciate is that Write the Docs feels like a conference designed by introverts or easily overstimulated folks for other easily overstimulated folks. There are designated quiet spaces and work areas, and those spaces actually do remain quiet. So if you've just hit that point of 'peopling' too much, you can go somewhere quiet while still feeling like you're still part of the conference. There was also socially distanced seating this year, which for me was a nice break since I do 'mask' through the whole thing, and I was definitely not the only one 'masking' which made me happy. There are so many other ways that Write the Docs prioritizes inclusivity. They've included real-time closed captioning of all the main stage talks for a really long time, and they have priority seating in front of the monitors where the closed captioning is shown. They also provide stickers to add your preferred pronouns to your conference badge, to just normalize that. I'm sure I'm missing other ways, but I appreciate all these small and large ways that the conference seems to welcome and support differences without expecting everyone to be a high functioning power networking extrovert at all times. Kate Mueller: [00:18:37] Those probably aren't documentarians by their very nature, but I really appreciate that there isn't that expectation. The fifth thing that I love about Write the Docs conferences is, what I'm going to call, conference talk egalitarianism. I'm sorry, that sounds like a pretentious title, but here's what I mean by it. Some conferences make it seem like you must absolutely be an expert or an influencer to present a talk, and that's absolutely not the case at Write the Docs. I saw in the Write the Doc's Slack after the conference that tech writers are the anti-gatekeepers, and I think that's a good way to think about this. You do absolutely need to know about the thing you're presenting, but you don't have to be a polished public speaker or an experienced speaker. You definitely don't have to be a big-name influencer in the space. Lightning talks don't even have to be about documentation. If you've been hankering to just get experience speaking in front of a large audience, you can submit a talk on anything you're passionate about and potentially give it. I actually gave a lightning talk this year linking dog care daily routines, with a whole bunch of dog pictures, to documentation best practices. Kate Mueller: [00:20:02] I like a good metaphor, also it was an excuse to show dog photos. Hopefully the recording will be up by the time we air this and we can share the link to that. The lightning talk topics are all over the place and delightful, and they're a great way to welcome first time speakers. For lightning talks, when you submit a talk, they ask you to self-identify as a "I've never given a talk at Write the Docs before" or "I am an experienced presenter at Write the Docs" and they go for a mixture there. In terms of main conference talks, they try to offer very real support to first time main stage speakers. Technically they offer that support to all speakers, but it's especially available for first time speakers. Once your talk is accepted, you have the option to get mentoring or feedback from conference staff as well as previous speakers. If you are considering giving a talk at Write the Docs, I highly recommend doing this. You can get feedback on your talk's content itself on your slide deck, you can do dry runs to get feedback on your delivery, all manner of things from folks who have been to the conference before and given talks before. For me, all of this signals a deep commitment to knowledge sharing and community rather than some kind of gatekeeping to entry. It's egalitarian conferencing at its best. Kate Mueller: [00:21:32] Finally, the sixth thing I most love about Write the Docs, the power of community. The five other things I've already mentioned allow this sixth thing to truly shine. Which is that you'll meet a lot of absolutely amazing, delightful people at these conferences. The organizers and staff clearly pour a lot of energy into keeping the community and the conferences running smoothly and enforcing the code of conduct. They very seriously do listen to and evaluate feedback about how to improve it. Volunteers keep the event and a lot of the meetups chugging along smoothly. As just a regular attendee, I kept finding myself into these absolutely awesome conversations with almost total strangers. This is the kind of conference where you can easily find a presenter after their talk to ask more questions or ask them to share the spreadsheet that they showed a screenshot of, or just tell them how much you loved it. You can talk shop with a bunch of other people who actually know about the kind of work you do, and do that work and love it. In other words, this is an entire conference full of not-boring documentarians. From developers who write docs to technical writers to marketing teams to support engineers. The people you'll interact with here get it. You'll feel like you belong, even if you're a lone writer attending. And that sense of community is almost impossible to put into words. Above all, attending Write the Docs helped remind me why I do this podcast. Kate Mueller: [00:23:17] I believe in building community. Not as some kind of marketing buzzword, but because communities are part of what keeps all of us going. They help us celebrate our successes and weather our mistakes. They help pull us up when we aren't feeling awesome and allow us to help pull others up when we are, and they aren't. They encourage us to simultaneously share the things we know and learn from others' knowledge. Here at The Not-Boring Tech Writer, I am always infinitely aware of how much knowledge I don't have. It's why we have so many guests with such a wide variety of experience. But I'm also aware of just how lonely it can be being a solo writer or even part of a remote team. I believe we all do better when we all individually and collectively do better. I've tried to center those needs in our podcast. This isn't about my ego, or our guests' egos, or about maintaining some kind of clique or in-group, or about trying to sell more of something. It's about sharing knowledge, expertise, and a sense of belonging and community. And in that, we are 100% philosophically aligned with Write the Docs and remain a proud supporter of their work. As I was packing up to head home from the conference, I texted my partner and I said something like, "I've been so social this trip". Maybe I'm not as much of an introvert as I thought, maybe it's just that I'm not hanging out with the kinds of people I like to extrovert with. Write the Docs is, for me, a conference made up of people I can delightfully, for hours on end, extrovert with. I'm not sure I can think of higher praise than that. So if you'd like to get your writing extrovert on, or discover if you even have one, consider checking out the Berlin conference later this year, virtually or in person, the Kenya in-person conference in Nairobi or the virtual Australian conference. Or you can hold out for Portland's in-person conference in 2026. I'm hoping to make it back there and I will gladly be one of your "I met a new person today" people. Kate Mueller: [00:25:38] As always, if you have ideas for episode topics or guests, please message us on LinkedIn or BlueSky at the Not-Boring Tech Writer, or email tnbtw@knowledgeowl.com. The Not-Boring Tech Writer is produced by the lovely humans at Astronomic Audio. With editing by Dillon, transcription by Alan, and post-production by Been and Alex. Chad Timblin is our podcast head of operations. Our theme song is by Brightside Studio. Our artwork is by Bill Netherlands. You can check out KnowledgeOwl's products at knowledgeowl.com. And if you want to work with me on docs, on knowledge management coaching, on revamping an existing knowledge base, go to knowledgewithsass.com. Until next time, I'm Kate Mueller and you are the not-boring tech writer.