Unit 1:Technical Writing

● Introduction

● Objectives of Technical Writing

● Characteristics of Technical Writing

● Major Writing Strategies

● Technical Writing Style and Language

● Tips on Language Use

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Example of technical writing/documents
• Technical reports Eg:project report,Annual report etc
• Technical description Eg:Process description,Land description,
product description etc
• Technical proposal Eg: Internal& External,Solicited &Unsolicited.
• Memos
• Instruction manuals

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 Introduction
• Writing or drafting technical communication used in technical or
occupational fields.
• Integral part of technical communication.
• Encompasses the largest sub field in technical communication.
• Writing should follow 7C’s of communication namely clarity, conciseness,
concreteness, correctness, consideration, completeness and courtesy.
• Effective written communication plays a crucial role in a institution,
organization or business.
• Is a type of writing where the author writes about a particular subject that
requires direction, instruction or explanation.
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Objectives of Technical Writing

• To provide clear and organized information.

• To ease decision making
• To motivate the employees and raise their morale.
• To instructions to the subordinates.
• To make requests and give suggestions and orders.
• To project the image and create goodwill.
• To communicate with government officials.

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Objectives of Technical Writing
• To give concreteness to the rules and regulations to be followed.
• To document information for the future use.
• To validate the plans and decisions.
• For receiving feedback.

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Characteristics of technical writing
• Technical writing follows the 7C’s of communication.
• The language is specific
• It is detailed and informative.
• It is structured.
• It is brief and sequential.

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Difference between General writing and Technical
writing.

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 Uses of Technical writing
The subject of technical writing can be
1. Tangible
Something that can be seen or touched .For example ,the manual may
explain how to assemble the pieces of an electronic gadget.
2. Abstract
It may explain the steps required to complete an official process.

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 Major writing Strategies
• There are some writing strategies that can make the writing
impressive.
• The aim of writing is to engage the audience in a clear and consistent
way.
• Sloppy writing is always confusing.
• Clear ,structured and organized writing is desirable.
Let’s see few tips to be followed to make the audience read more of
what has been written.

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 Major writing Strategies
i. A captivating opening.
ii. A sense of direction.
iii. Sincerity
iv. Sense of time
v. Clarity
vi. Quotes
vii. Facts and figures
viii. Vocabulary
ix. Keep it simple.

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Technical Writing Style and Language.
Technical Writing Style
• Is straight forward and easy to understand explanation of a particular
project, process ,topic or phenomenon.
• Clearly explains how something works.
• Follows the non-personal style and descriptive narrative.
• The audience of the text or document plays a vital role in determining
the style and language of a piece of technical writing.
• It is written to express.
• It aims at providing clear and useful information to the targeted
audience.
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Technical Writing Style and Language.
Points that will help in achieving the appropriate writing style in technical
documents.
• Audience analysis.
• Impersonal style.
• Make it informative.
• The writing should be straight forward.
• Educate the reader.
• Keep it concise.
• Ensure clarity in writing.
• Conduct extensive research.
• Evaluate the writing.
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Technical Writing Style and Language.
Technical writing language
• Formal in style, language and presentation.
• Following rules framed by George Orwell on language use can make
technical writing formal and comprehensible.
i. Never use a metaphor, simile, oxymoron other figures of speech.
ii. Never use a long word where a short one works.
iii. If it is possible to eliminate a word, do so.
iv. Use active voice in writing.
v. Never use a foreign word or phrase, scientific word or a jargon if its regular
English equivalent is available.

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Technical Writing Style and Language.
Technical writing language
Exceptions for technical writing :
i. If the audience habitually uses the figures of speech ,the author
can use it too.
ii. If the scientific jargon is a standard, the author must use it.
iii. Once a term or word is explained ,it becomes usable in the
document and can be consistently used thereafter.

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Tips on Language use.
i. Technical writing should be clear.
ii. Use simple active voice sentences.
iii. Keep the sentence structure simple.
iv. Avoid the obvious in technical writing.
v. Eliminate redundancy.
vi. Avoid verbosity and pomposity.
vii. Avoid using clichés and euphemisms.
viii. Use acronyms and abbreviations carefully.
ix. Use dictionaries, thesauruses and grammar checkers.
x. Use style manuals.

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 7C’s of communication

• Clarity
• Conciseness
• Concreteness
• Correctness
• Consideration
• Completeness
• Courtesy.

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 7C’s of communication
Clarity
• Technical document must convey a single meaning that the reader can
understand. Unclear Technical writing is expensive. They vital
communication link among the various employees is usually the
report, if this link is weak, the entire project may be jeopardized.
• Unclear technical writing can be dangerous e.g., unclear instruction on
how to operate machinery.

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 7C’s of communication
Conciseness
• To convey in least possible words. Conciseness can be achieved by
avoiding unnecessary wordy expressions and repetition. Using short
and brief sentences also bring conciseness in communication.
Conciseness in the message has the following features:
i. Conciseness saves time.
ii. Conciseness is also cost saving and economical.
iii. Concise message is more understandable and comprehensible to the receiver.
iv. Concise message appeals more to the reader/receiver.
v. A conciseness is non –repetitive in nature as it also holds to concentration and interest
of the reader.

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 7C’s of communication
Concreteness
• Concreteness means being particular and specific rather than being
general. Concrete words are comparatively more understandable,
accurate and even more believable. Concrete message has the
following features.
i. It reinforces confidence.
ii. The reader /receiver does not misinterpret the message.
iii. It is supported by specific facts and figures.

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 7C’s of communication
Correctness
• Good technical report must also be correct. It. must be free from
grammatical errors, punctuation mistakes, and should have appropriate
format standard. If a report contains grammatical errors, the reader
will doubt the accuracy of the information in the report. Technical
writing is meant to convey information and to persuade the audience.
To accomplish these goals, it must be clear accurate, easy to access
and must be economical and correct. If you mean to write "the three
persons: person 1, person 2 and person 3 attended a session" but you
use commas instead of the colon, your readers might think 6 people
attended the session, not 3.

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 7C’s of communication
Consideration
• Consideration means taking into consideration the audience
viewpoints, knowledge level and their education level.
• Consideration demands to put oneself in the place of decoder. It refers
to the use of ‘You-attitude', visualizing reader’s problems ,emotions,
expectations and their anticipated response.
• It also refers to emphasise the understanding of human nature and to
acknowledge positive pleasant facts.

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 7C’s of communication
Completeness
• The message must contain all the necessary information to bring the
response the sender desires. The sender should answer all the
questions and with facts and figures by going for extra details.It must
be confirmed that the sender has included all the information required
to ensure that the other person can do to complete a job or make a
reasonable decision.

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 7C’s of communication
Courtesy
• Courtesy means not only thinking about receiver but also giving
importance to his feelings. A lot can be achieved by using soft words
and gestures, being thoughtful, tactful and showing respect to the
receiver. Your message should reflect your positive-building goodwill
and be focused upon the reader.

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 Technical Writing Style and Language
Some elements in effective writing.
RIGHT WORDS AND PHRASES
▪ Prefer simple, familiar words to obscure, unfamiliar words.
▪ Prefer concrete and specific words to abstract and general words.
▪ Use acronyms carefully.
▪ Avoid clichés.
▪ Avoid excessive use of jargon.
▪ Avoid foreign words and phrases.
▪ Avoid redundancy and circumlocution.
▪ Avoid discriminatory writing.

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 Some elements in effective writing.
• Prefer simple, familiar words to obscure, unfamiliar words.
• Example1
• Original: Antiquated machinery was utilized for experimentation.
Revised: Old machinery was used for the test.
• Example 2
• Original: Company operations for the preceding accounting period
terminated with substantial deficit.
Revised: The company lost much money last year.

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 Some elements in effective writing.
Prefer concrete and specific words to abstract and general words.

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 Some elements in effective writing.
Use acronyms carefully
An acronym is a word formed by combining the first letters of the
words that make up the name of something.
For example, WHO is the acronym for World Health Organization.

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 Some elements in effective writing.
• Given below are a few samples of acronyms that may cause ambiguity
in a technical document or an email:
• CIA Cash in Advance
• CPA Certified Public Accountant
• FICA Federal Insurance Contributions Act
• CIM Computer Integrated Manufacturing
• IRA Individual Retirement Account/Irish Republican
Army/Instructionally Related Activities

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 Some elements in effective writing.
• Introduce acronyms the first time you use them by defining them in full,
parenthetically.
• Restrict the number of acronyms in individual sentences.
• When addressing non-expert readers, try to avoid using more than one
acronym in a sentence.
• Use the full term for an acronym when beginning a new section or when
the term has not been used for several pages in the technical document.
• When several potentially confusing acronyms are being used, they can be
defined in a separate glossary (an alphabetized list of terms, followed by
their definitions).

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 Some elements in effective writing.
• Acronyms are extensively used in email and sms communication. It is
acceptable as part of informal communication but should be strictly
avoided in official mails.

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 Some elements in effective writing.
Avoid Clichés
• Clichés are overused words and phrases that have lost their appeal.
• Some well-known clichés include
• food for thought, teeming millions, last but not the least, fishing in troubled
waters, and to burn the midnight oil.
• Example 1
Original: The report discusses threadbare the problem of air pollution in India.
Revised: The report discusses the problem of air pollution in India in detail.
• Example 2
Original: The engineers left no stones unturned to construct the bridge in time.
Revised: The engineers worked very hard to construct the bridge in time.
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 Some elements in effective writing.
Avoid Excessive Use of Jargons
• Jargon is defined as words or expressions that are used by a particular
profession or group of people and are difficult for others (outside this
group) to understand. Every profession has its specific jargon.
• Jargon is often used due to the false assumption that complex ideas
cannot be expressed without the use of highly technical language.

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 Some elements in effective writing.
Avoid Foreign Words and Phrases

Avoid Redundancy and Circumlocution

Some examples of redundancy are—the superfluous words are italicized—
basic fundamentals, return back, adequately enough, resume again, the month
of May, few in number, detailed perusal, true fact, new innovations, future
prospects, and so on.

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 Some elements in effective writing.
Avoid Discriminatory Writing
• In today’s all-inclusive society, it is wrong on a writer’s part to alienate a
section of the masses through the usage of politically incorrect words. Such
writing is offensive and does not speak well of the author’s open-
mindedness. All too prevalent are gender-biased words—words that
differentiate people based on their gender.
• The use of masculine pronouns can be eliminated in three ways:
• 1. Rewording the sentence: ‘A student in BITS does the assigned
homework well before coming to class.’
• 2. By making a dual reference: ‘A student in BITS does his or her
homework
• …’ 3. By making the reference plural ‘Students in BITS do their homework
…’

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Some elements in effective writing.

102003404:Technical Writing & Soft Skills_GCET

 Some elements in effective writing.
• Economy with words
• Avoid cluttering phrases

102003404:Technical Writing & Soft Skills_GCET

Some elements in effective writing.

102003404:Technical Writing & Soft Skills_GCET

Some elements in effective writing.

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Some elements in effective writing.

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Some elements in effective writing.

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 Some elements in effective writing.
• Active versus passive voice
• Economy of words is one of the hallmarks of good writing, and using
the active, rather than the passive voice, is one way to achieve
economy. Passive constructions often result in vagueness, and they
are longer since they need helping verbs (such as has been). Passive
voice can be used occasionally, especially when we want to avoid the
use of personal pronouns; otherwise, it is preferable to use active
voice.

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Some elements in effective writing.

102003404:Technical Writing & Soft Skills_GCET

Some elements in effective writing.

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 WRITING FOR THE WEB
• Print material is widely used by all of us for academic and professional
purposes
• But very soon online media will take over print media.
• Hence, it has become important for us to know the style in which we
need to formulate the web content.
• Writing for the web is different from that for the print media.

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 WRITING FOR THE WEB
• Keeping this behavioral attitude of the readers in mind, print media
try to attract and retain their attention by catchy visuals, color
scheme, and headlines.
• When we write for the web, we need to understand the various
platforms available and follow certain guidelines in order to grab and
sustain the attention of our readers.
• Social networks
• Wikis
• Blogs
• Websites

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 WRITING FOR THE WEB
Aspects to take care.
• Clarity of purpose
• Audience awareness
• Planning content
• Using effective style of writing
• Formatting
• Proofreading

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 WRITING FOR THE WEB
Clarity of Purpose
• When we think of creating content for the web, we need to ask ourselves
the following questions so that we are clear with our purpose:
• What are we achieving by publishing this content?
• What information should we include in this? • Does my objective
understand the readers’ needs?
• Have I read the other web contents on the same topic before I set my
objectives?
• Have I published the same topic on any other web forum and, if so, how
does this content differ from the earlier one?
• Does my content have a single purpose or multiple purposes? If it has
many purposes, which one is the most important one?

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 WRITING FOR THE WEB
• Audience Awareness
To get increased readership for our web content, it is not only
important to write what we know about, but also what readers want.

• Planning Content
Extensive research is important during the planning phase, and we
should try to identify the sources from which we can collect
information for developing our content. We can refer to books,
journals, magazines, online resources, etc., so as to keep ourselves
updated about the content.

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 WRITING FOR THE WEB
• Effective Style of Writing
We should use first person and second person, rather than using third
person.
We should get to the important point right away without spending too
many words on the introduction because if the readers don’t find the
required information soon, they would go for some other site.
We should be friendly in our tone and speak directly using active voice.

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 WRITING FOR THE WEB
Formatting
Our web content should be easily readable and scannable, and in order to
achieve these, we can follow the following tips:
• Use appropriate font type, size, and color; use bold or italics type to catch
the important points of the content.
• Use catchy headings and subheadings that reflect the content under each.
• Provide easy navigations for any links or other sources, etc. It is better to
connect the links to the appropriate words in the content rather than using
the words ‘Click here’.
• Bullet lists may be helpful in grabbing the attention.
• Use videos, photos, and other multimedia aids for enriching the text.
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 WRITING FOR THE WEB
Proofreading
• Our web content should be free from typos, incorrect spelling, and
grammatical errors.
• Just as we proofread our print content, we should proofread carefully
the web content too.
• Carefully edited, revised, and proofread content would have better
chances of getting more readership.

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 Summary

102003404:Technical Writing & Soft Skills_GCET