the it crowd stance on writing advice documents
TRANSCRIPT
The IT crowd guide to …
Advice Documents
Meet “Moss”
Hello!
He’s very smart
A real wizzkid one would say
Gosh… Now you gonnamake me blush!
But do you know his boss?
Meet “Jen”
Ohh, hi…
She’s good with numbers
Thank you!
But does not understand anything about the
“technical mumbo jumbo”…
I really don’t…
And her boss?
Doesn’t even care about IT…
I really don’t…
Yet Moss has encountered some “issues”…
Help! Exclamation mark!
So he does the obvious thing…
We need more memory!
Memo… what?
Memory! We need more memory, Jen!
Can’t we do without?
Off course not! And we
need it fast!
How fast?
Like yesterday…
duh!
How much does it cost?
How should I know?
You do the numbers!
This conversation isn’t going well…
So let’s reboot this, yeah?
What about going for version 2.0?
Let us help out our friend Mosson this one…
What does Jen want?
Just let me facebook?
Nice try Jen, we won’t be doing that…
Jen wants…
Brief summary of the issue at hand
Be assured that the issue will not return.
And her boss?
He wants to know how much it’s going to cost…
And why he should care about this issue?
Crap…That’s something
else then I had in mind!?!
Though, Jen will also want the summary to be backed by technical details…
But she does not understand
… ANY … of it !?!
True… But she will validate itwith other technical guys.
With Roy?
Yeah, maybe with Roy.
Or a consultant?
Hmm…How do I get about it then?
Let’s use the following skeleton…
The document should startof with the summary
So I shouldwrite
a summary …
of somethingI haven’t written
yet…
Good comment. Though it’s the first chapter in the document.
It will be the last thing you write…
Why not put it at the
end then?
No no no… Because Jen has a busy agenda and
doesn’t need all the nitty gritty details.
A summary at the beginning gives her the information
she needs to make a decision.
Write a summary of maximum one page covering everything in a nutshell
and in a language she can understand.
This summary be the first thingshe encounters. No need to lose half an hour trying to find it at the back.
So I don’tmention
“memory”?
Try to avoid technical terms… Translate them into the value they
deliver towards the business.
Euh…
You need the memory tomake the system go faster, right?
Off course silly!
Then say it like that!
Sounds fair!
And thenI write the
technical stuff?
In the second chapter …
Second? How many are there going to
be?!?
Five
Pffff…
Relax… stay calm and bare with!
OK!
Chapter TwoContext
Provide some details about the past…Often there have been events
in the past that relate to this issue.
Maybe there are certain decisions fromthe past, principles, contraints, …
culture things, that may affect this issue.
Sounds reasonable
Chapter ThreeCurrent Situation
Explain the current situation.
Duh!
No really. Explain it… Throw in diagrams, numbers, statistics, …
to show an insight into the issue.
I might have forgotten those
in the past…
You are not alone!
Chapter FourIdeal Situation
Now describe the end goal! What point do you want to achieve.
That’s the “advice”!
A lot of peopleonly see this chapter as “advice”
and forget the other four chapters.
Like I just did…
Indeed. But don’t feel bad… Now you know!
Chapter FiveRoad to … heaven
We know our starting point …The current situation
And we knowwhere we want
to be!
So now we can map the route between those two points…
Should I take the context
into account?
Indeed! Some contraints might prove to bespeed bumps on your road to heaven.
So…
1Management
Summary
2Context
3Current Situation
4Ideal Situation
5Road to …
Very well! You have been paying attention.
Thank you.I have!
Now let’s get started!
Jen, here is the advice
document
on the speed of the ordering
system.
Thank you Moss
Seems logical
Roy, can you check
…
the technicalcontent of this
advice document?
Sure
Seems logical
It’s correct, Jen!
Thank you Roy
Sir, you know everyone
is complainingabout …
the orderingsystem.
This is the solution!
Will it bepermanentlyfixed then?
Yes!
Great job Moss!We got the budget.
For the memory?
Memo…what?!?
Management Summary
Context
Current Situation
Ideal Situation
Road to Heaven
A quick recap
Credits
The “IT Crowd” is intellectual property
of “Channel 4”
