Reading #9: Chapter 13

Chapter 13 is entitled Managing Projects, and deals with the step by step process of how projects can be taken from the conceptual stages, through to a fully realized physical product. I found it interesting that the chapter discussed the difference between the prescriptive vs. descriptive approach to the entire process:  is it better to do have an outline, or prescribed way of working that should followed, of a detailed descriptive walkthrough?  The chapter discusses the waterfall method as being the main asses that technical communicators have at their disposal for planning and management, but does mention several others including:  iterative, or user centered design, extreme programming, in which pairs work closely together and test, test and retest until problems are solved, and agile, in which small teams focus on small parts of large products and chew their way through one piece at a time. The steps involved in the waterfall method are as follows:  planning, in which 30% of the total time spent on the project is recommended to be spent, research/info gathering, in which info should be sought actively rather than passively by technical communicators, composition/invention, in which documents are drafted, reviewing/testing against quality criteria, revision, production, and dissemination. I thought the chapter did a good job of balancing the heuristic heavy approach that the book is infamous for by this point with alternatives and other important information pertinent to the discussion. The alternative methods to the waterfall method were interesting to read about, and I can see how each approach would be best suited to a different situation.