TWB Paper on Estimation Techniques points to Methods of Minimizing Estimation Variance for Technical Documentation deliveries

Bangalore: The Writers Block (TWB), India’s leading provider of technical documentation outsourcing and training services released a white paper on Estimation Techniques for Technical Documentation.

Estimating and planning effort correctly becomes critical as the complexity of technical documentation increases. Correct estimation is crucial since it affects budgeting of a project and the final delivery cost, schedule and customer experience. Although program designers would always like to arrive at an accurate estimate, many unanticipated factors and risks could affect the overall health of a project. The paper looks into why estimates go wrong and what are the factors to be considered while making an estimate for a given document. It also discusses some of the viable estimating techniques and their implications and also the issues that are often overlooked at the project planning stage

The development of a technical document does not merely entail writing; it involves various stages that are collectively termed as the Document Life Cycle (DLC).The paper provides an overview of the concept of Estimation and explains how variance in the original estimate can result in a host of problems affecting the effort time, and thus the financial numbers and the quality of the deliverables. It lists the factors that need to be considered to create a precise estimate including the final deliverables, audience and available resources. The paper throws light on the pressures faced by a technical documentation team in case the estimation variance and the dilemma of trying to meet the client’s time bound requirement and maintain quality at the same time.

The white paper has three separate sections dedicated to glitches encountered in Estimation, Methods of arriving at a Realistic Estimate and the Techniques used in Estimation. The first section identifies the different types of estimation glitches like inaccurate information provided, improper unit of estimation used for the concerned document and Subject Matter Expert (SME) review among others. The second section describes the methods of estimation like Work Break Down (WBD) and Page Effort Distribution (PED) and also explains which one should be used under what circumstances. The third section has the description, the advantages and disadvantages of the various types of estimation techniques like Expert Judgment, Estimation by Analogy, Task based Estimation, Prototype and Sizing & Estimating.

The white paper on Estimation Techniques for Technical Documentation will help technical documentation program managers and technical writers in an organization understand the importance and techniques of arriving at realistic estimate and hence help in meeting deliverable on time, while maintaining the quality.


The paper can be requested from the TWB website www.twb.in.

About TWB:

TWB is India's leading Technical Documentation service provider. Founded in 2005 with the objective of providing world-class technical documentation outsourcing and training services to suit the demands of global technology companies, today the company provides technical documentation outsourcing services to over 35 organizations including Accenture, Samsung, MindTree, Siemens, AOL, Titan, Intel, Wipro, CGN, BearingPoint, US Technologies and others. TWB executes Offshore Documentation deliveries from its Bangalore facilities and Onsite at customer locations. Over 150 companies including Lucent Technologies, SAP Labs, Wipro, Infosys, Intel among others hire technical writers from the TWB Associate and TWB Fundamental Certification programs. More information on TWB is available on www.twb.in

Contact:
Lillian D’Costa
+91.80.41256367
lilian.dcosta@twb.in


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