When Tech Pubs Won’t Let Go (Of The KB)

You’re ready to launch your KCS program when, surprise!, the Tech Pubs team positions itself as the expert and gatekeeper for posting anything in the customer-facing knowledge base. Sure, they are the creators and guardians of the product documentation and the all-important style guide–and they do a great job of it! But adding them to the process will add time and complexity. Here are 5 tips for navigating this negotiation.

Create a bypass process for emergencies. Some articles are too precious to delay publishing. If nothing else, support is (usually) a round-the-clock affair while the Tech Pubs team works a regular schedule, so arrange for a handful of Support team members to be authorized to publish selected articles right away. “Emergency” articles can always be edited later, if needed.

Define SLAs. Publishing delays can absolutely kill a KCS initiative, as contributors stop contributing if they see that the articles they wrote languish in some review queue. Stress the benefits of a 24-hour create-to-publish cycle, and see what you can get. Don’t bother defining priority levels and assorted process time: just go with emergency, per the point above, and regular.

Track the publishing backlog. Regardless of the SLAs you negotiate, track and report on how long it takes to publish articles. Long delays are arguments for modifying the process. For instance, automatically publish articles that have waited more than X days, or only edit articles that have been linked X times.

Educate on editing vs. writing.  You may find that the Tech Pubs team is reluctant to commit to SLAs because they overestimate the effort required to transform a knowledge base article into something worth publishing. KB articles are short; they are written by support agents, who are used to writing to customers; they are already “validated” from the technical perspective. Most only require a light edit (and many customers don’t care that much about polish, anyway).

Preserve the relationship. Good product documentation really helps support. Plus, you may want to get some editing help for some articles. Be pragmatic: a harmonious relationship is worth preserving, even if the “help” is not all that helpful for your program. Take the long view and keep looking for opportunities to streamline the process.

(Much of the suggestions here also apply when working with the legal team…) Happy publishing!

Have you had that situation happen to you? Please share your experience in a comment.