How to speak end user   Tara Saylor

The making of a communications nerd Started in advertising, but moved to employee communications Master’s degree in Communications Studies Lifelong Mac user won over by Office 365 Talks about intranets whenever possible Who they mean by “the business” A lot of my job is explaining change to people who were happy with how things were and really aren’t too excited about the fact it’s changing Certified Microsoft Adoption Pro When IT says “we should talk to the business” that’s me. World wide site roll out for Deere Moving 28,000 people off a platform with 9+ years of content Creating a personalized, customized digital workspace where one never existed

Don Draper has lots to apologize for. Communication isn’t some magic dark art that happens when people you wouldn’t trust with your laptop have six martini lunches. It’s a process that you can follow. Sure, there are people who are naturally great at it, and you might not have quite the same “sizzle” on things. Good communication is effective, not flashy.

Rule #1: You are not the end user You can’t just work from what you’d personally like best. It may not be correct.

Rule #2: Your users are not idiots… Mostly…. There are probably a few out there if we’re being honest

Rule #2: Your users are not idiots… They just don’t care about the same things you do. And they may hate technology or Office 365 or Sharepoint in particular.

Document management,

We have a bad habit of showing them ALL the ways something can work and ALL the ways to do it, which is kind of like making someone look at ALL the variations of coral. It goes from interesting to overwhelming to tuned out.

You don’t need to know how the engine works in order to drive the car to the store. We want to understand things, especially this crowd and technical people. But not everyone cares. And even if you want to understand because that’s your style But imagine answering a question about how to drive to the store with an in-depth description of the combustion engine and transmissions and driveshafts, or using only GPS coordinates for where they want to end up. The equivalent happens all the time. Diagram of a cylinder as found in 4-stroke gasoline engines.: C – crankshaft. E – exhaust camshaft. I – inlet camshaft. P – piston. R – connecting rod. S – spark plug. V – valves. red: exhaust, blue: intake. W – cooling water jacket. gray structure – engine block. By User:Wapcaplet - Own work, made with Blender, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=182044

Microsoft sells technology to technology buyers, who then foist it upon their companies. Hey, that’s cool. That’s why people like me aren’t going to run out of work. They are getting better- look at some of the adoption communities and things, but STILL very techy crowds. Our influencers are site owners and people like me who talk at SP Saturday. They’re people who care about technology. Most of their stuff is still geared toward tech. And yes, the IT Crowd was a comedy, but the reason it’s funny is that reality in the center of it that we recognize….

Rule #3: Your users are trying to get something done. Tell them how you can help. Probably, it’s their job. They want it to be easy or at least minimally disruptive.

Make a plan Start by getting everything put on paper, and then get it organized. That will help you see what you need to tell people and when.

- Who is your audience? Is it all employees? Is it certain employees? Is it customers?

- Who is your audience? - What do they need to do? Focus on the impact to them. What in their world will be changing, and what actions do they need to complete as a result? Be precise but concise here- you don’t have to tell them everything at once, and you don’t have to explain everything in the Single Perfect Email.

“Just be aware” is not a concrete action “Just be aware” is not a concrete action. ”Start preparing for change” is getting there. “Know they have to be on a new system by Q3 2019 and begin allocating resources” is concrete. Actions are much easier to measure than attitudes. Plus, do we really need to know the FYIs that we get? Think of all the emails that you get– do you really care about the things HR or training or whoever thinks you should care about?

- Who is your audience. - What do they need to do - Who is your audience? - What do they need to do? - When do they need to do it? You’re going to need to remind them of this repeatedly.

- Who is your audience. - What do they need to do - Who is your audience? - What do they need to do? - When do they need to do it? - Why does it matter? Again, think of the impact to them.

”Because we say so” isn’t really motivating ”Because we say so” isn’t really motivating. “To help the company” isn’t my problem. ”It will have this impact on your life” is more personal. If you tell me my computer isn’t going to work after next week unless I do this, I care a lot more than if you just say that it’s going to improve network efficiency, blah blah.

- Who is your audience. - What do they need to do - Who is your audience? - What do they need to do? - When do they need to do it? - Why does it matter? - Where are they getting more information? You can’t fit everything into that one perfect email. Have appropriate supporting documentation linked, or give a timeline for when that information will be available.

- Who is your audience. - What do they need to do - Who is your audience? - What do they need to do? - When do they need to do it? - Why does it matter? - Where are they getting more information? - How do they want to get info? There’s two elements to this– what they prefer and what’s effective. Do they prefer emails? Meetings with Q&A sessions? Singing telegrams? People may say that they don’t want another damn email, but they read them.

Put it all together Audience Goal Timing Message Tactic IT Team Prepare for impact on their systems, Update internal processes Systems must be ready prior to by company-wide launch More technical, contacts for personalized follow-up available Email with supporting documents, attend meetings Executives Make sure their organizations are adopting new tool Set expectations prior to launch Ongoing follow up support Emphasize action, provide specific ways to help Email from high-level project sponsor All employees Use the new tool Launch and beyond This change is happening, outline timing and impact, point to supporting documents Email, web article, have pre-recorded videos and support material, open houses Often it works out to be execs and leaders Tech crowd Site owners General End users

Voila! A plan

Rule #4: write drunk, edit sober (get rid of all the extra words) Ruthlessly remove superfluous information. It’s not necessary, it’s distracting, and we don’t have time to consume it People skim/

Prepare for questions Reluctant to change- find out why Scared of tech- Not gonna read instructions

- How do you want users to get help and training? Depending on the magnitude of what you’re doing, it could be more on-demand support or it could be pushing training sessions.

Speak their language. Make it clean. Make it simple Speak their language. Make it clean. Make it simple. Give more than one option- some people love video, some people need transcripts.

- How do you want users to get help and training - How do you want users to get help and training? - What can you answer in advance? These may be the questions you expect and the questions you dread. If you have an answer prepped for the tough ones in advance, you’re less likely to flub it when it comes up. Remember, you don’t have to give them all the details awkward truths. It’s ok to just give a summary answer like “it didn’t work on our network”

- How do you want users to get help and training - How do you want users to get help and training? - What can you answer in advance? - Who can help field questions? Does this involve a support room? A launch floor? Your usual company channels? Your champions? Reinforce the desired place- link to the documents instead of just giving the answer. “here’s where you can find that”

Rule #5: Someone will complain That doesn’t mean you have to care. It’s not ignoring users to accept that you can’t make everyone happy.

Work the plan

Rule #6: It’s not going to work exactly how you planned, and that’s OK There will be something you didn’t quite see coming

Embrace an agile mindset Your plan can and should evolve as you get more information. You don’t need to be running full-on scrums, but the agile principles definitely still matter. Also, that communication one is about doing dev work, not user support image borrowed from the internet.

Worksheets

Resources Writing for the web Plain language checklist Duarte persuasive presentations Copyblogger guide to engaging emails Microsoft support Office 365 training center

I love talking SharePoint! Tara@sourcecodecommunication.com @anokheeTara