Cheryl Schmelzer has over 20 years of experience in the field of user assistance. She began her career as a technical writer at Johnson Controls and then spent some time working as a technical communications consultant. In April, 1998, she joined RedPrairie as an Information Architect focusing on the online help and supporting documentation for the RedPrairie inventory management solution. She is now the Director of Publications, and while she continues to develop product documentation, her main objective is to advance the department by supporting the research and implementation of new technologies to improve efficiencies and the quality of the product that the team delivers. Employing a wiki to develop user documentation is the most current initiative that the team has undertaken. Prior to that, solutions for single sourcing, file management and e-learning module development were implemented. Cheryl has a bachelor’s degree in Management and Communications from Concordia University.

Denise Allan has been working as a technical communicator since 1992, creating documentation for companies in the automation and logistics execution industries. She has been with RedPrairie for 12 years, and is currently the Manager of Publications. In addition to managing a team, Denise creates and edits content for the company’s online help and paper publications. Most recently Denise has explored how to use a wiki for content management and collaborative authoring, and has successfully led several initiatives to transfer documentation to RedPrairie’s wiki. Denise has a bachelor’s degree in Technical Communication from the Milwaukee School of Engineering, and is a senior member of the Society for Technical Communication.

Klemmer's Banquet Center
10401 West Oklahoma Avenue
Milwaukee, WI 53227
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So what exactly is a wiki, and why are wikis becoming more valuable as a technology for creating user documentation? These are two of the questions that Denise Allan and Cheryl Schmelzer will address in their presentation that explains why and how the writers at RedPrairie have modified their documentation development process by migrating content to a wiki and then relying on collaborative authoring. More specifically, in the presentation, you will learn about:

• their reasons for moved to a collaborative authoring environment
• their reason for choosing a wiki as their development tool
• their wiki documentation development and review processes
• the final output that they deliver to their customers, and
• other opportunities to consider to enhance accessibility to user assistance.

In addition, you will see

• demonstrations of how they actually manage the development of product documentation in the wiki, and
• samples of their final output.