Writing Essentials for IT Professionals

How to write well• Know your reader• Know your story• Get to the point quickly• Write succinctly• Use clear, understandable language

Know your story

• You can’t write a good article if you can’t tell your story simply• Think how you would tell it to a new IBMer, your mother, sister,

roommate, husband or cat

When good writing goes bad

Huh?

The team is developing into a Communications Consulting Services

model, where we become a center of competency with best practices

to support new deal engagement requirements, as well as ongoing

project communications needs. In the new model, our Communications

team offers a variety of services, from advice and counsel to working

with clients to jointly develop an overall Communications strategy.

Keep it simple

Important-sounding words often don’t serve the reader well

Say what?

Scintillate, scintillate, asteroid minific…

Twinkle, twinkle, little star…

Say what?

All articles that coruscate with resplendence are not truly auriferous.

All that glitters is not gold.

Keep it simple

Go on a word diet

Trim the fat

Our mission is to improve student achievement and thereby prepare students for continued learning in middle school and high school. This learning community will accomplish this mission by developing and implementing world class learning systems. Alignment will be monitored by continual application of quality principles and responsiveness to customer expectations.

50 words

Trim the fat

Our mission: Learning to write, writing to learn

8 words

Dept. of Redundancy Department

• Advance planning• Along the lines of• Are currently• At an early date• Both of them• Close proximity

• Planning• Like• Are• Soon• Both, or they• Close

Edit ruthlessly

• Make every word fight for its right to be in your work.

• What does each word add, if anything?

• Most adverbs and adjectives are unnecessary

Beware ‘Biz speak’ and tech speak

Keep it active

Avoid passive

A quick look at passive/active

• Active voice has a subject performing an action: Bob placed the book on the table.

• Passive voice focuses on the object of the action: The book was placed on the table.

• See how passive is weaker? We’ve lost Bob and an action verb.

Passive pop

• Love Is All That Is Needed By You

• The Dock of the Bay Is Being Sat Upon

• What You Want Can't Always Be Obtained By You

• Can't My Heartbeat Be Heard By You

Weak verbs

• Always try to use a verb – action keeps your readers engaged

• Convert to be verbs into active.• It was her observation that… • She observed…

Tune your sentences

• Use different sentence lengths• Avoid “shopping list”–

subject verb, subject verb, etc.

Check the flow

Read it to yourself -- fast. Look for comprehension, “speed bumps,” boredom

Use the breath test

• Read your sentences out loud. • If you have to take a

breath before the end of any sentence, it’s too long

If it feels wrong, it is

“Murder your darlings”

Remember

• Put yourself in the reader’s place• Stick to your story – tell it to your mother• Tell it well – keep it short, keep it active, keep it

punchy• Make every word fight for its existence• Write short paragraphs

Room for improvement?

Enhanced security features will be implemented for Privileged Users with workstations running Windows 7 or windows 7 on virtual environment. The new Windows 7 security configuration incorporates the latest security settings and solutions in order to provide the privileged users with the most secure computing environment possible.

Room for improvement?

Privileged users with workstations running Windows 7 or Windows 7 on virtual environment will soon receive improved security features. The new security configuration will give them the most secure computing environment possible.

Room for improvement?

One of the critical milestones of this initiative is that these enhanced security settings are properly tested throughout a thorough piloting activity.

At this stage of the pilot period, there are approximately 100 pilot users whose machines already applied the new security features.

Room for improvement?

One key success factor of the overall testing umbrella is to have at least 500 pilot users on board from each region, resulting a diverse, wide-spread representation of the global privileged user base from all business units. In the light of the above, we kindly request privileged users to volunteer for participating in this project as pilot user.

Room for improvement?

We're looking for volunteers to make this project the best it can be. While 100 privileged users are already testing the improved security, we need 400 more to accurately represent IBM's workforce with its diverse functions, geographies and business.

Room for improvement?

Volunteers need only run a script that takes about 15 minutes and report any malfunctions. The pilot will run through September 2012.

To volunteer...

Room for improvement?

Overview: The following information is being provided to ensure the highest level of success and ease of migration to the Open Client Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Hardened Workstation Platform. The recommendation is for those currently running on Windows XP is to migrate their customer work to a Windows XP Virtual Machine (KVM) and those currently running Windows 7 to migrate their customer work to a Windows 7 Virtual Machine (KVM). The Linux platform is to be used for your IBM activities (Notes, SameTime, Browsing, etc.).

Room for improvement?

Overview: The following information is being provided to ensure the highest level of success and ease of migration to the Open Client Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) Hardened Workstation Platform. The recommendation is for those currently running on Windows XP is to migrate their customer work to a Windows XP Virtual Machine (KVM) and those currently running Windows 7 to migrate their customer work to a Windows 7 Virtual Machine (KVM). The Linux platform is to be used for your IBM activities (Notes, SameTime, Browsing, etc.).

Room for improvement?

Windows Virtual Machine (KVM) Creation Overview

You are allowed to create as many Windows Virtual Machine (KVM) instances as you require and have space for. However, due to licensing rules, only one Windows instance can be operational at a time. Additionally it takes time to start and stop Windows instances which could have an adverse impact on meeting customer requirements and SLA’s.

Room for improvement?

Therefore, if you support many customers, it is not recommended to create a separate Windows Virtual Machine (KVM) for each customer. However, if you support only a “few” customers, having a separate Virtual Machine (KVM) for each customer may be a viable option for your implementation. This guidance should be taken into account as you plan the migration to your new Open Client Hardened Workstation