From Engineer's Perspective to User's Perspective: Evaluation and Standardization Cases of Industrial Product Manuals

 

Request from IHI Corporation

At IHI, we are actively working to consolidate the know-how of skilled engineers on-site into manuals to improve service quality.

Moreover, with the increasing ratio of overseas destinations for product shipments, synchronizing with manuals for overseas markets has become a challenge.

Without a dedicated manual creation team, in a situation where designers themselves create manuals, we were exploring solutions to the questions: "How can we make manuals that are easy to understand for users who perform operations and maintenance, rather than from the designer's perspective?" and "What criteria should we use to organize and consolidate various pieces of information that have been used for different purposes with varying levels of detail?"

Therefore, we decided to utilize our consulting services to first narrow down the target products and proceed with standardization.

Solutions of Human Science

Since manuals for industrial products require a high level of expertise, the cooperation of on-site engineers is essential for promoting standardization. IHI has assigned a person in charge of standardizing drawings necessary for each construction project to facilitate smooth communication with our company.

When rewriting manuals written from an engineer's perspective to summarize them from a user's perspective, it is important to ensure that "it is clear where everything is written" and "the content is easy to understand."

Therefore, we first evaluated and analyzed the existing manuals to visualize the current situation and clarified what points would appeal to the target users. Based on that, we reviewed the table of contents to ensure it was structured appropriately for the target users and optimized the readability and clarity of each section.

In the case of manuals not intended for consumers, writing that matches the user's level of expertise is required. In this regard, we held multiple meetings with IHI to align our understanding of the level of standardization.

For detailed information related to this case, please see below.

Creation of Manuals and User Guides

Manual Creation In-house Support Service

Manual Evaluation, Analysis, and Improvement Proposal Service

Customer Feedback

“

As we advanced standardization, there was a solid sharing of the overall process, and the tasks to be performed at each stage and their outputs were clearly presented, which gave us a sense that good results were being achieved.

Additionally, it was important to share the purpose of standardization within the company, as it was necessary to request busy engineers to attend meetings and provide materials. Focused hearings and precise advice from a professional perspective were very helpful in seeking cooperation within the company.

Not only does it simply compile existing manuals, but it also adds extra value. In particular, the text is expressed in a way that is easy to read, taking into consideration the intended users, and I feel it has significantly improved compared to the old manuals.

I believe that advice based on specialized knowledge of writing not only contributes to the clarity of the Japanese language but also serves as a foundation for developing high-quality overseas manuals. Including the improved readability of the revamped layout, other members are also satisfied with the results. I look forward to continuing this.

"

From Human Science representatives

"We are unable to maintain the manuals, and end up adding information haphazardly or creating separate volumes, causing necessary information to be scattered. It is difficult to understand where everything is written, and we struggle with inquiries from users."

-- We often receive such feedback from companies that produce their manuals in-house.

In the case of IHI, there was an awareness of issues regarding inconsistencies in information across multiple manuals, such as manuals written in detail by experienced engineers, manuals compiled by younger staff on a task-based approach, and English manuals created independently for overseas expansion.

Therefore, we would like to propose starting by organizing and consolidating this information to understand the current situation.

In addition, this time it was necessary to incorporate additional information that had not been explicitly documented in the manuals, not just to compile existing information, so the provision of information from our customers was essential.

It was a manual in a very specialized field of energy equipment used in plants, but thanks to the cooperation of the client in terms of interviews and providing materials, we were able to proceed smoothly with the project through close communication.

We have focused on improving the quality of the documents, such as reviewing the table of contents structure, refining the text expressions, and refreshing the layout. I am very pleased to hear that our clients have felt the effects of these improvements.

We plan to continue the standardization work for the manuals of other products, and we would like to do our utmost to assist you so that you remain satisfied in the future.

Related Services

Creation of Manuals and User Guides

In-house Manual Support

Manual Improvement