Technical writing

Technical writing is a specialized form of communication used by many of today's industrial and scientific organizations to clearly and accurately convey complex information to a user. An organization's customers, employees, assembly workers, engineers, and scientists are some of the most common users who reference this form of content to complete a task or research a subject. Most technical writing relies on simplified grammar, supported by easy-to-understand visual communication to clearly and accurately explain complex information.

Technical writing is a labor-intensive form of writing that demands accurate research of a subject and the conversion of the collected information into a written format, style, and reading level the end-user will easily understand or connect with. There are two main forms of technical writing. By far, the most common form of technical writing is procedural documentation written for the general public (e.g., standardized step-by-step guides and standard operating procedures (SOPs)). Procedural technical writing is used in all types of manufacturing to explain user operation, assembly, installation instructions, and personnel work/safety steps. Written procedures are widely used in manufacturing, software development, medical research, and many other scientific fields. The software industry has grown into one of the largest users of technical writing and relies on procedural documents to describe a program's user operation and installation instructions.

In some applications, technical writing may be written for experts or fellow scientists within a field of work or study. In these applications, a "white paper" form of technical writing is used to describe a specialized topic and market a product/service or opinion/discovery to select readers. Organizations normally use the white paper form to publish technical writing as industry journal articles or academic papers. The white paper form is written to appeal to readers familiar with a technical topic. Unlike procedural technical writing, white papers often include unique industry terms and data. Sometimes called scientific technical writing, this secondary form of technical writing must show a deep knowledge of a subject and the field of work with the sole purpose of persuading readers to agree with a paper's conclusion.^[1] This form of technical writing is often ghost written by a technical writer. A technical writer will closely collaborate with an organization's industry expert to author these documents but is rarely credited in the published version.

In most cases, however, technical writing is used to help convey complex scientific or niche subjects to end users in "laymen's" terms and includes purely factual content. Modern procedural technical writing relies on simple terms and short sentences, rather than detailed explanations with unnecessary information like personal pronouns, abstract words and unfamiliar acronyms. To achieve the right grammar; procedural docs are written from a third-person, objective perspective, with an active voice and formal tone. A more complete description of the technical writing style is provided in Strunk and White's book The Elements of Style. Technical writing grammar is very similar to print journalism and follows the same style.^[2] Although technical writing plays an integral role in the work of engineering, health care, and science; it does not require a degree in any of these fields. Instead, the document's author must be an expert in technical writing. An organization's Subject Matter Experts (SMEs), internal specifications, and a formal engineering review process are relied upon to ensure accuracy. The division of labor helps bring greater focus to the two sides of an organization's documentation, ensuring greater accuracy and quality. Most technical writers hold a liberal arts degree in a writing discipline, such as technical communication, journalism, English, technical journalism, communication, etc. Technical writing is the largest segment of the technical communication field.^[3]

Examples of fields requiring technical writing include computer hardware and software, architecture, engineering, chemistry, aeronautics, robotics, manufacturing, finance, medical, patent law, consumer electronics, biotechnology, and forestry.