Create documentation with the "Plan not to plan" methodology

Plan not to Plan is a simple methodology for creating and delivering your software documentation. The Plan not to Plan methodology will:

• Help you know what to document and when to do it
• Make sure that you don't waste time creating unnecessary documentation
• Give you a very simple way to see instant results from your documentation

The goal of the Plan not to Plan methodology is to help you decrease customer support requests with the least amount of effort.

Here is how to get started:

1. Skip the planning meeting. Just write down the top 5 questions customers are asking you.
2. Create a manual in ScreenSteps Live if you haven't already done so.
3. For each question, create a lesson in your manual with the question as the title.
4. Add lesson content to answer the question.
5. Publish the manual.

In less that 30 minutes you should have a manual with five lessons in it. The best part is that you know they are five useful lessons because they are answering real user questions.

From now on, when a customer support question comes in, check to see if you have the answer in ScreenSteps Live. If you do, send them a link to that lesson. If you don't then follow these steps:

• Create a new lesson in your manual with the title of the question.
• Answer it.
• Publish it and send the url to your customer.

By following this approach you will quickly increase the number of lessons you have on ScreenSteps Live with only a smaill investment of a few minutes a day. And the best part is that you won't waste any time in pointless planning sessions trying to decide "what" to document.