David Forsythe on Working for a Company Where Words Matter
As Kantata’s Director of Content Design, David Forsythe spends his days simplifying the complex, driving adoption and retention, and providing a single source of truth for users both internal and external. For this story, he explains his approach to creating content and how joining Kantata (formerly Mavenlink) gave him an opportunity to tackle new challenges.
Tell us about your role at Kantata.
I currently lead a team of content designers and technical writers in Kantata’s R&D department. The highly abridged version of my nine-to-five is that I research and collect information from numerous sources on various subjects. Then, I break that information down to brass tacks, simplify and clarify all the pieces, and put everything back together in a comprehensive and consumable way. How the information is reassembled and presented depends on the intended audience and medium.
What's the unabridged version of what you do?
The role of a writer on the product side of SaaS development is definitely larger than the sum of its parts. For starters, we save time and reduce workload for internal employees and external clients by creating and maintaining all sorts of referable, user-centric content — a single source of truth that stretches from interface microcopy to full-fledged Knowledge Base articles and everything in between.
As user advocates, our influence has a significant impact throughout the customer journey and product life cycle. What we write raises awareness with prospects, eases onboarding and implementation, facilitates change management, and beyond. In addition, we help drive feature adoption which later pays dividends when it comes to product retention.
Essentially, we’re intermediaries; what matters most to us is establishing a relationship between our users and the product. Therefore, my team and I are responsible for words anywhere they’re used as a touchpoint or potential interaction with a client. Jessica Collier, a member of Evernote’s product design team, put it this way:
“When no one truly owns the words that make the app work — when front-end engineers and designers and developers and product managers are all inserting language in their own particular style — that product’s voice becomes scattered and its narrative structure fragmented.”
If we’re not deliberate about the words we choose, our clients will pick up on it and the only message we’ll be sending is that we don’t care as much as we should, and that can be catastrophic to the user experience.
“Essentially, we’re intermediaries; what matters most to us is establishing a relationship between the user and the product.”
Tell us what you mean by user-centric.
We write for the users, so everything we do is with them in mind. In order to remove potential barriers that stand in their way, the content we produce must accommodate different learning styles and make no assumptions about a user’s technical competencies.
One of the ways we do this is by maintaining consistent, accessible language and documentation across all our products. The right content—no matter how small or seemingly insignificant—has the power to shape a person’s online experience and make our product more relatable. When words aren’t written for human beings, they typically end up being vague or difficult-to-decipher jargon, and that can show a real lack of compassion and empathy.
When you write plainly, there’s little room for ambiguity; not only will you boost the usability of your product and credibility of your company, you’ll create a more meaningful experience for the people who use your software.
How are writers integrated with the product team at Kantata?
When I first started at Kantata, content design hadn’t yet been established as part of the process. This hasn’t been an entirely uncommon occurrence at many of the companies I’ve worked, especially considering that I’m typically the very first writer, so they don’t initially understand the benefit.
It was important for me, then, to quickly learn how Kantata’s product development process worked. Once I had an understanding of how features were built from start to finish, I was able to determine how content design should be part of the process, where I needed to insert myself, and ways to stay visible.
Now, five years later, content design works lockstep with product designers, researchers, engineers, product managers, quality assurance, and other product stakeholders. Our involvement starts at inception and continues throughout the design and development process. We sometimes act as a dissenting voice, asking the designers or product managers to explain decisions about the user interface. If those on the development team have trouble explaining the workflow — or the writers are having trouble documenting it — it’s often a sign that the design, not the words, needs improving.
“The right content — no matter how small or seemingly insignificant — have the power to shape a person’s online experience and make your product relatable.”
It sounds like you get involved in the process early on.
Yes. Being involved at an early stage helps us to identify and preemptively solve problems that might appear further down the road. It can take a lot of time and effort to fine-tune the messaging for each product, so the earlier a writer is involved, the better the product will be.
Where a lot of companies go wrong is in thinking that words are something the writers can throw together at the last minute after a feature has been designed and built—like slathering icing atop an already baked cake. Instead, content should be thought of as one of the basic ingredients that, when mixed with UX design and research, helps form the strategic layers of the cake, not just the icing on top.
Content design shouldn’t be an afterthought — good writing isn’t a Band-Aid. Not all user flows and interface issues can be circumvented by bringing a writer in at the end. Content should complement, not redeem, a complex product.
How do technical writers influence user interface copy?
Regardless of the experience you want your users to have, they’ll need to read to make sense of your software. Content designers end up setting the tone for what becomes the voice and personality of your product, ideally one that gently guides a user through an interface and empowers them with decision-making clarity.
Think of it this way, if you remove all the text from a user interface, what remains are blank buttons, ambiguous icons, empty drop-down menus, and a bunch of boxes with slightly rounded corners. Without words, every interaction becomes a frustrating guess and the only way forward is by process of elimination.
Needless to say, if there are no words, you have no product, so getting them right is crucial. If the content isn’t clear, concise, consistent, and context-sensitive, then it doesn’t matter how good your software is because people won’t want to use it. Even if they have no choice and are required to use it, they won’t use it effectively or in the way it was intended.
Worse, they may become detractors, rather than supporters and champions of your brand. Words can be the difference between a client who has a positive, long-lasting relationship with your product and those who drop your software in favor of one that’s more intuitive and delightful.
“Needless to say, if there are no words, you have no product, so getting them right is crucial.”
How obvious is the value of content design to others?
Writers have been a prominent part of product development teams for a very long time — so that’s nothing new. Nevertheless, most technical writers and content designers I know are quick to joke about how no one fully understands what we do.
It’s less common now, but there are people I’ve worked with in the past who couldn’t care less if technical writers or content designers were part of the process, mistakenly seeing us as a hindrance that interferes with velocity and deliverables. Fortunately, I’ve always been able to find our advocates — usually the front-end engineers, designers, and quality assurance testers — who have a clear understanding of our qualitative and quantitative value. Gavin Austin, Principal Technical Writer at Salesforce, says it best:
“The benefits of great technical writing is like electricity in a house: it keeps everything running and you don’t even notice it’s there until it’s missing.”
What do you see for the future of technical writing?
I believe that technical communication is in a state of transcendence. For many years, technical writing in SaaS companies has been evolving alongside UX design and gaining its place as a reputable discipline.
These days, leading product organizations recognize the need to have strong writers dedicated to planning, creating, and managing content in all its forms — and the very best companies hire, integrate, and retain writers. Less successful organizations may instinctively know that they need content designers, but aren’t sure where they fit; this is usually a clear indicator that the company isn’t user-focused or has a low content maturity level.
In any case, it’s exciting to think about what our role might look like in 5 or 10 years. No matter what we end up being called or the subtle differences in our duties from one company to the next, what we do will remain the same: craft words that build trust, show users a path, encourage action, and help people feel good about our product.
Interested in joining the team?
Check out Kantata’s open roles on the product team.
