Writing deliverables

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Technical Communication Fourteenth Edition John M. Lannon Laura J. Gurak

Chapter 13
Designing Pages and Documents

Even the most basic word processing programs offer powerful design tools that make the writing and designing of a document happen almost simultaneously. Workplace writers often make design decisions as they are writing, sometimes without giving adequate consideration to page layout, font choices, headings, white space, and so forth.

But readers have come to expect documents that look professional and are visually inviting and accessible. In class, it’s important to emphasize that a reader’s first impression of any document—online or on paper—may in fact be a purely visual, aesthetic judgment. Poor formatting is a sure way to alienate readers. Students need to recognize that although page design and formatting choices may seem obvious, these decisions must be made carefully.

Learning Objectives

Explain why document design is important in the workplace

Describe how digital and print documents differ

Discuss the everyday design skills technical communicators need to have

Consider a variety of techniques for designing a reader-friendly document

Learning Objectives (continued)

Develop an audience and use profile to guide your design

Explain how digital documents have special design requirements

Page Design

Page design, the layout of words and graphics, determines the look of a document.

Well-designed pages invite readers into the document, guide them through the material, and help them understand and remember the information.

Page Design in
Workplace Documents

An audience’s first impression tends to involve a purely visual, aesthetic judgment: “Does this look like something I want to read, or like too much work?”

Having decided at a glance whether your document is visually appealing, logically organized, and easy to navigate, readers will draw conclusions about the value of your information, the quality of your work, and your overall credibility.

Page Design for Print and
Digital Documents

Today, pages come in all forms, including hard copy (printed), PDF, Web-based, e-book formats, small-screen sizes, and more.

Despite this proliferation of formats, the most common technical and workplace documents continue to take the shape of a printed page, designed to be read in portrait mode, similar to the pages of a book.

Design Skills Needed by
Technical Communicators

In smaller organizations, technical writers are often responsible for writing and designing the document. Therefore, you’ll need to be familiar with:

A word processing program for designing basic documents

A desktop publishing program, or DTP for designing complex documents, particularly longer ones that contain more visuals and require sophisticated layout, page flows, and formatting

Design Skills Needed by Technical Communicators (continued)

You’ll also need to be familiar with styles and templates.

Styles are pre-formatted options in word processing and DTP programs that make it easy for you to maintain a consistent look and feel across particular features of your document.

Templates, on the other hand, apply to the entire document, for example pre-set templates in word processing and DTP programs for résumés, brochures, letters, sales proposals, etc.

Design Skills Needed by Technical Communicators (continued)

Finally, you may need to be familiar with your company’s style guide or create a style sheet.

Style guides are documents that describe an organization’s rules for document design and language use, in order to help ensure a consistent look across a company’s various documents and publications.

Style sheets, on the other hand, specify the design elements of a particular document, such as a complex document created by a team.

Creating a Design that Works
for Your Readers

Approach your design decisions to achieve a consistent look, to highlight certain material, and to aid navigation. You will need to think about four design categories:

Shaping the page

Styling the words and letters

Adding emphasis

Using headings for access and orientation.

Shaping the Page

In shaping a page, consider its look, feel, and overall layout. Consider the following:

Use a Grid. Readers make sense of a page by looking for a consistent underlying structure:

Shaping the Page (continued)

Provide Page Numbers. Use lowercase Roman numerals for front matter (ii, iii, iv). Number the first text page and subsequent pages with Arabic numerals (1, 2, 3).

Use White Space. Sometimes, what is not on the page (white space) can make a big difference. Areas of text surrounded by white space draw the reader’s eye to those areas.

Provide Ample Margins. Small margins crowd the page and make the material look difficult. On an 8½-by-11-inch page, leave margins of at least 1 or 1½ inches.

Shaping the Page (continued)

Keep Line Length Reasonable. Long lines tire the eyes. Short lines look choppy. A reasonable line length is sixty to seventy characters per line for an 8½-by-11-inch single-column page.

Keep Line Spacing Consistent. In general, single-space within paragraphs and double-space between paragraphs.

Tailor Each Paragraph to Its Purpose. Use a long paragraph for clustering material that is closely related. Use a short one to make complex material easier to digest.

Shaping the Page (continued)

Make Lists for Easy Reading. Whenever you find yourself writing a series of related items within a paragraph, consider using a list instead.

Guidelines for Shaping the Page

Picture the document’s overall look and feel when you make design choices about pages.

Select an appropriate grid pattern.

Use white space to make pages easier to navigate.

Use adequate margins.

Keep line lengths easy on the eye.

For PDF documents, use white space to break up text and make it easier for people to read on a screen.

Styling the Words and Letters

After shaping the page, decide on the appropriate typefaces, type sizes, and capitalization. Consider the following:

Select an Appropriate Typeface. Typeface,
or font, refers to all the letters and characters in
one particular style (e.g. Times, Arial, Helvetica).
In selecting a typeface, consider the document’s
purpose. For visual unity, use different sizes and
versions (bold, italic, small caps) of the same
typeface throughout your document.

Styling the Words and Letters (continued)

Use Type Sizes That Are Easy to Read. Use
10 to 12 point types sizes, depending on the typeface. Use different sizes for other elements like headings, titles, and captions for emphasis.

Use Full Caps Sparingly. Uppercase letters are hard read and look like the writer is shouting at you.

Guidelines for Styling the
Words and Letters

Use a serif font (such as Times New Roman) for formal documents such as reports, legal communication, and letters.

Use a sans serif font (such as Helvetica) for captions, most visuals (charts, graphs, and tables), and engineering specifications.

Create visual unity by using the same typeface throughout.

Keep fonts at sizes that people can read.

Adding Emphasis

Once you have selected the appropriate font, you can use different features, such as boldface or italics, to highlight important elements such as headings, special terms, key points, or warnings.

Guidelines for Adding Emphasis

Use indentation to set off examples, explanations, or any material that should be differentiated from body copy.

Use ruled horizontal lines to separate sections in a long document.

Use ruled lines, broken lines, or ruled boxes, to set off crucial information such as a warning or a caution.

Use boldface for emphasizing a single sentence or brief statement.

Guidelines for Adding Emphasis

Use Small type sizes for captions, credit lines, and labels for visuals.

Avoid large type sizes and dramatic typefaces—unless you really need to convey forcefulness.

Use color in some documents, but sparingly.

Using Headings for
Access and Orientation

Headings announce how a document is organized, point readers to what they need, and divide the document into accessible blocks or “chunks.” Consider the following:

Lay Out Headings by Level. Like a good road map, your headings should clearly announce the large and small segments in your document.

Decide How to Phrase Your Headings. Depending on your purpose, you can phrase headings as short phrases, statements, or questions.

Using Headings for Access and Orientation (continued)

Make Headings Visually Consistent and Grammatically Parallel. All headings at the same level must look the same and use the same linguistic format (for example, if the first major level heading is phrased as a question, all others should be).

Guidelines for Using Headings

Ordinarily, use no more than four levels of headings (section, major topic, minor topic, subtopic).

Divide logically.

Insert one additional line of space above each heading.

Never begin the sentence right after the heading with “this,” “it,” or some other pronoun referring to the heading.

Guidelines for Using Headings (continued)

Never leave a heading floating as the final line of a page.

Use running heads (headers) or feet (footers) in long documents.

Audience Considerations
in Page Design

In deciding on a format, know your audience and their intended use of your information:

If people will use your document for reference only, make sure you provide plenty of headings.

If readers will follow a sequence of steps, show that sequence in a numbered list.

If readers need a warning, highlight the warning so that it cannot possibly be overlooked.

If readers have asked for a one-page report or résumé, save space by using a 10 point type size.

Audience Considerations
in Page Design (continued)

If readers need to evaluate something, give them a checklist of criteria.

If readers will be encountering complex information or difficult steps, design the page so that it is easy to read.

In addition, keep in mind cultural expectations. Ignoring a culture’s design conventions can be interpreted as disrespect.

Designing Digital Documents

Pay special attention to these additional considerations when designing digital documents:

Adobe Acrobat and PDF files: PDF (Portable Document Format) documents, which are readable via Adobe Acrobat, are like photographs of print pages and therefore are difficult to alter. They can now be edited, but edits appear as handwritten/typed comments on top of the page not incorporated into the page. Also, PDFs cannot be redesigned without permission of the writer and an advanced version of Adobe.

Designing Digital Documents (continued)

Web Pages: Unlike typical print and PDF pages, Web pages must be designed to accommodate the shape of a screen. Most computer screens are more “landscape” than “portrait”—wider than they are high. Also, content must be written in smaller, more discrete chunks than in print documents.

Tablets, Smartphones, and E-readers: Today’s workplace documents might be read on a large computer screen, a smaller laptop, a tablet, a phone, or an e-reader. Keep in mind screen size when writing and designing for these environments.

Review Questions

1. What is page design and why is it important?

2. What design skills will you need to learn to compete in today’s workplace?

3. What are the four design categories that you need to consider when designing a document?

4. What are five considerations you need to keep in mind when shaping a page?

5. What is white space, and why is it important?

6. What are three considerations you need to keep in mind when styling words and letters?

Answers

1. Page design, the layout of words and graphics, determines the look of a document. Well-designed pages invite readers into the document, guide them through the material, and help them understand and remember the information.

2. Using word processing and desktop publishing programs, using styles and templates, and using style guides and style sheets.

3. Shaping the page, styling the words and letters, adding emphasis, and using headings for access and orientation.

4. Any five of the following: Using a grid, providing page numbers, using white space, providing ample margins, keeping line length reasonable, keeping line space consistent, tailoring each paragraph to its purpose, and making lists for easy reading.

5. White space refers to the areas of a page that contain no text or illustrations. Areas of text surrounded by white space draw the reader’s eye to those areas.

6. Selecting a typeface, using type sizes that are easy to read, and using full caps sparingly.

Review Questions (continued)

7. What are five ways to add emphasis within a document?

8. What are three considerations you need to keep in mind when using headings for access and orientation?

9. What are three considerations to keep in mind when designing for your audience?

10. In what ways do Web pages differ in design from print pages?

Answers (continued)

7. Any five of the following: Using indentation, using ruled horizontal lines, using ruled lines/broken lines/ruled boxes, using boldface, using italics, using small type sizes, avoiding large type sizes, and using color.

8. Lay out headings by level, decide how to phrase your headings, and make headings visually consistent and grammatically parallel.

9. Any three of the following: 1) If people will use your document for reference only, make sure you provide plenty of headings; 2) If readers will follow a sequence of steps, show that sequence in a numbered list; 3) If readers need a warning, highlight the warning so that it cannot possibly be overlooked; 4) If readers have asked for a one-page report or résumé, save space by using a10 point type size; 5) If readers need to evaluate something, give them a checklist of criteria; 6) If readers will be encountering complex information or difficult steps, design the page so that it is easy to read; 7) Keep in mind cultural expectations.

10. As opposed to print pages, computer screens are more “landscape” than “portrait,” and content must be written in smaller, more discrete chunks than in print documents.