Study and Assessment Guide
BSBITU306A Design and Produce Business Documents
Design and produce business documents
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Intellitrain Intellitrai n Pty Ltd PO Box 331 Spring Hill Q 4004 Ph: 1300 735 082
[email protected] www.intellitrain.com.au
Copyright Intellitrain Intellitrain Pty Ltd 2011-12. 2011-12. All rights reserved. Except as permitted by the Copyright Act 1968, no part of this publication may be reproduced, recorded, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted, published, resold or used for any unauthorised purpose without the prior written permission of an Intellitrain Executive Director. This course has been prepared for educational purposes only. Intellitrain, course authors and other contributors have NOT provided credit, financial, business, tax or legal advice either directly or indirectly. Material is believed to be correct at the time of writing however ever-changing legislation, thresholds, regulations, products, policies and opinions can result in errors. The material provided must not be relied upon in professional practice, with Intellitrain and authors accepting no responsibility for loss, damage or injury arising from the use of the material. External Resources: External resources referenced were correct at the time of original publishing and do not necessarily reflect Intellitrain’s views or opinions. Intellitrain cannot be held liable for the use of or reliance on any external resources. Students must adhere to the copyright requirements of external material providers.
Course Authors:
Chandra Vallath Ph.D Paul Eldridge MBT(UNSW), BA(Deakin), Cert IV TAA, AFAIM, MAITD
Intellitrain also wish to express our appreciation to all those who have offered up their skill, knowledge and time to assist in the development of this course.
Version 1.7.2
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Unit Overview This unit, BSBITU306A - Design and product business documents, describes the performance outcomes, skills and knowledge required to design and produce various business documents and publications. It includes selecting and using a range of functions on a variety of computer applications. This unit applies to individuals who possess fundamental skills in computer operations and keyboarding. They may exercise discretion and judgement using appropriate theoretical knowledge of document design and production to provide technical advice and support to a team.
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ELEMENT
1. Select and prepare resources
PERFORMANCE CRITERIA
1.1. Select and use appropriate technology and software applications to produce required business documents 1.2. Select layout and style of publication according to information and organisational requirements 1.3. Ensure document design is consistent with company and/or client requirements, using basic design principles 1.4. Discuss and clarify format and style with person requesting document/publication
2. Design document
2.1. Identify, open and generate files and records according to task and organisational requirements 2.2. Design document to ensure efficient entry of information and to maximise the presentation and appearance of information 2.3. Use a range of functions to ensure consistency of design and layout 2.4. Operate input devices within designated requirements
3. Produce document
3.1. Complete document production within designated time lines according to organisational requirements 3.2. Check document produced to ensure it meets task requirements for style and layout 3.3. Store document appropriately and save document to avoid loss of data 3.4. Use manuals, training booklets and/or help-desks to overcome basic difficulties with document design and production
4. Finalise document
4.1. Proofread document for readability, accuracy and consistency in language, style and layout prior to final output 4.2. Make any modifications to document to meet requirements 4.3. Name and store document in accordance with organisational requirements and exit the application without data/loss damage 4.4. Print and present document according to requirements
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REQUIRED SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE This section describes the skills and knowledge required for this unit.
Required skills
keyboarding and computer skills to complete a range of formatting and layout tasks literacy skills to read and understand a variety of texts; to pr epare general information and papers according to target audience; and to edit and proofread documents to ensure clarity of meaning and conformity to organisational requirements numeracy skills to access and retrieve data problem-solving skills to determine document design and production processes.
Required knowledge
appropriate technology for production requirements functions and features of contemporary computer applications organisational policies, plans and procedures organisational requirements for document design e.g. style guide.
Resources Publications Duarte, Nancy, "Slide:ology" O'Reily Media. August 2008
Websites http://www.firsthome.gov.au/ www.dropbox.com www.jeanweber.com/howto/examplestyleguide.pdf
Assessment This unit is assessed via a combination of multiple choice questions plus a practical exercise that encompasses all the units within the course. All assessments are to be completed online through the iTRAIN platform. Your username, password and instructions on how to access and use iTRAIN were issued to you on enrolment. If you have forgotten your password or username, or if you are having any problems in accessing or using iTRAIN then please call the student support team on 1300 735 082 or email
[email protected] for assistance. Students are entitled to one inclusive resubmission per unit. If a third submission is required a re-assessment fee will apply, details of the cost are in the student handbook. This will
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cover the re-assessment plus related support. Students who are unsuccessful after a third attempt are required to re-enrol in the particular unit(s) which will incur an enrolment fee.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS 1
INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................... 10
2
SELECT AND PREPARE RESOURCES ........................................ ...................................... 11
2.1
Selecting appropriate technology and software .............................................................11
2.2
Selecting layout and style of publication .........................................................................14
2.3
Using design principles ....................................................................................................16
3
DESIGN DOCUMENT .................................................................................................... 21
3.1
Maintaining files and records .......................................................................................... 21
3.2
Ensuring consistency of design and layout ...................................................................... 23
3.3
Using input devices ..........................................................................................................25
4
PRODUCE DOCUMENT ................................................................................................ 26
4.1
Completing documents in designated time frame ..........................................................26
4.2
Store document appropriately and save documents to avoid loss of data ....................26
4.3
Using manuals and other help .........................................................................................28
5
FINALISE DOCUMENT .................................................................................................. 31
5.1
Proofreading document...................................................................................................31
5.2
Make modifications to the document .............................................................................31
5.3
Naming and storing documents.......................................................................................31
5.4
Printing documents..........................................................................................................32
6
LET’S SUMMARISE ....................................................................................................... 33
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1 INTRODUCTION As a finance professional operating in the finance and/or mortgage broking industry, you will be required to produce all sorts of documents, including (but not limited to) email, Business Plans and Goals, Accounting Documents, Business Reports, Operational Documents, and Customer Service Documents, loan applications, marketing documents, policies and procedures. All business documents must be accurate, clear, and designed for the right purpose and audience. Conventions have evolved over time about how each of these document types should look and read. These conventions have to do with both the content and formatting of documents. As an example, the minutes of an internal business meeting would likely be brief and highly condensed, following the same format as for past meetings and intended for an audience that is familiar with the context, if not the content itself. A project proposal, on the other hand, may run to tens of pages, be extremely detailed, and directed at an audience that may not be familiar with the topic or content. Both are business documents, but their intents and audiences vary. The range of document types is growing, as companies find themselves launching web pages, Facebook pages, online blogs, and tweets, or grappling with increasing rules and regulations and associated paperwork. As the needs of businesses for communication, information gathering, record-keeping, archiving and presentation have grown, so have technology tools available to meet this growing demand.
There are a wide range of
computer products that can be used by novices and experts alike. This unit covers some of the important tools and the functions they allow you to perform. It is not intended to teach the use of hardware or software; rather, it is a reference source, especially of underlying principles that cut across computer applications. You are encouraged to explore the links provided here and to seek further training.
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2 SELECT AND PREPARE RESOURCES The resources you will need to generate business documents may be readily available to you. It is quite common, for example, for most businesses to have office productivity software such as Microsoft Office. The Microsoft suite of products allows you to send emails, create presentations in PowerPoint and build spreadsheets in Excel. Other, more specialised tasks such as producing a marketing brochure may require more advanced (and costly) purpose built design applications. In these cases, it may be far easier and less time-consuming to outsource the work to a de sign shop or a copy centre that could probably do it more professionally and with a minimum of fuss for you. In most cases, generating business documents is relatively uncomplicated and requires only a computer and one of three most-used software programs from the Microsoft Office family of products. Of course, you will also need more resources for saving and archiving documents, printing and mailing.
2.1 Selecting appropriate technology and software Today, there are a wide range of technologies that let you design, produce, save and retrieve, or present business documents. Some of the common ones are:
Laptops, desktops, tablets (e.g. iPad by Apple and Galaxy by Samsung) and slate PCs
Networked servers
Printers and scanners
USB flash drives and portable hard drives
Photocopiers
Digital cameras
There also is a wide variety of software packages. Based on the functions they perform, some of the more common software programs are:
Word processing
Used for producing documents, memos, letters, faxes, manuals and reports, etc.
Used when the content of a document is mostly text.
Most widely used is Microsoft Word.
Desktop publishing software
Used for documents that require more graphics such as flyers, business cards, stationary, letter head, newsletters, logos and brochures.
Examples include Microsoft Publisher, Adobe InDesign and Quark Xpress.
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Spreadsheet software
Spreadsheets are typically used to store, manipulate and present data and to produce reports. For example, a broker could create a spreadsheet capturing the amount of leads generated from a particular local area marketing campaign. Presenting this information in a graphical format allows a visual view of the success of the campaign.
Prime example is Microsoft Excel.
Presentation software
Used for making overhead presentations.
Allows the creation of slides and effects emphasising key points and can be used in conjunction with other media.
An example of this is Microsoft PowerPoint.
Accounting Software
Used for accounting and payroll functions in a business. Allows electronic financial records to be kept for the business. Produces a variety of financial reports for management and for the business.
Common programs include MYOB and QuickBooks. Larger companies use more specialised software.
Email
Used for correspondence between parties.
Can be used to manage appointments, tasks and meeting attendees.
An example of this kind of program is Microsoft Outlook.
In addition to proprietary software, such as the Microsoft Office Suite, there are also free versions of software available online that may be downloaded to your drive or used online. One good example is the Google suite of products that is available to anyone with a free, registered Google account. One advantage of Google documents (Google Docs) is that they can be accessed from anywhere where you can get on the internet. You don’t need any
software other than a web browser like Firefox or Internet Explorer. Another advantage of Google Docs is that you can share files with anyone you choose. You can even work collaboratively on the same document at the same time, wherever you and your collaborators are located. As a learning aid for this unit, we have selected Microsoft PowerPoint for you to design and produce a document.
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PRACTICAL EXERCISE You are tasked with designing and producing a PowerPoint presentation. The topic –
Overview of the First Home
Owners Grant. To help you do this, visit the website link below, http://www.firsthome.gov.au/ pick your state, and use the information to produce a 3 page PowerPoint presentation. Make sure you use your company’s logo, colour palette and
font types are in your presentation.
NOTES:
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2.2 Selecting layout and style of publication The choice of layout and publication style will vary with the type of document. Print layout decisions include page dimension (routinely A4 in Australia), orientation (portrait or landscape), single column or multi-column, colour or black and white, text alone or text and image, font usage, and use of white space. Publication styles include single-sided or backto-back printing, type of paper and binding, colour and resolution. A different set of layout and publication decisions come into play for presentations, web pages, and other electronic display documents. Many business documents have to conform to standard design guidelines which may be the standard for a particular industry, firm, or document type. For example, a business letter routinely has the sender’s address, current date, and recipient’s address at the top of the
first pa ge. It also may have a letterhead and a subject line starting with ‘Re:’ to draw the reader’s attention to the topic of the letter. If enclosures are attached with the letter, they
may be listed after the signature of the sender at the bottom of the page.
Figure 1: Sample of a Business letter layout (source: Xerox Corporation)
These are just conventions, but they make sense in the context of business communication. The recipient should not have to look up the persons contact details if they wish to send a reply to the letter.
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Other business documents, such as invoices, sales reports, order forms, and memorandums, too, are laid out to conform to styles that may be defined by industry or organisation guidelines. Depending on your organisation, you may be provided with business document templates that you could save and reuse repeatedly.
PRACTICAL EXERCISE List two types of documents which have set formats that may never vary. List two types of documents whose formats may vary from document to document. Do the differences between the two types of documents reflect a difference in purposes or audiences? When does it help to stick to a format?
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2.3 Using design principles DOCUMENTS Designing professional documents can be done using typical desktop publishing tools. However, it is worth noting that many companies outsource their design to professional graphic design studios in order to ensure they achieve a professional look. Whilst, you may not become a professional graphic designer, you can employ some fundamental design principles in order to produce well-presented documents that are easy to read. The fundamental document design principles are:
Catch and hold the reader’s attent ion;
Make it easy to navigate through a document; and
Provide information in language and layout that is easy to understand.
Readers prefer documents with logical order and flow, consistent layout, and easily understandable terminology, so if you want your handwriting to be read, pay attention to those elements. Don’t use jargon or set things up in a way that makes the relevant sections
difficult to find. Whether your document is a report, a proposal or an email, you want your reader to actually read it. You wouldn’t be writing it if it wasn’t important, would you?
As an example, a marketing document would be worded very differently from a submission to a lender. The use of layout styles, colours, paper, and such, also may be very different.
Important design features to consider in producing a document include: Formatting: As you have learned already, when designing documents, you need to consider the needs of the audience. Pages and pages of text can be tough for a reader to cope with. Consider using:
Bullet points to highlight key concepts
Tables to represent complex information
A picture can replace a thousand words
Microsoft Word comes with various Styles that can be applied to entire documents or parts of documents. The software allows the user, to fine tune the distance between lines of text, paragraph indentation, insertion of watermarks, and a whole host of other formatting features. Microsoft Word also contains a wide selection of pre-designed templates that can help you to produce a professional document.
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Figure 2: Selecting a template in Microsoft Word 2010
When designing large documents with many pages, it may be a good idea to use columns and to provide white space on each page. Interspersing text with graphics and text boxes help to break up the monotony. Microsoft Word is a powerful tool for producing most business documents. However, for larger documents that may go for professional printing and are meant for wide distribution, a more appropriate choice may be a desktop publishing program, such as Adobe’s InDesign.
It is not very difficult to master and can be a very versatile tool to produce professionallooking documents.
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Figure 3: Documents produced using desktop publishing application
Typography: Typography refers to the appearance and arrangement of letters that appear on the printed page or the monitor. Some terms with which you may be familiar include font family, font, font size, and font style. You also may know about paragraph indentation, line spacing and alignment. These, and many more terms, are associated with typography and apply to a wide range of computer applications, not just word processing. An important issue in document design is that of legibility – what features of typography make a document more readable? What may put a strain on the reader’s eyes? There has
been a good deal of back and forth about the merits of serif versus sans serif fonts. Serif fonts, like
Times New Roman,
have small, finishing strokes at the ends of characters, like
little tails. Sans serif fonts, like the one used to type this document (Calibri) don’t have those
fancy strokes. There is no conclusive ruling on this argument, but it is generally accepted that serif fonts are harder to read on the screen. Headlines may be in serif fonts, but it’s better to have body text in sans serif for online content and overhead presentations.
PRESENTATIONS The design rules that work for printed documents don’t necessarily work for overhead presentations.
It’s important to know the distinctions because you will probably find
yourself designing presentations quite often in your job. And a well-designed presentation could possibly give you credibility and earn the viewer’s trust and business.
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A poorly-designed presentation, on the other hand, could reduce the confidence others place in you. A good resource for learning how to design effective presentations is the book ‘slide:ology’ by Nancy Duarte (2008).
Figure 4: Slide:ology book cover. Author - Nancy Duarte (August 2008) O’Reilly Media
What follows is a list of suggested guidelines on how to design an overhead presentation. These are rules of thumb suggested by many sources; this means it may be okay at times to depart from them.
Presentation flow: Ensure you have a logical flow to the presentation. If there are many subjects to cover, it may help to divide your presentation into sections. PowerPoint and other presentation software let you format different sections in different ways, have section header slides, etc. For longer presentations, you may want an introductory slide that lists all the topics you will be covering. Also, tell the audience how long you expe ct the presentation to last.
Look and feel: The overall appearance and theme of the presentation must match the intent. If your presentation is serious you probably wouldn’t want to overdo cartoons, cheery sounds, and a lot of bright primary colours. Whatever the look and feel you decide on, it should be consistent throughout the presentation. Consider the Practical Activity you have been asked to undertake. What sort of audience do you have? What sort of presentation look and feel would they expect? Microsoft PowerPoint comes with a number of templates which you can adapt for your presentation. You can also use the ‘Slide Master’ function in PowerPoint to specify fonts,
colours, backgrounds, etc., for the entire presentation. This will ensure consistency in layout throughout the presentation.
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Design simplicity: Avoid clutter. Don’t overdo graphics. Resist the temptation t o add a lot of ‘frills,’ such as slide transition effects. A simple transition -free change from slide to slide or a
dissolve should be enough transition.
Use of text: Too often, presenters don’t seem to realise that the slide show is just a tool to augment the spoken word, not a substitute for the oral presentation itself.
Many
presenters often clutter their slides with text and then spend their time reading out what they wrote. This is the surest way to lose an audience. Rather, the text on the slide should only highlight the most important points. Some suggest that any bullet point should have no more than eight words. The first letter should be capitalised, and commas and periods should be avoided. Font sizes should be clearly readable from anywhere in the room. If you must use colours to highlight text, use them very sparingly. When using graphs or charts ensure that the labels are clearly visible from the last row. Titles should not be ALL CAPS. And while the title fonts can be sans serif, body text should be in serif fonts (like
Times New Roman)
so it can be read easily. Use the ‘Notes’ feature in
PowerPoint to make additional information to accompany the slide during the oral presentation.
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3 DESIGN DOCUMENT Before designing a document, you need to make some decisions:
1. If the document is something that is produced frequently, is there a template readily available which you could fill in with a minimum of effort?
2. If so, which template fits with company and industry requirements? 3. If a template is available, does it need to be tweaked to make it conform to your needs?
4. If a template is not available, can one be created and saved for future use? 5. Who needs to approve the template before it becomes a standard tool for the business?
6. What software should be used to create the template? Should it be proprietary software or free software?
7. Should the template be produced in-house or contracted to an outside party? 8. Where should it be saved and who can have access to it? 9. What naming convention needs to be decided on for the template and for the documents produced from it? As you can see, the idea should be to minimise effort in the long term and automate document generation to the extent possible.
3.1 Maintaining files and records It is good practice to maintain records of all documents produced by the business, to name them according to a standard convention, to organise and save them on a storage medium (hard drive, server, etc.) in a manner that makes sense and facilitates ease o f retrieval. Managing files on your computer isn't much different from the way you've always stored and managed your paper files. It boils down to this: store the information in folders – by category, and in a sequence that makes sense to you. Here are some tips to help manage your files:
Avoid saving unnecessary documents. Don't make a habit of saving everything that finds its way into your Inbox. Take a few seconds to glance through the content, and save a file only if it's relevant to your work activity. Having too much data on your computer adds to clutter and makes it harder to find things in the future – and it may, over time, slow down your computer's performance too. Be selective about what you keep!
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Follow a consistent method for naming your files and folders. For instance, divide a main folder into subfolders for clients, marketing, operations, administration, invoices receivable etc. Give shortened names to identify what or whom the folders relate to.
Store related documents together, whatever their type. For example, store Word documents, presentations, spreadsheets and graphics related to a particular client in a single folder – rather than having one folder for presentations for all clients, another folder for spreadsheets for all clients, a nd so forth. Create an identical folder structure for each. For example, under a CLIENT folder, you may have subfolders such as CONTACT DETAILS, WORK COMPLETED and WORK IN PROGRESS.
Separate ongoing work from completed work. Some people prefer to save current or ongoing work on their computer's desktop until a job is completed. Then, once it's done, they move it to the appropriate location, where files of the same category are stored. At periodic intervals (for example, weekly or every two weeks), move files you're no longer working on to the folders where your completed work is stored. Always, always have a backup. If you are using a laptop, backup your files to an external hard drive or to a cloud-based storage site such as Dropbox (www.dropbox.com)
Avoid overfilling folders. If you have a large number of files in one folder, or a large number of subfolders in a main folder (so many that you can't see the entire list on your screen without scrolling down) break them into smaller groups (e.g. subfolders). Think of creating a sequential menu, arranged either in chronological or alphabetical order, to make retrieval easy. For example you can divide a folder called "Marketing Plan" into subfolders called "MKTNGPLAN11," "MKTNGPLAN12," and "MKTNGPLAN13." Notice the shortening of the name to enable the folder to be seen easily via the directory.
Make sure your filing system is backed up . Again, this is a bit tedious, but it's so important, as anyone who's had a failed disk drive will testify! Make sure, firstly, that your PC is backed up regularly and, secondly, that the backup includes the directories where you file information. Source: adapted from MindTools website, 2012.
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3.2 Ensuring consistency of design and layout As has already been mentioned, it is very important to have consistency of the documents your business produces. Consistency operates at many levels. At one level, it is in the use of language; at another, in the appearance of documents; at yet another, it is in the frequency with which documents are produced and made available to the audience. The last applies when you produce periodic bulletins, newsletters, blogs, and such. Consistency in language may vary, depending on who produces the document. However, one way to bring some level of sameness in style is to use style guides that are distributed throughout the organisation. In this way, you can ensure that everyone uses the same spellings, terminology, or even composition style. It may also help to provide everyone with a glossary of terms used within the industry and by the organisation. At the time of writing of this unit, one useful example of a style guide was available at Example Style Guide (www.jeanweber.com/howto/examplestyleguide.pdf ). Consistency in appearance, too, can be ensured by using saved templates and by distributing style guides for everyone to follow. A useful fact to remember is that most software applications come with built-in templates, functions and reusable styles.
For
example, if you routinely send printed letters to a group of individuals, Microsoft Word allows you to use a function called ‘Mail Merge.’ This lets you create a single copy of the
letter and have mail merge pull in information from another single file with the names and addresses of all the recipients. Word then creates custom letters for each recipient. Most applications these days also come with ‘format painter’ functions, which allow you to
copy the format of a particular segment of text and apply it to other segments. For example, you may have a headline that is in Times New Roman, 14 points, bold, and in red. By clicking within that text and using the ‘format painter’ tool in Word, it is po ssible to then
highlight another portion of text and instantly apply the same format.
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USEFUL TIP Use a Style Guide for Document Consistency A style guide is a reference document that includes rules and suggestions for writing style and document presentation. Style guides often specify which option to use when several options exist, and they include items that are specific to the company or industry and items for which a ‘standard’ or example does not exist through commercial style guides. The spe cific content in the style guide is not usually a matter of ‘correct’ or ‘incorrect’ grammar or style, but rather the
decisions you or your employer or client have made from among the many possibilities. More specifically, style guides can serve several purposes:
To ensure that documents conform to corporate image and policy, including legal requirements
To inform new writers and editors of existing style and presentation decisions and solutions
To define which style issues are negotiable and which are not
To improve consistency within and among documents, especially when more than one writer is involved or when a document will be translated
To remove the necessity to reinvent the wheel for every new project
To remind the writer of style decisions for each project, when one writer works on several projects that have different style requirements
To serve as part of the specifications for the deliverables, when writing for clients outside your company or when outsourcing writing projects
A style guide contains both rules (non-negotiable) and suggestions or recommendations (negotiable). Which items should be rules and which should be suggestions is a matter of opinion and corporate policy, though items that result from audience analysis and usability testing are more objective and thus more likely to be rules. Keep in mind as you’re planning and developing a style guide that it should be an evolving document. You don’t need to include everything on the first pass; add items as questions arise and
decisions are made, or change items as you make new decisions to deal with changing s ituations.
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3.3 Using input devices The most commonly-used input devices are the keyboard and the mouse, but there also are disk drives, scanners, computer cameras, touch screens, graphic tablets, voice recorders, joy sticks, etc. The devices you use have to be compatible with your hardware and operating system. Your software needs to be able to recognise and use the inputs from these devices. Often, this means the installation of additional software called device drivers. These drivers may already be installed by the computer manufacturer. Or they may come with the device on a DVD.
Yet another possibility is that the drivers can be downloaded from the device
manufacturer’s web site. When in doubt, turn to a reliable computer consultant.
Ensure that your input devices are adjusted to provide files at a quality appropriate for your output. For example, an image that you scan in for a web page can be of much lower resolution than one you scan in to incorporate in a print brochure. Having some knowledge of constraints such as graphic file resolution and differences between screen display and printed colours can be useful when producing business documents
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4 PRODUCE DOCUMENT 4.1 Completing documents in designated time frame Business documents have time-bound utility; i.e., they need to be produced and distributed quickly and efficiently. You can help speed up the production of business documents by using the methods discussed earlier: using saved templates, style sheets and the built-in functions of software packages. Another way to speed up production is to establish a clear workflow and to stick to it. For example, you may have one or two people who write the content, which is proof-read by another person, approved by someone higher up the organisational hierarchy, then sent for layout and printing. Once the channels are established and adhered to, document production will be a lot more streamlined and efficient.
4.2 Store document appropriately and save documents to avoid loss of data Invariably you will get caught in a situation where you have spent hours writing some brilliant prose or completing a detailed application only for the computer to freeze and you loose all your work. After you have picked up the pieces of the machine you smashed onto the floor and received the new computer you ordered, you may become more paranoid about saving files regularly (author just saved this document right then). A simple rule is that as soon as you have made any change that you are happy with or would not like to lose, save the file. Recognising that people make mistakes and accidents happen, Microsoft Office applications have an Auto Recovery feature. The Auto Recovery feature of Microsoft Word comes in handy during many situations and it sometimes proves to be a life saver. You might know that the default setting of Microsoft Word is to save your document after every 10 minutes for auto recovery.
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Just to be on the safe side, you may wish to reduce this time and want Microsoft Word to save the document more often. Click the Office (File) button and then choose Options (refer screen grab on the right) .
Note: This setting can be applied to Excel 2010 and PowerPoint 2010 as well.
Figure 5: Word Navigation
The Word Options dialogue box will be displayed, now locate the Save option on the left sidebar (Figure 6). You will find the Save AutoRecover information option listed on the right, change the time to whatever you want from the drop down menu.
Figure 6: Auto Save option
Now your document will be auto saved after the specified number of minutes.
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4.3 Using manuals and other help On occasion you may need help or assistance with applications. It is common practice for all applications to have an in-built help function. This should be your first port of call when something goes wrong or you don’t know how to use a particular tool within an application.
In addition to the in-built help function, there are many other resources available to assist you, including some of the following:
Application website
Manuals
Using Training Booklets
Reference Books
Online Forums
Help Desks
Figure 7: Help options available
Using Microsoft Office Help Microsoft has a help option for you to use if you need to. The main access point for this is the help window. You can access the help menu at the top right hand side of the screen as shown in the following diagram by clicking on the question mark. There are two ways to get help using the help option:
Browse for information by topic
Search for the information using key words
Browsing for Help by Specific Topic If you want to browse by help by topic e.g. animation you can do this as follows using the help menu:
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Figure 8: Using help search function
Using Key words to search for help To search for help using key words, enter the key word into the box as displayed below:
Figure 9: Using keyword function
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Enabling Office Online You can also use the Microsoft online help options, information and tutorials. You can enable online access when searching for a help topic to make sure that you have access to both the built-in help system as well as the o nline help function.
Using Help Desks Some applications and organisations have a help desk. You can contact these help desks if you experience any technical issues relating to software or hardware. When doing so make sure that you provide the technician with a clear and concise summary of your issues so that the help desk team can assist you as quickly as possible. It is also a good idea to bullet point your issues, beginning with the most serious. You should also be aware that the help desk will use a triage system when logging all issues and anything that may jeopardise your organisation’s operations will be prioritised and attended to before yours.
So, if you are facing an issue that c ould be potentially harmful to the company’s operations or is extremely urgent, then you should let the help desk team know this immediately so that they can prioritise the job accordingly.
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5 FINALISE DOCUMENT 5.1 Proofreading document It is important to review all documents before copying or distributing them. That way you ensure the accuracy of information, as well as correct any errors in grammar, style, spelling, etc. It’s a good idea for the proof reader to be different from the person who wrote the
document – authors are not particularly good at proofing their own copy. Another good practice is to have the Spelling and Grammar function turned on if you are using Microsoft Word or another application that has such features.
5.2 Make modifications to the document Microsoft Word has a function called ‘Track Changes’ which allows changes made by each
individual to be seen (in different coloured text) as the document passes from person to person. Ultimately, an individual with the authority to make final decisions on the document can approve or reject the editorial changes made by various individuals.
5.3 Naming and storing documents When you are dealing with a large number of documents, as is normal in any business, it is important to ensure that you do not lose track of the different versions of each document. You need to establish and stick to a naming convention that makes sense and which tells you who in the workflow currently has ownership of the document. One way is to include version numbers at the end of the file name, or date and time along with the initials of the current owner. It also helps to have a master file that tracks all documents, specifically who in the workflow chain currently has the document, when they received it, and when it is passed on to the next individual. It is important to archive older versions in one location. All documents must be filed in an orderly manner, in a file and folder system that is organised logically. Confidential files should be saved separately in a password-restricted location. It is generally not a good idea to carry business files around on a portable medium such as a flash drives. Flash drives are easily lost or forgotten on someone else’s computer. If you do have to carry files on a
portable drive, make sure they are password protected so they cannot be accessed by strangers.
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5.4 Printing documents Printing is easy right? You just hit the print button on the application you are using. Printing isn’t rocket science, however, there are some key points to remember when printing:
Make sure you save it in the right format. As often happens, if the document has to be sent from computer to computer before being printed, the same software may not be available on the computer attached to the printer as was used to create the document. One way to avoid this is to convert the document to PDF (portable document format) before sending it to print. A majority of mainstream applications have an option to output to a PDF file.
If you are going to incorporate colour images in your document and have it printed in colour, try and ensure that the images are formatted in CMYK (the colour formatting for the printer) and not in RGB (the colour formatting for the screen).
You may not be aware that the printer does not print all the way to the edge of the paper. If you have a document with pages where you want images go right up to the edge of the paper, then you need to consult a professional printer in order to print documents with that feature.
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