Building Comprehensive Standards

Design teams under pressure to prove their value don't often have time to build proper standards. In startup environments, that pressure is never-ending. As a result, teams are left scrambling to establish concrete standards after they've already shipped inconsistent work, or the work goes through several pointless iterations when an established standard would've meant producing quality work. Documentation is the lifeblood of a high-functioning team.

I have written comprehensive standards documentation that has been beneficial for teams in industries from fintech to aerospace. The ultimate goal of any standards documentation should be to ensure that any team member - new or veteran - is able to build successful and comprehensive coursework with little to no supervision. To that end, the following images are examples from an in-progress style guide. They have been scrubbed for use here.

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Unified Standards for Storyline Projects

Team Course Creation Process

• Team Course Creation processes include:

  • Generate Primary Outline: this is the initial prototype of your course that provides broad details of what will be discussed within the course.

  • Expand Outline: this second iteration expands upon the broad themes discussed in the primary outline by providing supplemental information, sources, research, and general scripting.

  • Generate Initial Storyboard: this phase provides a rough draft of visual design for the course based on the Expanded Outline. The purpose of this storyboard is to provide a visual example for the stakeholders of what the course will roughly look like. All storyboards are completed in PowerPoint.

  • Peer Review of Initial Storyboard: this phase provides the ID with the opportunity for peers to review the storyboard and provide suggestions for improvements to the visual design of the storyboard only. This is not the same as copy-editing. No copy edits should be provided in this phase.

  • Refine Storyboard Based on Applicable Edits: In this phase, stakeholders and copy editors provide all requisite changes to information or additions to content. Instructional designers edit the storyboard based on this information.
    

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Writing Standards

• General Best Practices: When writing content for eLearning, input all script information, and any large sections of on-screen text in Readable. According to the National Literacy Institute, 54% of Adult US citizens read at or below a 6th grade reading level. When writing, ensure all writing accommodates these individuals.

  • All writing should be easily understood by persons reading at or below a 6th grade reading level. Because most learning content will require the use of medical terminology, aim for a passing score of 70% or higher.

    • Quick tip: Wherever some content can be simplified, consider using sixth grade appropriate phrasing for terms to convey the same meaning.

  • Refrain from using idioms or culturally specific language in all writing.

  • When writing, refrain from using contractions in all scripting and on-screen text. English contractions do not translate well when the same information is provided to primary language learners in PLL courses.

• Ableist and Exclusionary Language:

  • Eliminate potentially ableist references: For example, using language like “in this example…” or “review the following…” is preferable to using “let’s see how this applies…” because “let’s see how this applies…” assumes the learner has full use of their vision.

  • Wherever applicable, adhere to the following:

    • Use the word “select” rather than “click”

    • Use the phrase “Get someone’s attention” rather than “Shout for help”

    • Use the phrase “Check  if the person is breathing” rather than “listen for breathing sounds."

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• The Skin of Color Society describes a concept called dermatology of skin color. This concept recognizes that skin conditions and their presentation can vary significantly based on skin color. Historically, this has led to persons of color being underrepresented in medical diagnoses because of the predominant focus on Caucasian skin.

  • When building content, refrain from using exclusionary language.

    • E.g. “Bluish lips”

    • E.g. “white knuckle grip”

• Instructional Text: [in progress]

• Empathetic Language: When building scripts, employ the use of empathetic language by using words and phrases that encourage another person’s perspective, validate another person’s feelings, experiences, and emotions. [Example Here]

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Storyboard Best Practices The storyboard is a visual representation of the designer’s expanded outline. It is intended for stakeholder approval only and is subject to change at any point during the approval process due to stakeholder or quality edits.

• Slide Notes: All slide notes should contain three parts: Voiceover (V/O), Developer Notes (Dev Notes), and when applicable (e.g. Instructor Led Training that will transition to eLearning), Instructor Notes.

  • The V/O section contains the script information for the slide being created

  • The Dev Notes section is specifically for the designer who is constructing the course and contains any information about how the slide will function when the course is created in Storyline.