How to write an introduction to a training manual

This document is designed to be read by any user of Mahara, as most users will have access to. How to write a training manual to make an amateur a pro A winning training manual takes the employee on a seamless journey from an understanding of training objectives right down to equipping the employee with the relevant skills to execute the task on hand.

Think like a user. You should have a good understanding of your users so you can understand the information they need to know, their background, and their knowledge of the product. Once you think like a user, you can write content that the users need to know. Plus, with some material, it may also make sense to offer the client a hands-on walk through to ensure your instructions accomplish what they need to accomplish.

And keep in mind that learning styles vary, so one client may be able to run with the same instructions that confuse a different client. Being flexible in your format and delivery can help make sure the instructions work for the recipient. Have you ever been in this situation? Training manuals are essential for any process related to training or onboarding — be it customer support, employee training, task delegation, new hire onboarding, or online learning.

Once, I was working with three new employees who kept asking similar questions regularly — that is when I understood the true value of training and the onboarding process. That is why I have prepared this extremely useful article and training manual template for you — read on to find it! A winning training manual takes the employee on a seamless journey from an understanding of training objectives right down to equipping the employee with the relevant skills to execute the task on hand.

Understanding how to write a training manual is an inherent skill necessary for the success and continuity of businesses. Read on to discover 5 steps on how to write a training manual and find a training manual template enclosed. Whichever objective your training manual strives to achieve, starting out by outlining the objectives will help you identify the successive important elements of the training program to create a cohesive flow.

A training manual can be as effective as a trainer skilled in connecting with the target audience and making the learners understand the content. Write your training manual template keeping in mind the demographics and psychological behaviors of the learners, their backgrounds, their jobs, industry, and language proficiency.

By understanding the subtle nuances of your target audience, you will avoid developing a training manual template with a low completion rate, or result in recurring on-the-job errors that the training manual failed to address.

Now that you have identified your training objectives and target audience, it is time to select the necessary tools and develop your training materials. For this purpose, we strongly recommend using StepShot Guides. As usual, this software documentation tool is used to create training manuals, user guides, product manuals, video tutorials, help articles, and other docs designed to teach a user how to use a program or how to accomplish a procedure.

Just imagine, by launching StepShot Guides, you can automatically capture screenshots and effortlessly create a training manual and a training manual template with the help of customizable templates and export them into whatever format you need.

Similarly, you no longer need to toggle between different software programs to input comments, remarks or icons to draw attention to specific screenshots. They can help increase employee efficiency, proficiency, productivity, and overall profits.

But what role does a company training manual play in the overall training of employees? Employees who are not constantly learning or new hires who are not familiar with the tools, apps, software, or machinery used by their company can become disengaged in their work. This disengagement often leads to poor job satisfaction and higher employee turnover. In the end, both the employee and the employer gets hurt. The stats are never-ending. The problem is real.

Employees want to grow and hone their skill sets through regular training and developmental opportunities. A good way for companies to start this much-needed process is by crafting an awesome company training manual or training guide.

In order to create a training manual that is not only informative but interesting to read, you need to have a plan in place. We have put together some key points you need to keep in mind to create the best training manual. The first step in creating an effective training guide is to have a clear objective in mind. Answers to questions like these will help you figure out the main objective of creating the training guide.

After the training is complete, the employees must be able to carry out the tasks for which the training manual is being created. Writing a training manual is not an easy task. Your employees are counting on you for help as their entire work might depend upon the information present in the training manual. Gather your peers around and start working on a training manual collaboratively. One person could be in charge of writing it, while others search for information, organize information, or create visual assets for the manual.

In order to create an effective training guide, you need to have a good idea of what type of content you want to include in it. Compile all the information, knowledge, process, checklists, etc. Make sure you are thorough with every point and have everything you need to write a training manual. Never, ever, rely on your memory!

Even skipping a small step may lead to confusion amongst your readers. For example, forgetting to tell the reader about an important switch in a piece of new machinery, can not only be misleading but can also be dangerous. The content of the training manual directly depends upon the type of audience reading it.

If your training your employees on new software that no one has used before or training new hires , then going in deep with explanations and describing the steps precisely and clearly can help them grasp the knowledge quickly. However, if you are teaching them some additional features of software they already use, no need to go all-in from scratch. Keeping your audience in mind will give you an idea of how broad or specific you need to be throughout the manual.

Outline the flow of the training guide into chapters, sections, or parts. Make sure that the training manual is in a smooth flow and covers all the steps in-depth from start to finish. Organizing the information is important to avoid confusion and make it an easy read for your audience.

Adding a table of contents to your training manual is a must. If your training manual is heavy on pages, the importance of having a table of contents increases exponentially. The table of contents provides navigation to the reader and helps them go to a particular topic quickly. This is especially useful when employees need to go back to the training manual to refresh their memory on a particular topic, helping them save time and effort.

See the chapter on instructions for details on planning and designing instructions. Instructions—and therefore user guides—also make abundant use of: Graphics. Show readers key components of the objects they will be working with, before and after views, and illustrations of key actions that readers must perform. See the chapter on graphics for details on planning and designing graphics. Provide statistical information and other such details in easy-to-access table form. In user guides, tables are particularly useful whenever reference-type information must be presented.

See the chapter on tables for details on planning and designing tables. Use a consistent and standard scheme of highlighting bold, italics, alternate fonts, color, caps, and so on. See the chapter on highlighting for details on planning and designing highlighting guidelines. The most obvious are those step-by-step directions on how to assemble, operate, or troubleshoot the product. Instructions in user guide should generally be task-oriented —that is, written for specific tasks that users must perform.

Instructions should generally use vertical numbered lists for actions that must be performed in a required sequence. Similar or closely related instructions in user guides should be grouped into chapters. Precautionary information. You'll see notes, warning, caution, and even danger notices in user guides. These represent liability concerns for the manufacturer of the product. Reference information. User guides typically contain plenty of reference information, but only up to a certain point.

For example, if there are numerous commands, a separate book for commands is necessary. Reference information in user guides is often presented in tables: columnar lists of settings, descriptions, variables, parameters, flags, and so on. Getting-started information. Some user guides will actually include brief tutorials that will help new users get acquainted with using the product. About the product. User guides also provide some description of the product, a review of its essential features or its new features.

Sometimes this information also gets put into a separate volume, if it is extensive. Typically, the volume will be called something like 'Introducing New Product Sometimes, users guides will include technical explanations of how the product works, what physical or chemical principles are essential to its operation, and so on.

Descriptive Examples of User Guides Consider these examples. Covers: On the front cover, you see the full book title, a version number, the company name with its logo, and warning that the book is not for retail sale. The back cover contains advertising material—rather atypical for user guides—on the product's best features, special offers on the full version, a number to call, and the book number.

Title page: The first page inside this user guide is the title page, which includes the product name, the book title, the book edition number, the date of the edition, the company logo which includes its name , several addresses for the company, and the not-for-retail-sale warning. The company name has a registered trademark symbol beside it; the product name has the trademark letters beside it.

No trademark symbols are shown on the front or back covers. A greener approach is to omit the title page, since it is practically a duplicate of the front cover, and put the edition notice on the back of the front cover. Edition notice: On the back of the title page is the edition notice. This edition notice includes the book title, a copyright notice, legal statements concerning copying the book, list of trademarked product names occurring in the book, and the document number.

License agreement: On the next page is the software agreement, a two-page thing that outlines permitted uses of the software and related warranties. Table of contents: The TOC begins on a right-hand page numbered 'i' and lists up to level of headings within the chapters.

Headers and footers: The book title is used for both the left and right footers: on the left page, the title is right-aligned; on the right page, the title is left-aligned. The page number appears opposite of both footers, and a solid ruled line is placed just above both footers. The chapter title is used for the inside header on each page; the current heading is used for the outside header on each page.

A solid ruled line is placed just beneath these headers. Preface: The overview which is treated as chapter 1. It contains some promotion of the product, a diagram of the product's many uses, hardware and software requirements on its use, an overview of the manual contents, and instructions on how to get help. Body chapters: Chapters use the following design features: Chapter title—Large bold Arial letters with the chapter title on the left margin and the chapter number on the right and a double ruled line below.

Headings—First-level headings are about 1 point smaller than chapter titles, left aligned, with a solid ruled line just below. Second-level headings are about 2 points smaller, left aligned, with no ruled line.

Third-level headings are the same size as body text but use bold italic Arial and are placed on the left margin. Text—Body text is a serif font about 10 points in size. This manual does not use hanging-head format; run-over text extends to the same left margin as do headings. Graphics—Numerous screen captures are used through the book; they are all centered. Lists—Numbered lists are used for items in sequence such as steps. Open squares are used for bulleted items that have a subhead.

Otherwise standard filled disks are used as bullets. Highlighting—Text that users must type uses a sans serif type probably Arial as do screen buttons, options, field names, and system messages. Bold is used for simple emphasis. Notices—Only notes and hints are used. The word 'Note:' or 'Hint' uses bold-italics. The text of the notice is regular body font indented an inch.

Appendixes—The book ends with two appendixes: Appendix A addresses common problems with a situation—solution format; Appendix B addresses fonts. These pages are numbered A—1, A—2,. B—1, B—2, and so on. Index—The book ends with a page index whose page are numbered with lowercase roman numerals starting at i. The index uses the standard but does something unusual with entries. It uses a table-of-contents format for the entries and their page references, connecting them with the sort of leader dots you'd see in TOCs.