Documentation

All types of documentation fully support me in avoiding work delays.

Why documentation matters for engineering organizations?

Documentation when properly maintained, accessible, and comprehensive, documentation can drastically reduce the time engineers spend searching for information, clarifying requirements, or rediscovering past decisions.

What exactly constitutes "documentation" in a modern engineering organization?

Documentation in engineering organizations spans multiple formats and serves various purposes:

• Code documentation: Comments, READMEs, API docs
• System architecture documentation: Diagrams, decision records, data flows
• Process documentation: Onboarding guides, development workflows, deployment procedures
• Knowledge bases: Wikis, internal blogs, FAQs
• Visual documentation: Video tutorials, recorded demos, dashboard snapshots
• Task management: Kanban boards, ticket systems, user stories

"Documentation is definitely something that I consider one of our recent major successes... thanks to our developer portal and its new version. What's important is the ease of accessing documentation and connecting it to other resources. Previously, teams were each doing things their own way."

Dev Exp manager at Technology Company

How does poor documentation impact developer productivity?

Poor documentation creates several forms of delay:

1. Search time waste: Engineers spend excessive time trying to find information
2. Context switching: Interruptions to ask questions that could be documented
3. Duplicate work: Solving problems that have already been solved
4. Onboarding delays: New team members take longer to become productive
5. Dependency bottlenecks: Waiting for subject matter experts to provide information
6. Decision paralysis: Uncertainty about requirements or architectural constraints

"I have a codebase where my developers simply needed to add some events or aptitude events. That's it. And it took them three weeks just trying to compile the code for what should have been two hours of work. And even after all that time, they failed. So essentially, I wasted three weeks of developer time to accomplish nothing."

Developer Productivity & Platform at Software Development Company

What are the key characteristics of documentation that effectively supports avoiding work delays?

Effective documentation has these qualities:

• Accessible: Centralized, searchable, and easy to find
• Current: Regularly updated and reviewed for accuracy
• Comprehensive: Covers the full scope needed without overwhelming detail
• Contextual: Provides rationale and background, not just instructions
• Structured: Well-organized with clear navigation
• Actionable: Contains practical guidance, not just theoretical information
• Consistent: Uses standard formats, terminology, and organization across teams

"The key issue was accessing documentation and the ease of connecting it to other resources. Previously, teams were working in different ways. Some would say 'I have it here, I have it there, I have it somewhere else.' Now it's much easier to access and utilize documentation. We've also implemented standardization. So we're moving in a direction where it's easier for everyone to use."

Dev Exp manager at Technology Company

How can leaders measure if documentation is supporting developers effectively?

Several measurement approaches can help assess documentation effectiveness:

1. Developer Experience Surveys: Specific questions about documentation quality and access
2. Time metrics: Time spent searching for information, waiting for answers
3. Onboarding efficiency: Time for new developers to become productive
4. Documentation usage data: Page views, search queries, most accessed pages
5. Dependency patterns: Frequency and nature of interruptions to senior team members
6. Qualitative feedback: Gathering specific pain points about documentation

The Network Perspective DevEx Survey specifically addresses this with the question: "All types of documentation fully support me in avoiding work delays" – providing a direct measurement of documentation's effectiveness.

How do DevEx surveys help organizations improve their documentation? Developer Experience surveys provide critical insights about documentation effectiveness:

1. Identify pain points: Pinpoint specific documentation areas causing delays
2. Segment analysis: Compare documentation experiences across different teams
3. Trend monitoring: Track improvement or deterioration over time
4. Priority guidance: Focus documentation efforts where they'll have the most impact
5. ROI validation: Demonstrate the value of documentation investments
6. Cultural indicators: Reveal attitudes toward knowledge sharing and collaboration

The Network Perspective DevEx Survey specifically measures whether documentation supports avoiding work delays, allowing organizations to:

• Compare their documentation effectiveness against industry benchmarks
• Identify correlations between documentation quality and other productivity factors
• Track improvements after documentation initiatives

"And now the most interesting thing happens when you have these roadblocks, regardless of what kind—let's say documentation—and you have developers' comments. What happens in real-time is that our AI groups these comments and directly identifies what pain points they represent. That's really cool because it simply makes thinking about solutions much easier."

Team & Culture Director at Video Game Developer and Publisher

What tools and approaches are engineering teams using for effective documentation?

Modern teams are leveraging various tools to improve documentation:

• Developer portals: Backstage and similar platforms providing unified access
• Knowledge graphs: Tools that visualize relationships between systems and documentation
• AI assistants: GPT-based tools trained on internal documentation to answer questions
• Automated documentation: Generated API docs, system diagrams from code
• Wiki platforms: Confluence, Notion, and other collaborative documentation systems

"Currently on our roadmap, we have items like structured documentation for our internal clients. Every team has their own documentation, but beyond that, we need golden paths and a single entry point where I can simply access all tools and all processes. We also need a developer portal that's customized to our needs, which essentially means researching what the organization actually requires."

Engineering Teams Manager at Online Trading and Investment Platform

What are the common pitfalls teams encounter with documentation?

Common documentation challenges include:

1. Documentation debt: Outdated information that misleads developers
2. Fragmentation: Information scattered across multiple systems
3. Over-documentation: Excessive detail making it hard to find relevant information
4. Under-documentation: Critical information existing only in people's heads
5. Format mismatch: Using text when diagrams would be clearer, or vice versa
6. Maintenance burden: Processes too cumbersome to keep documentation updated
7. Discoverability issues: Documentation exists but can't be easily found

"We ended up with an ultra-complicated tool and documentation that was expanded to astronomical proportions. None of our metrics specialists have time to read all of it."

IT Team Manager at Banking Group

How can teams improve their documentation practices to reduce work delays?

Practical improvement strategies include:

1. Implement a single point of entry: Create a developer portal or knowledge hub
2. Establish documentation standards: Templates, style guides, and metadata requirements
3. Incorporate documentation into workflows: Make it part of definition of done
4. Apply just-in-time documentation: Focus on high-impact areas first
5. Create feedback loops: Regular reviews and updates based on usage patterns
6. Leverage automation: Generate documentation from code where possible
7. Use the right medium: Match the format to the content (text, video, diagrams)
8. Allocate dedicated time: Budget for documentation maintenance

"We have a dedicated time block every Friday for knowledge gathering, where we explore new technologies or things we're less familiar with. We've found this really valuable because when someone has a question later in the week about how to do something that would normally take 45 minutes to get the context for, we've already built that knowledge base."

Senior Manager at Software Development Company