9 helpful tips for collaborating on a UX writing project - UX WRITING HUB

For our Hibob project, Airtable was heavily used early on because of its usefulness for multiple types of UX research. Also, remember to consider which tools are best for delivering your final work. In our case, Google Workspace was ideal for deliverables such as our final report, presentation slides, and folders containing final mockups. 

We discussed work completed, challenges, upcoming tasks, who was doing what, and when our next check-in would be. If anything needed to be reviewed for discussion, this was done before the meeting and not during. Add to the agenda before the meeting begins so talking points drive the discussion.

The Hibob project scaled up quickly and thanks to our project board on Miro, all 9 UX writers, 2 project managers, and the Hibob team were aligned through a visual story that unfolded as we progressed. This was complemented by our storage of documents in Google Workspace, where the final deliverables would eventually live.

This type of project is a great chance to learn to the max, all the while delivering great outcomes. Is there a task you’ve never done? Volunteer so you can expand your skill set. What experiences can you contribute? Offer to be a backup for another team member in case they need support.

In a word, communicate. This seems trite, but in a group setting, sometimes people may hesitate to say “no” or let others know when they have less time. Regular communication is key for knowing what each person is working on, if the tasks are still manageable for everyone, and how others’ work may affect your own.

Set foundational style guidelines early, before team members start making copy suggestions.

Early in the project, we put several polarizing style decisions to a vote among writers and stakeholders. Everyone’s votes and rationale helped steer decisions for what eventually became the content style guide, one of the final deliverables. Specifically, our process was streamlined because initial decisions were already in place to use serial commas and sentence case for headings, allowing all 9 writers to have unified microcopy suggestions.

Try to agree on templates before building out content to avoid having to check for consistency in formatting and structure later. Circling back to previous points, err on the side of overcommunicating with your teammates to make sure everyone is using the most recent version of any file.

Even with multiple team members populating shared documents, we were able to create one voice with unified formatting.

For all the effort you put forth in the previous points, the true value of a UX project is in how useful the deliverables are for the stakeholders. Remember: How your team presents the project is as important as the work itself.

Allocate enough time and resources to finish the project with a bang. In final presentations—spoken or written—show the stakeholders what you’ve done, why it’s important, and the benefits. 

We would like to thank the Hibob team for this opportunity, Anja and Yuval for their project management and guidance, and our other collaborators on this project: Helen Griffith, Sabine Morrow, Gina Schlatter, Parmesh Chopra, and May Vilailuck.

This crucial industry experience made possible by the UX Writing Academy has helped launch us into future opportunities.