Writing to STOP

A writing methodology known as STOP Sequential Thematic Organisation of Publications was developed at in the 1960s. The purpose was to improve the speed of document production, and to allow multiple authors to work simultaneously on the same document. The STOP approach still resonates today, as we still have the same needs to reduce document creation times and to work collaboratively. In this workshop, we will look at how the STOP approach worked and how it might be re-applied even more effectively in the 21st century.

By Tony Self

The Cold War

The escalation of the Cold War in the 1960s saw massive increases in military spending in the United States, and the rise of "military-industrial complex". One of the beneficiaries of this increased military spending was Hughes Aircraft Company. The Hughes company had been formed in 1932 by the enigmatic aviator, film director and inventor, Howard Hughes. It had grown to become a massive conglomerate. (At the start of World War II, Hughes had 4 full-time employees; by the end, it had 80,000!) In 1959, the Hughes company opened a radar division in Fullerton, California. It was in the Hughes-Fullerton Ground Systems Group that a new technical writing methodology was devised: the Sequential Thematic Organisation of Publications (STOP).

The Problem

The STOP methodology was devised to overcome a major problem within Hughes-Fullerton. The company had an endless stream of requests for proposals, all of which were extremely complex. One single writer or engineer could not work alone on the proposals, as the "Red Alert" schedule made this impossible. Teams of writers needed to prepare proposals, but the existing writing approaches didn't lend themselves to teamwork (or collaborative authoring, as we know it now).

The Solution

The solution to the problem was a topic-based approach to writing, where a proposal document was built as a set of modules using a storyboard device as a planning and project management tool. Rather than designing a document into categories, proposal documents prepared under STOP were structured using argumentative or persuasive outlining as a basis.

STOP was developed in the Technical Publications department by three of its "author corps", James Tracey, David Rugh, and Walter Starkey, who published a paper STOP - How to Achieve Coherence in Proposals and Reports in 1965.

"Thematic Quantization" Theory

The STOP authors understood that coherence is best achieved by the reader being able to recognise "topical units of discourse", or topics. They believed the best way to achieve topic recognition was through the device of uniform modules. Much emphasis was placed on the idea that a group of topics arising from a theme was a better organisation structure than arbitrary rules of "logical categorisation".

A document written to STOP is made up of uniformly-sized topics, arranged into a sequence of themes.

Overview of the STOP Concept

The thematic, topic-based structure of STOP

The uniform size of the topics ( "thematic unity") was important. Topics had to be two pages in size, each must include an illustration, and the required number of words was 500. The fixed physical size of a topic, two pages, was an adaption of the idea of index cards. A document became more modular and flexible if the topic "cards" could be easily shuffled and re-arranged.

Not Just Presentational

The STOP approach wasn't just a method of presentation. STOP also changed the way in which documents were produced. The previous method involved distinct stages in the process, where you would research, then outline, then draft, and then revise. And you could not change this linear order. Headings used a parallel grammatical form because they were part of a hierarchical taxonomy, and reflected subdivisions of a larger grouping of information.

By contrast, the STOP approach defined no particular order to the production. Some topics might be complete, while others were yet to be drafted, and others were under review.

Storyboarding

The document was planned, and the project managed, through a "Storyboard Wall". This was a public, visual plan of the document, and could be understood as a "collective" outline. This approach to planning allowed revisions to the publication to be made before the writing proper had even begun!

The storyboard wall permitted individual authors could see where their topics fitted in the overall document. The topic-based structure allowed each to write independently of other authors, yet everyone was still able to see the "big picture" of the publication.

Key Features

The key features of STOP were:

• Meaningful headings
• Distinct modules, paragraphs, or chunks
• Modules "signalled" by formatting treatment
• Focus on a topical "thesis statement"
• Illustrations supporting the thesis and directly visible in the two page topic

Was it a success?

According to Wiess (1999):

"STOP, ... in nearly every instance, reduces dramatically the stress of designing, drafting, editing, testing, maintaining and modifying publications - while simultaneously producing the most readable technical documents ever published. It maximises the talents of the best writers, fully exploits (and disciplines) the work of the worst, allows for the early discovery of flaws, supports project management methods and technology... - while simultaneously yielding books that can be read with a minimum of searching, branching, looping.... Moreover, it is a process that can be learned in a week and mastered in about a month. "

What Happened to STOP?

The success of the Hughes-Fullerton approach (they achieved a greater win rate on proposals) led to other companies adopting the storyboarding approach. But over time, and especially with the introduction of computerised writing tools such as word processors, the STOP method faded away. Some ideas can be seen in Word's outlining feature, which made non-linear writing workflows easier. (The outline is a tool used during planning, writing and revision.) Some of the ideas of visual "signalling" of topic chunks were adopted by Information Mapping.

The STOP approach still resonates, particularly as we re-discover topic-based authoring and the need for collaborative authoring. We have similar needs now to the author corps at Hughes.

References