Ardis Ramey - Information Architect and Content Strategist, Aurensis Technologies

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Work Background

Aurensis TechnologiesTechnical Writer and Information Architect

Oct. 2024• Provide technical communication consulting services to writers, engineers, and software organizations to enhance and future-proof their documentation. • Advise startups and established product teams on how to build user-facing documentation that is clear, sustainable, ready to scale, and speaks directly to the needs of their customers. • Collaborate with cross-functional teams to streamline documentation processes and improve user experience, including: tool selection, process design and optimization, agile methodologies, user experience design, metrics collection, document design, and content strategy. • Implement innovative strategies to simplify complex technical information for better comprehension and usability.

AT&T CybersecurityPrincipal Technical Writer

Mar. 2019 - Jul. 2024remote• Lead a globally distributed team of writers responsible for authoring, maintaining, and publishing user-facing documentation for AT&T Cybersecurity’s suite of products. • Managed the content strategy and information architecture for AT&T Cybersecurity’s Documentation Center, serving 100,000+ customers per quarter with 1,100+ articles. • Redesigned and optimized docs-as-code workflows using Git and GitHub, improving version control, peer and developer reviews, and CI/CD integration. Streamlined collaboration, reduced review times, and enhanced documentation delivery through data-driven improvements. • Led part of a multi-disciplinary initiative to implement Google Analytics for user data collection, providing quarterly insights that enabled data-driven decisions on documentation and customer-facing content. • Synchronized documentation with CI/CD workflows, partnering with product managers and engineers to ensure technical content was continuously updated, accurate, and aligned with iterative development. • Developed and maintained configuration, tuning, and integration guides for 40+ integrations. Created detailed resources to help developers build custom integrations using REST APIs. • Partnered with training and support teams to refine and enhance educational materials, ensuring content remained optimized for customer success and evolving user needs. • Collaborated with product management, compliance, engineering, and others to support the flagship product’s path to FedRAMP compliance, ensuring user-facing documentation met government requirements and compliance targets. • Partnered with the Security Operations Center (SOC) to document SOPs, business processes, and vulnerability management. Captured how SaaS customers leveraged AI/ML algorithms for threat detection, incident response, and security automation. • Directed recruitment, onboarding, and training of a new documentation team, guiding team members from new hires to fully independent contributors.

AristocratSenior Technical Writer

Jul. 2018 - Jan. 2019Austin, TexasAristocrat Leisure Limited is an ASX50 listed company and one of the world’s leading providers of gaming solutions. They're licensed in 240 gaming jurisdictions and operate in 90 countries around the world, with a team of over 3500 employees who deliver outstanding results by pushing the boundaries of innovation, creativity and technology. • Worked with management and product team developing new Lone Star game development SDK to build product documentation from the ground up, beginning with comprehensive content strategy assessment, design and wireframes, and sprint-based documentation development. • Met with key users from globally diverse teams to discover documentation requirements and establish knowledge sharing processes between Aristocrat and other agencies. • Documented Aristocrat’s migration from a C++- to Typescript-based SDK, educating stakeholders on known divergences, new processes, and best practice recommendations for the new language, new SDK, and new toolkits. • Developed and instituted an ongoing publishing process that combined rolling publication for living documentation with clear version control for project release schedule. • Authored complete body of documentation according to topic-based authoring guidelines, using MadCap Flare and integrating with Git for source control and branching. • Worked with Aristocrat’s global initiative to convert all customer-facing documentation to DITA by 2020, particularly with the Information Architecture group and in future-needs assessment. • Developed CSS, HTML to design and publish a professional HTML5 documentation portal, with context-sensitive search (backed by Elasticsearch), using Javascript and JQuery to extend Flare’s native HTML5 functionality and achieve a robust and modern documentation portal. • Designed knowledge capture workflows for Aristocrat’s internal knowledge base in Atlassian’s Confluence, including custom plugins to best serve the needs of Aristocrat and their partners in development.

FICO®Technical Publications Engineer

Jul. 2016 - Jul. 2018Austin, Texas AreaFICO™ is a leading analytics software company, helping businesses in 80+ countries make better decisions that drive higher levels of growth, profitability and customer satisfaction. The company’s groundbreaking use of Big Data and mathematical algorithms to predict consumer behavior has transformed entire industries. While with FICO, my responsibilities were to: • Maintained an extensive body of documentation for FICO’s Identity Resolution Engine (IRE), a big data solution which maximizes search speed and guarantees high match and cluster accuracy. • Worked daily with engineering team to document ongoing product development, as well as communicating with professional services, support, and product management to ensure that documents were clear, concise, and directly addressed users’ needs. • Managed the conversion of IRE’s body of product documentation (8 documents/2000 pages) from standard documents in Framemaker to DITA format, while staying up-to-date with ongoing development. • Coordinated and lead meetings with subject matter experts (SMEs) and stakeholders, key users, technical team members, and management to gather and confirm product information, and assess documentation needs. • Developed entirely new documentation to describe IRE’s new proprietary user authentication system and enhanced options for securing user data (both in flight and at rest). • Worked hands-on with the product throughout the development lifecycle to test and confirm documented processes, take screenshots, and gather product information to save time in information exchange where possible.

Periscope HoldingsTechnical Writer

Apr. 2015 - May. 2016Austin, Texas AreaPeriscope Holdings is an industry-leading firm providing large-scale public eprocurement solutions. While with Periscope, my responsibilities were to: • Managed every documentation project throughout its lifecycle, from initial conception through creation to publication and after. • Managed all technical documentation projects and led project teams, including setting requirements, working with management (all levels) and team members to handle tasking, benchmarks, deadlines, and project tracking through JIRA. • Coordinated and led meetings with subject matter experts (SMEs) and stakeholders, key users, technical team members, and management. • Incorporate user input throughout documentation process to ensure user needs and wants are understood, anticipated, and met. • Research, create, edit and maintain both internal and client-facing technical documentation. • Write materials in conformance with style guides and established document standards. • Work across teams to collect information, distill and clarify that information, and produce complete documentation that is both easy to follow and easy to use. • Coordinate and lead meetings with subject matter experts (SMEs) and stakeholders, key users, technical team members, and management. • Work through new features or services and service workflows as part of the documentation development process. • Develop and maintain a wide variety of technical documentation, including: technical specifications, design/architectural documents, instructional materials, user reference guides and manuals, and policies/procedures documentation.

Knowledge Based Systems IncTechnical Editor

Jun. 2010 - Oct. 2014College Station, TXCreated and edited document content and style for software deliverables and sales, sourcing information from Star Team, developer interviews, and through working directly with the software. Designed, developed, and disseminated departmental policies and training material throughout the company. While with KBSI, my responsibilities were to: • Created, established, and enforced a publishing style for internal and client-facing documentation • Designed, created, and disseminated training and testing materials for all KBSI departments • Maintained all internal and client-facing Help, Installation, and Use Guides for KBSI’s flagship software application • Wrote and published internal newsletters and company updates through Microsoft Sharepoint and Microsoft Publisher • Gathered, assimilated, and interpreted data from client documentation, developer interviews, source code version histories, and third-party datasets to create software documentation • Interprets published proposal guidelines to understand solicitors’ needs and collaborate with researchers to produce compelling proposals • Advised KBSI staff on NLP-related software structure and information processing and analysis • Proofread, analyzed, and edited coworkers' writing to recommend or make changes in scope, style, and content before publication

Knowledge Based Systems IncIntern

Jun. 2009 - Aug. 2009Collected and evaluated data for social network modeling, interviewed Air Force personnel to collect data by phone, worked as part of teams providing a unique perspective, drawing on diverse backgrounds to offer original and innovative solutions to roadblocks to project development.