Documentation as a shared responsibility

Most people agree that collaboration is a major factor in determining the success of a documentation project. But I’ve noticed that they rarely define what this means in practice. It’s easy to assume that collaboration starts and ends when a technical writer jumps on a quick call with an engineer or subject matter expert at the start of a project and when they share their draft for technical review.

In reality, good documentation is often the product of shared responsibility within an organization, and collaboration often involves multiple stakeholders: product managers, UI/UX designers, web developers, software engineers, legal teams, and sometimes editorial teams.

Product managers’ responsibilities

Where documentation isn’t an afterthought, collaboration begins with the product managers. This makes perfect sense when you consider that product managers are responsible for defining what success looks like for any product feature or initiative. And increasingly, this includes how well users can use what’s been built, which is where documentation becomes critical. To this extent, the role of the product managers becomes central: they aren’t only defining features but also ensuring those features can be understood and applied effectively.

Forward-thinking product managers understand that documentation isn’t just a nice-to-have; it’s an integral part of the user experience. When a user struggles to implement an API, configure a feature, or abandons a tool because they can’t understand how it works, that’s a product failure, not just a documentation failure. Recognizing these failures forces a shift in perspective.

This perspective shift—from documentation as support material to documentation as a product component—changes how it gets prioritized, resourced, and measured. Product managers who embrace this responsibility treat documentation with the same importance they apply to feature development. They define success metrics, allocate resources accordingly, and hold teams accountable for outcomes.

The perspective shift also influences how organizations structure their teams. Most organizations that take documentation seriously often place technical writers within product teams rather than in isolated documentation departments. Product managers then become the bridge between business objectives and documentation strategy. They can answer the critical questions that make documentation useful: Who is this for? What problem does this solve? How does it fit into the user’s workflow? What does success look like? These aren’t questions a technical writer can answer in isolation.

UI/UX designers’ responsibilities

In a world where users’ attention spans are becoming increasingly shorter, the role of UI/UX designers in documentation is becoming more important. This is especially true for customer-facing documentation, where first impressions can determine whether users engage with your product or abandon it entirely.

This growing importance stems from several key factors. First, modern documentation often includes interactive elements, such as menus, buttons, tabs, and widgets. These elements need to function intuitively and feel familiar to users who are already navigating the main product interface. When documentation includes interactive demos, embedded tools, or clickable prototypes, the design principles that govern the main product become equally critical in the documentation.

Second, UI/UX design focuses on the overall experience users have when interacting with a product, including how easy and enjoyable it is to use. Documentation is part of this user experience journey. A user who can’t find information quickly, struggles to scan content effectively, or feels frustrated by poor information architecture will carry that negative experience back to the main product.

There’s also a crucial need for documentation to reflect the organization’s branding. When documentation feels disconnected from the visual design your users are already used to, it creates cognitive friction. UI/UX designers ensure that documentation maintains visual consistency with brand guidelines, color schemes, typography choices, and overall aesthetic that represents the organization’s identity.

Web developers’ responsibilities

Although there are already documentation site generators that come with great templates, most documentation sites still require some customization to achieve user needs and improve overall experience. Solutions like GitBook, Docusaurus, Sphinx, or MkDocs provide solid foundations, but they often fall short when it comes to specific organizational requirements. For instance, organizations may need custom search functionality that integrates with their existing systems, specialized interactive elements that demonstrate their product features, or unique navigation patterns that align with their users’ mental models. The technical implementation of these customizations requires web development expertise.

Also, in many organizations, documentation isn’t just a standalone site. It’s embedded as a section of the organization’s main website, especially for customer-facing products. This integration brings its own set of responsibilities for web developers. They ensure that documentation looks and feels consistent with the rest of the site, follows accessibility standards, and works seamlessly across devices. Embedding documentation also creates opportunities to connect it with other resources such as product demos, marketing pages, or support portals, giving users a unified experience instead of siloed information.

Beyond the user-facing aspects, there are other technical considerations like SEO optimization, analytics tracking, and consistent branding across different content types.

Software engineers’ responsibilities

As mentioned earlier, most people associate collaboration on documentation projects primarily with engineers. This focus is understandable and expected, as their collaboration is arguably the most critical to documentation success. Engineers possess the deep technical knowledge and contextual understanding that underpin all meaningful documentation.

This central role is reflected in how the writing aspect of a documentation project begins. In many projects, the first drafts emerge from READMEs, inline code comments, or quick usage notes written by engineers. These early contributions provide the foundation on which technical writers and other collaborators can build. For this reason, it’s important to encourage engineers to document their work. Doing that ensures that valuable insight isn’t lost.

While engineers often have an unmatched understanding of how a product works, their writing may assume too much prior knowledge or include excessive technical detail. This is where technical writers step in. They improve early drafts by adding necessary context, such as prerequisites, reorganizing information into a clearer structure, trimming unnecessary details, and ensuring the content is usable by the intended audience. Over time, technical writers develop deeper technical expertise, but their ability to edit, refine, and shape engineers’ contributions means documentation can progress in real time without waiting for that ramp-up.

Legal teams’ responsibilities

While this isn’t a common practice, documentation for products in critical or highly regulated sectors must be reviewed by legal teams to ensure compliance and limit liability. This is especially true in industries like healthcare, financial services, pharmaceuticals, aerospace, and government contracting, where documentation carries legal and regulatory weight.

Because of this, legal teams take on the responsibility of ensuring documentation aligns with applicable regulations, standards, and contractual obligations. For example, API references may need disclaimers about data usage, and user guides for medical software may require clear safety instructions. Without legal oversight, even well-written documentation can expose organizations to significant risks, such as regulatory penalties or loss of customer trust.

Editorial teams’ responsibilities

Some organizations have specialized editorial teams that review all organizational content, and because documentation is part of that content, it falls within their scope of responsibility.

Editorial teams focus on consistency, clarity, and adherence to the organization’s voice and style. They ensure that documentation reflects the same tone and quality standards as other outward-facing materials, preventing it from feeling disconnected or overly technical compared to the rest of the organization’s messaging. For example, editors may refine phrasing to make it more accessible, enforce terminology guidelines, or standardize formatting across different types of documentation.

This review process also acts as a safeguard against errors that might slip past technical writers. While engineers and writers concentrate on accuracy and usability, editors bring an additional layer of polish and coherence, ensuring the final documentation is professional, trustworthy, and aligned with the organization’s brand identity.

In conclusion, good documentation results from multiple individuals and teams seeing it as critical to product success and recognizing that they each have a meaningful role to play. When all stakeholders feel genuinely accountable for documentation outcomes rather than treating it as one person’s responsibility, the result is documentation that truly serves users and drives product success.