Keep in mind the Chinese proverb, "a picture saves a thousands words" when you design your documents. Carefully chosen pictures, diagrams, tables, charts, and other graphic representations of things and relationships, go a long way to improve communications across borders, when supported by a minimum of carefully chosen text.
Pay careful attention to the type of symbols you use. Research the symbols you intend to use to verify their suitability in the international marketplace.
[Editor's comment: The Watlow manual of industrial heating equipment, from which the illustration on the left is taken, represents a high standard in technical communication. It is organized logically, written in clear English, and uses both US and metric units to express measurement values. Above all, it is very well and abundantly illustrated.
Here is one tip to keep in mind: If you intend to translate the document into other languages, key the main elements of your diagram to a table of captions, as shown below. This technique will greatly reduce the production cost of the translated document because only one graphic element is required for each illustration.]
