15  Points of view

Voice is about indicating who/what is doing an action, and who/what it is being done to. Essentially, it is about the level of responsibility of each with respect to the action.

Here, the perpetrator is the one responsible for the action, while the victim is the one acted upon. Notice that in the active example, the subject is the one doing the action, while the object is the one acted upon, whereas they are swapped for the passive example.

Using active voice can help the reader feel involved in the narrative, as if they are part of the action, or should be. Conversely, using passive voice puts the reader as an observer, watching events unfold.

Judicious use of these in an action novel can help align a reader with the protagonist while making them unconcerned with the fate of their foes. You use voice to manipulate the emotional involvement of the reader. A reader wants this in a novel but should be wary of it in the presentation of non-fiction.

One place where voice can really help is in procedures, where the actions required of the reader should be in active voice, whereas the resulting response should be in passive voice, reflective of the actual level of activity. This subtlely reinforces the needed activity level for each phase of a step.

It is very clear to the reader when they are to take action and when to just observe.

Person is about indicating how involved you want the readers to feel. It indicates how much they need to identify with the subject matter.

The first person plural can be used to highlight group identity and sense of belonging. It implies inclusiveness, especially of the writer. It can help with audience bonding over the subject matter, though it can backfire if the author is not perceived by the audience as belonging, as it will be seen as faking solidarity.

The second person puts the audience in the spotlight, so they may need have that indicated to them, if not by context, such as a procedure, then explicitly in an introduction.

Third person is for referring to other people/places/things that are typically not part of the audience's immediate situation, but of interest to them, so it is good for discussing most topics. However, when the topic shifts to them being personally involved, such as in a travel acticle when starting to describe what a reader may need to do to get accommodation, then shift into second person mode, at least for those particular instructions.

In English, the singular second-person pronouns were dropped so that the plural pronouns always apply, with the context providing how many are being referred to. Unless the gender is known, the third person plurals can also be used instead of the single version, avoiding the unnecessary gender stereotyping that the singular versions may imply.

In one-to-one use of second person, such as in the action phase of a procedure step, the you is implied. For a procedure, the third person is useful when you want to provide background information that may help a person understand and prepare for the instructions that follow, without them feeling they are obliged to take the action.

Beware of converting design documentation into user documentation because the design documentation will use the third-person to describe users, typically assuming that they will not read it. However, such users will be the target audiences for the user, operator and system administration manuals. This means that while some parts may still be suited to using the third-person, the wording needs to be adjusted to the context of them now being the ones described. That means that their issues and concerns need to be addressed, not those of the designers.