How Chisom Uma is using documentation as a growth engine for global startups

Before rebuilding documentation architectures for a global SaaS company, Chisom Uma was a frontend developer with two passions: writing and solving problems. At first, they seemed unrelated; one lived in code, the other in language. But as he built more products, he noticed that many user frustrations weren’t caused by broken features or poor interfaces.

“I realised very quickly that a lot of user pain was not inside the product,” he recalls. “It was around the product. People did not understand what they were looking at, even when the interface was fine.”

This insight changed his career. Occasional documentation tasks became a deliberate obsession. How could he make technology understandable enough for users to succeed without friction? Gradually, writing evolved from a side task into the core of his work, leading him to step fully into documentation engineering, a discipline that treats documentation as an extension of the product rather than an afterthought.

When Chisom joined GBG plc, a global identity verification and fraud-prevention company, documentation existed but was fragmented. Information lived in silos, user journeys were unclear, and different personas were forced into the same documentation experience.

“Docs were there, but they were underleveraged,” he explains. “We had content, but not a clear journey. Users had to work too hard to find what they needed.”

Chisom approached the problem like a hybrid of product manager, UX writer, and editor. He audited the entire documentation ecosystem, mapping how users moved through pages, where they dropped off, and which paths caused frustration. The result was a full-scale redesign that treated documentation as a front door to the product.

He introduced a new homepage that acted as an intelligently structured hub, guiding each user to the right content instead of forcing them to navigate a maze of unrelated links. With this redesign, documentation became a critical growth engine.

“Documentation is often the first real touchpoint after marketing,” he says. “If someone lands on your docs before they talk to sales, that’s not a support page; it’s a sales conversation in another form.”

One of Chisom’s most impactful insights was simple: developers and business users are not the same audience. They should not read the same documentation.

On the new homepage, two clear tracks were created. Developers received API references, code samples, endpoints, and error responses, while business stakeholders got conceptual overviews, implementation guides, and product explanations in accessible language.

“Putting everyone in the same documentation bucket creates friction,” he explains. “Developers don’t want marketing copy. Business users don’t want to dig through JSON responses. When you respect the difference, engagement goes up.”

The results were dramatic. Daily active users on the documentation platform jumped from 2,000 to 10,000, a fivefold increase. For a SaaS business, that translated into faster onboarding, fewer support tickets, and more informed customers who convert and stay.

Chisom Uma treats documentation like code

Chisom also redesigned how documentation was produced. He built a workflow mirroring software development: pipelines, reviews, versioning, and release schedules.

“We started treating documentation like code,” he says. “It has a pipeline. It has reviews. It has a release schedule. If the product moves forward, docs must move with it.”

This approach eliminated gaps between product and documentation updates, reducing user confusion and internal friction. Support and sales teams no longer improvised, and engineering teams had a single source of truth.

Chisom attributes much of this philosophy to his early contributions to the NGINX open-source community, where clarity is essential for millions of users.

“Open source forces you to be clear. People don’t have time to guess what you meant. That standard never left me.”

Though GBG is UK-based, Chisom’s thinking is global and deeply tied to Africa’s technology landscape. He believes documentation is one of the most underrated tools for levelling the playing field for startups across the continent.

“A lot of African companies think they have a documentation problem. What they really have is a clarity problem. Features exist. The ideas are strong. But users cannot see the path from where they are to the value the product promises.”

Treating documentation like growth infrastructure can dramatically reduce onboarding friction, especially for startups selling across borders or operating in markets where sales teams cannot be physically present.

“If your docs can onboard a developer at 2 a.m. in another country without a call,” he notes, “that is growth. Real, scalable growth.”

Building the next generation of technical writers

Chisom’s ambitions extend beyond GBG. He aims to become a technical writing manager, aligning product storytelling with engineering excellence. Meanwhile, he is already shaping the field through community work.

He runs an open-source documentation resource project that helps aspiring writers build skills, portfolios, and confidence. Beyond grammar, he teaches strategy, how to structure content, guide users, and align documentation with product goals. He also mentors career aspirants, showing paths into documentation engineering for those from development, design, and content backgrounds.

“Community is the backbone of progress,” he says. “If you want better documentation in the ecosystem, you don’t complain. You train the people who will write it.”

The SaaS landscape is becoming more complex, and the need for clear, structured documentation is rising. The once-niche role of documentation engineer is now strategic. Chisom sits at the intersection of engineering, product, storytelling, and user experience, a space that companies are only now realising is essential for growth.

“In the end, documentation is about one thing,” he says. “Does the user feel confident enough to take the next step with your product? If the answer is yes, then you are not just informing them. You are growing the business.”

For global startups hunting for every competitive edge, documentation engineering may be one of the most powerful growth levers they haven’t fully tapped. And for Chisom Uma, it’s exactly where he plans to keep building.