Making the mistake of not understanding the whole process (and sticking to the work done in your department) will definitely make you think small. It is possible to think big only if you can see what all it takes to make a product, you cannot be interacting ONLY with your team members to come up with an earth shattering idea for the product. Just talk to the guys in other teams, it makes sense. Before you get to know your customers/users, get to know the makers of the product. It is almost around 4 years that I am developing manuals, and still I am not sure how is it being consumed...the point it, the content is static and there is no way to know what the user sees; as a writer, I see helluva opportunity here (Think analytics and online publishing).
It's shipped...not yet!
Your job should be end-to-end. If you are developing a manual or a book, you have got to know how it's being shipped and how it is used by the consumer (the user experience)...what I mean is that your job doesn't end with book production. I believe a lot of enterprises have their divisions working day-and-night to make sure their product is shipped well, but the point is, not a lot of us get to see how the user experiences it. It takes a lot of cross-functional talks to get to know what our output means to the users and how every division's output comes along to solve a problem.
