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Hello Tripwire,

Firstly congratulations on gaining full-time position; it sound like something that you've been trying to obtain for a while.

Off-topic, I noticed that you are a Technical Writer (Author). This is one of a few job roles that I'm looking at for a future career. I just wanted to ask how you got into that job position, and basically what is the job role like? I assume that there is a lot of communication involved.

Thanks
Picc.

 

A,

Thanks for the link.

 

To be fair Picc, my "path" to this type of career has been very atypical. The technical writers I've met, both at HP and at the vendor companies that write for them, have degrees in English or Technical Writing (I didn't even know there was a degree in Technical Writing until just a month or so ago). My background (if you want to call it that) is in being a support tech, but I hadn't gotten very far along that path before writing lured me into "the dark side".

There are all kinds of jobs that fall under the "technical writer" banner and they all use different kinds of tools. Some writers are more or less slaves to Microsoft Office products, while others are more markup language focused (HTML, XML) and appear little different than web designers. Those are just two examples. Technical writers can have a wide variety of writing and technical skill sets. Some (maybe most) are writers first and have just a small technical background, while others are primarily technical people who have a knack for writing. Some writers have a tremendous command of all the tools of their trade (and their are many) and border on being programmers, while others just plug content into a framework and rely on technical sources (programmers, engineers, and such) to provide information and understanding.

Then there's me. The job I came from before HP and the one I'll be going back to on Friday requires that I use the LaTeX postscript language in the Kile environment to generate and maintain my basic documentation. I'll use GIMP for image editing and will be working primarily on Ubuntu.

I just love this stuff.

 

You're right, a technical career does have many paths not set paths that lead to that desired career. Like you said, it's interesting that there is now a degree in Technical Writing; I wonder if the OU has one.

I've over 10 years technical background, and about to start a Writer's Bureau course, that might go someways into Technical Writing, but with the current climate I'm happy to be a System Administrator and study in my own time until the storm blows away.

 

I'm also a technical writer, having written one book and numerous practice exam and study guide products. The writers at Boson actually DON'T have degrees in Technical Writing or English... we're real-world techs who know how to write well. That said, we have editors who DO have those Technical Writing and English degrees to clean up what we've written.

I was a senior systems admin with a good bit of network admin experience when I found my first technical writing job by accident - found it on an online job search engine. I applied to the recruiter, and he said I didn't have enough writing experience. So... I figured out what technical writing company was based in Nashville, and I applied directly to the HR manager, who brought me in for an interview. The rest is history: along with BosonJosh, I currently help direct the content development process for our practice exam products, and train new writers as they are hired.

In truth, with 10 years of technical experience, you could start a professional writing career at any time... all you really need is a good measure of logic and the ability to write well.

I'll be blunt: you can probably make more as a tech than as a writer. However, there's something to be said for not having to repair a downed server at 2am, or carry an on-call pager, or put out fires that arise out of nowhere. Plus... I simply enjoy what I do. The job is very rewarding, and I'm *never* bored.

 

In a nutshell, this is probably most *really* technical savvy people aren't technical writers (assuming they can write, and not everyone can). While I can be called upon to do a rush job on a priority document or documentation project, as Michael says, there are few documentation emergencies that require being up until the wee hours hammering away at the keyboard.