CNN Money.com said technical writing is the #28 best job in the U.S., with an average salary of $67k and a projected job growth rate of 20% over ten years. Best is determined by "great pay and superior growth prospects. Work that's meaningful." Interestingly, 56.4% of technical writers say their job is "low-stress," which makes technical writing the fifth least stressful job in the U.S. Software developers are slightly more mellow, with 5...
Listen here: For the past couple of days I've been in Idaho at a pre-professional writing conference at Brigham Young University – Idaho. The purpose of the writing conference is to bring in published novelists, poets, editors, and professional writers to give students a glimpse into the careers they plan to enter. Recommended link: If you're looking for a small liberal arts school, check out San Diego University of Phoe...
Listen here: This is a special podcast for Carly Finseth at Clemson University who is thinking about entering the field of technical writing and wanted to ask me a few questions. After I recorded the podcast, she was kind enough to transcribe it. I polished up the transcription a bit so that it would be more readable. How did you make the career transition from academia and teaching to technical writing? I taught basic ...
Seven deadly sins of blogging 1.0 Being fake (Sins of blogging) 1.1 → Being irrelevant (Sins of blogging) 1.2 Being boring (Sins of blogging) 1.3 Being unreadable (Sins of blogging) ...
Listen here: As you know, the sessions at the STC Summit in Atlanta last year were recorded. My blogging presentation, Introduction to Blogging: A New Technical Communicator Role, is the only recorded session you can listen to for free. It's labeled as the "Featured session - free of charge." I didn't even realize this until someone tweeted it this afternoon. I figure it means one of two things -- either my presentation...
Chrysler moved their car manuals from the traditional thick paper manual to a shorter format accompanied by a DVD. Chrysler says the switch will not only save 20,000 trees a year, the videos on the DVD will also be more helpful to users trying to perform tasks. The shorter quick reference guides will still be 60-80 pages long (judging from the photo below, they also look more attractively designed). Chrysler's new documentation stra...
Section Widget The winner of the latest WordPress plugin competition is the Section Widget by Godfrey Chan. I was exploring it yesterday, and I've got to say, it's one super cool widget. Look in the lower-right corner of my sidebar to see it in action. The Section Widget provides a tabbed widget, first of all. On each of the tabs, you can type your own text or code. You can also choose from one of about 20 different styles. And you can ap...
Google recently released Sidewiki, a new feature in the Google toolbar that allows you to add comments in a pop-out sidebar that appears beside every page on the web. It's not a typical wiki -- you can't edit what other people write. You can only add another comment about the page. After you install the Google Toolbar with Sidewiki, look for the Sidewiki button on your Google toolbar (see image below). When you click it, it expands a sid...
Keith Soltys recently highlighted Joel Spolsky's thought-provoking post, The Duct Tape Programmer. Joel praises the practical programmer who puts aside snobbish practices and simply goes for the quickest way to finish and ship a product. In his post, Joel sounds a bit like Holden Caulfield from the Catcher in the Rye. He writes, Here is why I like duct tape programmers. Sometimes, you're on a team, and you're busy banging out the code, an...
Smashing Magazine recently posted 10 Useful Usability Guidelines and Findings. The 10 guidelines are as follows: 1. Form Labels Work Best Above The Field 2. Users Focus On Faces 3. Quality Of Design Is An Indicator Of Credibility 4. Most Users Do Not Scroll 5. Blue Is The Best Color For Links 6. The Ideal Search Box Is 27-Characters Wide 7. White Space Improves Comprehension 8. Effective User Testing Doesn't Have To Be Extensive 9. Inform...
If you're thinking about submitting a proposal to present at the next STC Summit in Dallas, Texas, the deadline is October 5. See the proposal site for details. Presenting is a good idea for a number of reasons. Presenting either gives you a discount or free registration to the conference. It gives you something to focus on during the long winter months. And if you're passionate about your topic, you raise the quality of the STC Summit. I...
Rahel Bailie has started a new SIG focused on content strategy. SIGs are special interest groups sponsored by the STC, involving other STC members also interested in sharing about the same topic. Rahel writes, We welcome the participation of any STC members who are engaged in content strategy, want to develop the skills to become a content strategist, or simply want to know more about content strategy. Rahel is trying to bring content str...
The 2008 Salary Database released by the STC this month provides an impressive amount of salary and industry information in easy-to-read, attractive charts and graphics. It's kind of mind blowing how informative and professional this report is. The depth and quantity of location-specific information available is especially useful to job seekers, employees or consultants negotiating salaries, or technical writers looking to relocate. The s...
The lead article in the Sep/Oct 2009 issue of the Intercom is Saul Caroliner's "Addessing Implicit Age Discrimination in Your Job Search Activities." This is a well-written article of special interest to older technical communicators looking for jobs. Some of Saul's advice includes omitting an extra degree or two if you seem to have too many omitting experience that makes you too qualified for the position listing the current software y...
Listen here: Dealing with information overload can be a huge stressor in life. Not only trying to keep up with the constant deluge of information that comes at you daily, but also managing that information in an organized way -- so that you can find and implement it -- can put your sanity in question. In this podcast, I talk with Ricardo Amigo, a translator in Costa Rica, about different ways to manage information overlo...
