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Materials from the Nontraditional Roles session at the 2005 STC Annual Conference are now available. Click here, then search on Kunz to find links for
downloading handouts and PowerPoint slides.
I hope these case studies will provide inspiration and encouragement for technical communicators who are looking for ways to add value.
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Contents:
Table of contents
Policies & Procedures Writing
Procedures Writers Can Move into ANY Role!
Name: Karen Baranich
Company: SCANA
Location: South Carolina, USA
I work for a power company in South Carolina. The technical writers helped to maintain documentation for our Storm and Crisis planning. I decided that because of reading and editing the documentation, I probably knew as much or more than most people about storm procedures, so I volunteered to be assistant storm coordinator. Now I do disaster planning for the IS department on the corporate level and am helping to develop corporate plans, training and documentation for all types of crisis planning. It's a bit more work
Roles in Contracting and Consulting
Name: Raymond Urgo
Company/Organization: Urgo & Associates / STC Policies & Procedures SIG
Location: California, USA
A useful way to understand and apply contracting and consulting services is according to the way one may leverage his/her role in a client engagement. Three roles for leveraging services are an extra pair of hands, expert, and collaborator. Each role differs in positioning, marketing, and fee setting.
In an extra pair of hands role, the Policies & Procedures (P&P) practitioner functions more like contract labor being led or managed by others to help solve a client’s problem. He markets his services passively through others, offers a low risk in his value of services, and is compensated by the hour.
In the expert role, the P&P practitioner contracts to perform a project whereby she manages or leads her self or team to solve a client’s problem. She markets her services proactively through networking and professional reputation, offers a moderate risk in service value, and seeks compensation hourly or for a fixed fee.
In the collaborator role, the P&P practitioner advises the client in determining how the client solves its own problem. He markets his services actively yet indirectly through volunteer services to his profession and reputation in his specialty. He offers a high level of risk that has a bearing strategically on an organization, and he seeks compensation by the hour or on a fixed fee, retainer, or contingency basis.
For further information, contact me by email or phone: (323) 957-9317.
Writing QA Plans, Test Plans, Acceptance Criteria
Name: Bob Bench
Company/Organization: None given
Location: unknown
I worked for several years in a quality assurance organization. This was in a company that manufactures Computer hardware and software. I wrote quality assurance plans, product acceptance criteria, and product test plans. In addition to writing ability, this position required knowledge of the company's products and procedures, some knowledge of quality assurance methods, and negotiating skills
Sales and Marketing
Technical Communicator Became a Marketing Communicator
Name: Wendy Cunningham
Organization: Pennsylvania College of Technology
Location: Pennsylvania, USA
I was hired as a technical writer for a small software development group. They had a team of programmers and technical support staff, but no marketing department. They hired a consultant for any marketing materials they couldn't handle on their own. (Postscript: No marketing background. I relied on my technical writing training/experience to keep my message in line with the audience — IT and financial administrators — and mission — sell software in a highly competitive market.)
They had one other part-time writer who never stepped outside the box. Based on their experience with her, they assumed that I was only able to write software manuals. Being someone who quickly gets bored with the "same old" routine, I kept my eyes open for an opportunity to spread my wings.
My chance came prior to an annual software industry conference. Our group would man a booth with some handouts and a couple of laptops for demonstration purposes. So I designed an auto-running PowerPoint presentation - basically, it was an electronic advertisement for their various applications. The presentation was a hit.
After that time, I became their primary source for marketing copy and was included in marketing strategy meetings. The consultant was called on less and less frequently. They found that my in-depth understanding of the software helped me write more convincingly than the consultant, who had only a basic understanding of the products he was trying to market. I added credibility and relevance to marketing materials that had previously failed to sway the target audience.
During my time there, I stepped out of the traditional technical writer's role many times (e.g., training, UI design meetings, long-range planning meetings, technical support, etc.), but my marketing work stands out as the feather in my cap--it required a level of flexibility and creativity that broadened my writing skills and increased my job satisfaction.
Guidelines for Becoming an Asset to the Organization
Name: Connie Giordano
Company: Time Warner Cable
Location: North Carolina, USA
I've been handling non-traditional roles since I entered technical communications over 10 years ago. Previously I managed marketing, PR, and advertising functions, so I was well-versed in crafting messages appropriate to audiences.
I could probably boil it down to a few simple guidelines:
- Take initiative; don't wait for others to come to you. Offer to help; do favors without expectation of payback.
- Be aware of all the potential stakeholders for your products.
- Keep in mind that the documentation is NOT the product.
- The goal is customer satisfaction: that can mean docs, a well-designed product interface, training, multi-media, case studies, and a whole bunch of other stuff. But it doesn't mean waiting around for a finished product and whining about short timeframes.
- Use previous experience to build future possibilities. Make suggestions not demands.
- Learn as much as you can about design, usability, information architecture and ultimately knowledge management.
- Build a thick skin and a sense of humor.
- Learn the corporate dance, but participate according to your own sense of ethics and purpose. Never denigrate anyone whose dancing ability and desire differs from your own.
This is what usually works for me: Ask for stuff such as access to the product (software world) and get on the project teams as a fully participating member. Offer to help test, write guidelines, work on specs, or anything where communications skills are useful. Vent only to people who you trust. Be patient but persistent, and the opportunities will start opening themselves up. Then enjoy the experience; it tends to be contagious.
Proposal Writing
Make the Slides Pretty? I Can Make a Business Case
Name: Kevin Montgomery
Company: QualComm
Location: California, USA
I recently guided a bunch of EEs in making a business case for the purchase of a several-hundred-thousand-dollar CAD software system. The EEs knew they needed it, but had little clue about what the VP meant when he required cost justification. I asked the right questions and gathered the right information to analyze the benefits to cost, then created a PPT presentation showing the benefits graphically. The VP received it very well. Toward the end of the presentation, I inserted a graph of productivity showing it dipping for the first several weeks of implementation, then improving substantially over the baseline for the future. I labelled the area of lower productivity "Some pain..." and the area of improvement "Ongoing gain!" The VP cracked up, said that was wonderful, and committed on the spot to buying the tool. Now, some months later, I'm documenting the implementation.
I thought that was a rather successful ending for a project that started as "Can you make my slides pretty?"
Database Designers, Proposal Editors
Name: Laura Ricci
Company: 1Ricci
Location: Wisconsin, USA
I work with Proposal Teams. If a technical writer made an appointment to come meet the team leader and brought a sample of their work and one paragraph written about themselves, we would fall over ourselves to call them the next time we had a crunch. The sample is to show the depth of their technical expertise (sometimes needed desperately) and the paragraph about themselves is to show their writing skills. Waxing eloquent would be a good strategy for the second piece. Proposals often need someone who can make the dull sexy.
Do ask what software the team uses. If the team leader needs writing backup, that can be cut and pasted into anything they use. And if the team needs database consultation, someone brushing up skills wouldn't be helpful. If the team needs database migration support, willingness to brush up skills is helpful, but not necessary as the migration tends to be more repetitive than challenging.
Ask whether they have predictable crunch periods. Some firms compete on contracts that appear at specific times of the year. Others ebb and flow without a predictable pattern. "Would it help if I touched base with you again in _?" would be a good question to ask. And then make a note on your calendar and do it.
Unlike most parts of an organization, the proposal teams are most pressed to perform when times are bad. They don't get RIFed. I would not hesitate to go out of my way to get someone we wanted available, off another manager's RIF list. In one firm, the technical writers were all laid off except the three I tagged as backup to the proposal team. When it comes to a RIF, having other managers know you is helpful to getting extra protection. This is best for the firm, because people who can work in multiple areas are more valuable because they contribute productively when one area is slow, by helping out in another. The proposal team leaders (if they know what they are doing) become more powerful the worse the economy gets because proposals are the only way out of trouble. Most proposal team leaders have the ear of the CEO when they need it.
If you write technical manuals, look for a place to offer services that is closer to the point of sale instead of the product delivery. People providing services that are visible to upper management are better protected. Senior management pays most attention to the areas making the sale happen, and don't involve themselves in the delivery of product unless things go wrong.
User Interface Design
Conference Session Leads to a New Role
Name: Diane Feldman
Organization: STC Editing SIG
Location: North Carolina, USA
One story in my own experience comes to mind. As you know, tech writers often complain that their jobs are made difficult by software interfaces that are poorly designed and that they wish they could have more input into the design process. One year I attended a session at the annual conference that focused on ways for tech writers to get involved in design. I included a description of this session in the trip report that I wrote up when I came back to the office. Trip reports were posted to the company intranet, where the Engineering Manager for a new product line happened to read it. The short version of the story is that this trip report led to the Pubs team being entirely responsible for organizing the interdisciplinary teams that would design the interfaces for the new product line.
Support and User Interface Specialist
Name: Ken d'Albenas
Company/Organization: None given
Location: Alberta, Canada
With a B.Sc. in Geology and a minor in Geophysics, I moved from a job as R&D tech writer in one software company to geoscience support specialist at another one, then progressed to support team leader and on to the software R&D dept. Most of the technical communication I did there was either 1-to-1 (on the phone or by e-mail, with customers and other support staff) or in classrooms as a trainer.
If I ever start a SIG for tech support people, all the people who want to be known by the mellifluous moniker, "technical communicator," will discover what a huge population of other technical communicators there is out there! ;-) I also oversaw the regular updates of training docs, served as SME when the company engaged some contractors to update the entire user doc set, and I wrote release notes and install guides, etc. My experience in tech writing made me a better, relentless user advocate in software development, from install wizards to workflow GUIs.
Instructional Design
Performance Technologist
Name: Jane Smith
Organization: STC Instructional Design SIG
Location: Arizona, USA
I, for one, am a very non-traditional technical writer, having been in instructional design for many years, doing multimedia, e-learning, and what-not. I also am a Certified Performance Technologist, given by ISPI, for work done beyond ID to improving the performance of a work team and company. This work involved assessing performance problems and needs and determining a solution set, including training, mentoring, process improvement, project management, re-titling jobs, and improved communication. By working all issues, the company was able to develop a product in 6 months that had been in research & development mode for over a year.
I'm doing a workshop on "Performance Technology: Going Beyond Documentation and Training." This workshop focuses on the methodology of performance technologist, a role technical communicators often find themselves filling but don't know it. It asks folks to look at the question of "what is the appropriate solution to the problem" rather than blindly developing documentation and training when asked. I consider this a non-traditional role but one that most folks sometimes but don't know what it's called or how to truly go about it. While a 1.5 hour workshop won't tell all, it does present an overview of the issue and processes.
I have worked in this capacity on purpose a few times and "by accident" (meaning I'm called in to develop training but I find other solutions are needed as well) a few times.
Online Learning Course Became a Company Standard
Name: Jan Watrous-McCabe
Company/Organization: HealthPartners
Location: Minnesota, USA
Summary:
Although my position in IS&T is billed as "technical writer," and my primary job responsibility is to create online help files and paper manuals, I have managed to add the creation of customized eLearning to my menu of services.
The movement toward the creation of online learning opportunities began simply enough with requests for documentation. When I would talk to the client about the type of help file or manual they needed, I found that quite often they didn't need to have a help file, they needed to organize resources or provide training resources to their staff. About this time we contracted with an LMS provider for IS&T online courses. I discovered that under our contract we had the ability to create custom online courses and upload them to our SkillPort site. (It was actually not SkillPort at that time, but it is the name today.)
I wanted to understand more about how to create online instruction, so I went back to school and got my MS in Instructional Design with a specialization in Online Learning. As I was taking my classes I was able to put what I was learning to work immediately. I created an IS&T New Employee Orientation which was uploaded to our site and made available to all IS&T employees. That was the beginning of what has become a growing area of interest to our internal clients. Online learning fills what was previously an unmet need, even an unrecognized need! The first course was created just about the time that HIPAA privacy training was needed. Since we had shown online courses were possible, my coworker was asked to create a HIPAA privacy course. The result was a huge savings in training dollars for the company and a compliance level that exceeded any mandatory training effort we had ever attempted.
I'm not only getting a lot more requests for custom online courses as the word travels, but am in the process of creating annual updates for several of the courses that were previously created. Requests for updates tell me that we are doing something right! It's an exciting time to be able to expand the services beyond help files and technical manuals!
Software Development
Writing Programs to Automate Reference Documents
Name: Feimin Lorente
Company/Organization: None given
Location: Ontario, Canada
I like programming as a hobby (but I’m definitely not a professional; my degree is in English), so I tend to apply it to documentation development whenever I can automate something. About 15 years ago, I wrote a program to pull the error messages out of the programming code, present an interface to the programmers so they could document the message, stored all the information in a database, then spit out a manual in FrameMaker by tagging the fields with MIF. About 3 years ago, I wrote a program in VBA to find the abbreviations in a Word document, linked them to a database so the user could choose the right expansion (or enter a new one), then generated the list in another Word document.
Thinking Outside the Traditional Boundaries
Name: Suzy Davis
Company/Organization: None given
Location: Victoria, Australia
I'm an entrepreneurial kind of girl, so in my work, as long as it has some impact on my work (such as developing templates and VBA tools to assist in the documentation process, or stream line the RFP response process), or the results of my work identify information which is of value to someone else (say a software development team) I will do it, but I see that as part of my job. I would be negligent, in my eyes, if I did not introduce improvements where I saw they were needed, or become a kind of SME that could consult to other teams. As a result, I'm moving my career into VBA tool development and distribution, and other product development (not much money yet, so still technical writing!)
I'm know I'm not traditional as the reason why I don't work with large technical writer teams is because they want to box you in too much, or they already have established procedures and tools that they don't want to change. But where the traditional boundary is meant to be, I don't know.
Writing about the Technology Led to a New Role as Expert in the Technology
Name: withheld by request
Company: Boeing
Location: Washington, USA
My new roles:
- Database application consultant
- Database application troubleshooter
- Database application programmer
- Requirements consultant
In writing and developing a user guide for a database application and associated documentation and websites, I became an expert in using the tool and extending its capabilities (i.e., scripting). This extended my role greatly, added much depth to my work experiences, and greatly enhanced my satisfaction with my career. I feel both sides of my brain are being used, and I'm building relationships — an essential part of job satisfaction.
Volunteer Work
Community Service Creates New Opportunities
Name: Becky Hall
Company: Rebecca C. Hall Consulting
Location: Illinois, USA
I have used my skills in two community volunteer roles, either of which could have been paying projects under different circumstances.
In one I helped spearhead a successful library referendum campaign by using audience analysis to determine how to write campaign literature that would persuade enough people to change their votes the next time. We analyzed precincts to see where the previous campaign had been successful or failed, and then analyzed the type of voters in those areas.
In the second, I used both writing and project management skills to help our City Museum create an award winning historical community cookbook that contains the stories of the people and places behind the recipes.
Other
Conference Planning and Coordinating
Name: Linda Cooper
Company: RTI International
Location: North Carolina, USA
I worked with technical and scientific leads to coordinate all logistical, communication, and financial elements for a conference — as well as developing the agenda and planning.
I am viewed as the senior, or lead, person at my organization for this area of support for my group, the Office of Communication, Information, and Marketing.
Had Other Roles and "Backed in" to Technical Communication
Name: Brad Lawless
Organization: Sam M. Walton College of Business
Location: Arkansas, USA
I consider myself as technical communicator, although I've spent less than a year of my entire career as a technical writer. The rest of the time, my titles have ranged from systems engineer to managing director, my current role here at the Information Technology Research Center at the University of Arkansas. I have no formal technical communication training, but have rather backed into the profession via an undergraduate English degree, a master's degree in Information Systems and a willingness to try new things.
Writer Evolves into a New Role: Analyst
Name: Steve Gillespie
Company: FedEx
Location: Tennessee, USA
Over my 20+ year career I've 'evolved' from Tech Writer to Analyst ... cannot take all the credit, but was able to see a trend here at FedEx (the largest employer of TC'ers in the Mid-South), where once there were scores of TC'ers (by TITLE), now most (including myself) are an 'analyst' of one flavor or another (by title and by job task).
To answer your question about the skills that 'analysts' need (at least here at FedEx), these would include project management, Web page design and maintenance, enterprise-level project scheduling, software requirements gathering and management, software testing, CASE (Computer-Aided Software Engineering) tool admin (e.g. Rational).
Of course, you see the overlap with technical-writing skill sets ... but all of these are an obvious value-add to project management and support.
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