Archive for June, 2008
« Previous EntriesSeeing the Big Picture
Wednesday, June 18th, 2008High tech companies have a lot of moving parts. There are numerous projects on the go, multiple teams at work, different divisions to oversee company operations, and the need to continually keep one eye on what’s going on outside the company as much as what’s going on inside it. It’s very easy to lose sight [...]
Teaching Professionalism
Tuesday, June 17th, 2008I was asked how it is possible to instill professional identity into technical writers. My response was that professionalism can indeed be taught, and we do that very thing here in the Seneca Tech Comm program. Simple things such as document ownership, good project management, displaying integrity, building relationships (with SMEs and others), using good [...]
Gadget Junkie Heaven
Monday, June 16th, 2008If you were the kid who took all her toys apart to see how they worked… If you love to browse the tools, products, and gadgets in every Big Box store you see… If your version of the ideal present is something that whirrs, clicks, or runs on electricity… If you’re an inveterate tinkerer… …You [...]
We Speak Geek
Sunday, June 15th, 2008Technical communicators are the people to call when you have complex technical information that needs to be communicated to people who are non-technical. We are also the people to call when the information is dense and hard to understand, even if it isn’t particularly technical (think government policies). Our skills lie in figuring out the [...]
No Gender Bias
Saturday, June 14th, 2008Technical Communication is a profession that is practiced equally well by women and men. For many women working as technical writers in the ’60s and ’70s, our entrée into some male-dominated high tech fields came through the door of technical communication. We were accepted on teams in aerospace, engineering, automotive, and manufacturing because our skills [...]
Dependencies: The Bane of Efficiency
Friday, June 13th, 2008Students in the Technical Communication program learn how to manage their documentation projects. I’m fond of drawing the parallel between the Software (or Product) Development Life Cycle and the Document Development Life Cycle. They both have the same phases. The keys to project management of course are to control scope, supervise resources, and manage dependencies. [...]
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