From SME to tech writer in 7 steps

My colleague Mattias Sander writes today’s guest post about his journey from an SME to a tech writer – which is a noteworthy answer to my post two weeks ago why not to hire an SME for documentation. I thank Mattias for the permission to reprint the post from his own nascent blog The Techwriting [...]

Top 3 reasons not to hire an SME for documentation

There are 3 reasons (at least) why you should hire a technical communicator for documentation, not a subject-matter expert (SME). I work in the field of financial software. Applications for banks and other financial institutions are complex. The office swarms with people who have solid financial knowledge, both practical and theoretical. Recently, I talked to [...]

Framing tech comm: O’Reilly vs. Dangerfield

Technical communication is perceived in many different ways, some more constructive than others. Luckily, the framing of tech comm is the result of a dialogue/feedback loop, so we can help to shape how we come across. Tim O’Reilly on the future Consider Tim O’Reilly, quite a visionary technical communicator. He works to create “The Missing [...]

Recommended read: Degree helps tech writers

Here’s an example of how graduates of a tech comm program put their skills to use in a high tech company. Specifically, National Instruments at Austin contributes two guest posts to the Texas Tech STC Student Chapter blog. Yes, these are recruiting posts, but they do ring true. I think they reflect well how a [...]

Shift your perspective and learn

We tech writers can learn a lot from neighboring disciplines and from people in other professions who address similar issues as we do. Today, I recommend a couple of recent blog posts that speak to technical writers, too. For each post, I’ll first point out what it’s about and then explain why I find it [...]

Top 4 steps to solicit perfect documentation reviews

To get the best possible reviews from subject matter experts (SMEs), we tech writers can prepare, make our expectations clear and help our reviewers excel at their job. Soliciting documentation reviews from SMEs can be tricky: They are usually very busy, juggling dozens of tasks, while putting off several more. The last thing they need [...]

Are you asking questions right?

Asking questions right (as in: correctly, appropriately) is more difficult and just as important as asking the right questions. This is not about asking the right questions – with a little trainning and practice, we tech writers usually know how to do it. I find it much harder to ask the right questions right. I [...]