Re: Career paths of lone technical writers

["Kiewiet, Loraine" <Loraine -dot- Kiewiet -at- indymacbank -dot- com>]

jmalone -at- ResourceConsultants -dot- com wrote:

>>My upcoming annual review has me pondering my career path.  
>>If you are or have been the lone technical writer either for 
>>a project (I am now) or for a company (I have been), have you 
>>found it career-limiting? In general, what's been your career 
>>path: mostly vertical or lateral?
>>

I've been the "lone writer" since 1986. Maybe I have not had what you call a
"career" but I've always had great learning experiences and made a pretty
good salary. I just fell into technical writing. Or maybe I was dragged in,
when I was in software support (Help Desk like function) and my manager
tapped me to document new Beta releases of A.I. software/systems. From there
I went to maintaining manuals, using a Xerox proprietary software product
written in Smalltalk. The year before Xerox shed the Smalltalk group, my
department was trying to commercialize the government sponsored software
product and my manager gave me the chance to use any tools I wanted to
develop WinHelp. I learned RoboHelp in 1994. When I got laid off in 1995, I
was already prepared to write WinHelp for a small, privately-owned company.
Did this till 1999. Developed over 7MB of Help systems for their different
products, and converted a FrameMaker manual to Word (they did not want to
pay for Frame licenses). Left this company and tried being a manager at a
dot com. Missed writing, so I went to an internet start-up as lone writer.
They went under, and I continued going solo as a consultant. I'm on a
3-month contract now, and have recently received phone calls from two people
in town looking for a Help author/consultant.

Is that a career? I think so. My resume gets attention on Dice and I think
having been a "lone writer" helped me develop the flexibility and "can do"
attitude that lands me good jobs. 

My education is a Master's in library science, but when I moved to
California (1979), there were no librarian jobs in town. My husband urged me
to get into computers. At my first library-computer related job, my
supervisor (also a former librarian) said, "You'll learn a lot working here,
and sometimes it will drive you nuts. When you aren't learning anything, it
is time to move on."  She left 3 months later. I left within 9 months and
got a 40% salary increase. So---are you still learning? Then stay and enjoy
your career there!

Good luck and HTH,
--Lorraine
______________________________________
IndyMac Bank... Raise your expectations.

Lorraine Kiewiet
Technical Writer
Corporate IT Operations
Quality Process Management
Phone: (626) 535-5620
Loraine -dot- Kiewiet -at- IndyMacBank -dot- com

Website: www.indymacbank.com


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