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Subject:RE: Why so few medical techwriters From:"Jones, Donna" <DJones -at- zebra -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 25 Aug 2004 11:18:15 -0500
-----Bonnie Granat wrote:-----
No, but if you start out in midlife in the technical writing field with
a master's in technical writing, you can within a short time get up to
the level of a mid-career technical writer.
Out of the starting gate, I was just another intern, even though I had a
master's degree. But moving up took less than three years. My second job
in the field came with a $19,000 annual salary increase over my first
job.
-------------------------------
I disagree with the need for a master's degree. A bachelor's works just as well and probably keeps you from looking "overqualified" for certain positions. Some places may not call you if they think you'll be out of their price range (whether you are or not). The only positions that I have seen advertised that required an M.S. rather than a B.S. didn't sound like a job that I wanted anyway.
My degree is a B.S. in Scientific and Technical Communication (STC the degree, not the organization). My first writing/editing job back in the early 90s started at a measly $19K/year. I "did my time" there for three years to get some experience under my belt (and raises that brought me to $21K/year). In the five years after that, I changed jobs a couple of times and more than tripled my salary to almost $70K/year. I don't know anyone with a master's degree who did better than that during the same time. I even know someone who didn't complete her B.S. studies for the STC degree (she was a handful of credits short and took a tech writing job that was offered to her), and she experienced the same salary leaps. All they cared was that she was a trained writer, not which degree she had or even whether she had a degree (she was always up front about it).
I think the difference is all in attitude and aptitude. Some people are inherently good at this work, and a degree has little to do with it. Others have a lot of "book smarts" but aren't able to put together a decent sentence/chapter/book.
Donna
Donna L. Jones
--------------------------------------
Technical Writer II
Zebra Technologies Corp.
Vernon Hills, IL
djones -at- zebra -dot- com
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