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Subject:Re: Consensus for a Tech Writing Certificate From:"Gene Kim-Eng" <techwr -at- genek -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Tue, 14 Jun 2005 09:18:55 -0700
This isn't really any different from any other profession. Having
spent four years getting an engineering degree, I can attest to
the fact that having a BSME and skills like stress analysis or
geartrain design does not automatically qualify one for every
mechanical engineering job opening; specific industry work
experience is still king, and engineers don't generally jump
back and forth between diverse industries. My degree occupies
the same space on my resume as all my other training, both
engineering and techwriting related: they're at the end of the
second page, after the summary of my achievements and work
experience, and any TW cert I ever got would just end up as
a few more characters in a section that gets a nanosecond
of attention during a resume scan.
Yes, we have common skills, but they're often only a subset of the
overall skills required for a particular TW job. In that case, TW
certification would serve neither the employer nor the well-qualified
candidate, but rather the less-qualified candidate who needs to divert
attention from a lack of industry-specific experience.
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