RE: When you hear the Axe in the dark...

["Lauren" <lt34 -at- csus -dot- edu>]

"producing documentation required reaching a balance between goals and
resources and the willingness to adjust both when needed"

What corporate discipline does not require "reaching a balance between goals
and resources and the willingness to adjust both when needed"?

I really do not want to come off sounding derogatory, I might sound a little
harsh because it's late and I am in the middle of doing my taxes, but points
1 and 2 sound a little like rhetoric to me.  These comments can be applied
to many situations and not just documentation.

What I get from reading this is a sense of someone who will not make waves,
who will accept management decisions without question, who wants just enough
support to maintain a middle of the road position, and who will probably
shun an intense increase in workload (or leave the company because of it)
like what often occurs after management fails to properly budget its
resources.  The last point of "having these conversations with the
management of some other company" in the event of a lack of management
support sounds threatening and almost inviting the axe.

Lauren

-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+lt34=csus -dot- edu -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+lt34=csus -dot- edu -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On Behalf Of Gene
Kim-Eng
Sent: Wednesday, January 24, 2007 9:50 PM
To: ct; techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject: Re: When you hear the Axe in the dark...

During my most recent round of interviews, in my conversations with my
prospective boss and with the company's CEO I told them:

1. That if they were looking for someone to be an "evangelist"
    for documentation and sell its value to corporate management,
    developers, etc., that that was not me, but that if management
    had already made the decision that they needed it and were
    ready to do what needed to be done to get it, I could help them
    there.

2. That producing documentation required reaching a balance
     between goals and resources and the willingness to adjust
     both when needed, that as long as the company was willing
     to do this we could get where they wanted to go, and if the
     time came when they weren't I would probably be having
     these conversations with the management of some other
     company.

I've reached the point in life where two years goes by as fast as two months
used to.  Can't afford to spend that kind of time on dead horses.

Gene Kim-Eng


----- Original Message -----
From: "ct" <straylightsghost -at- gmail -dot- com>
> The moral here...training a poorly managed company to properly use a 
> Technical Writer?  A daunting and DIFFICULT task.  I've tried doing it 
> for almost 2 years now.  Here's what I've learned.

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