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Betsy Perry <betsyp -at- VNET -dot- NET> made some excellent comments about the pros of
working under the engineering arm. Then she said:
>The disadvantage of this organization is that your professional life
>winds up being controlled by people who may not understand (or value)
>your profession. A good engineering manager may be a very bad writing
>manager, either because s/he thinks writing is easy ("Just add some
>commas to the specs and you're done") or because s/he doesn't want to spend
>valuable engineering dollars supporting a staff member who isn't
>cranking out code. When you report to engineering, it can be very
>difficult to get money for hardware, software, and professional
>education. In the worst case, you may find that it's impossible to
>pry raises for writers out of engineering management, or that writers are
>last-hired first-fired. If this last happens to you, your only recourse is
>to find a new job.
To this I say YMMV. When I worked as a writer under the Engineering
umbrella, my work life improved vastly on all of these fronts. The woman
who headed Engineering was *freer* with the money -- my professional
development plan improved tenfold, and suddenly I had an outstanding new
workstation to replace an outdated one. Why? She said, "I want you to have
the right tools and the right opportunities to learn more." And the entire
technical writing department survived a layoff that some engineers didn't.
Peace,
jim
--
jim grey |"Ain't nothin' better in the world, you know
jimgrey -at- iquest -dot- net|Than lyin' in the sun, listenin' to the radio!"
|http://www.iquest.net/~jimgrey/
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