Treatment

[Bruce Byfield <bbyfield -at- AXIONET -dot- COM>]

robyn <robyn -at- MAIL -dot- GOT -dot- NET> wrote:

>I work for a small subsidiary of a large company. While their Program
>Managers are sent to conferences almost monthly, my two requests to go
>to a conference were ignored. Also, I know that they're not competitve
>salary-wise. I'm not trying to find a new job, but what I am trying to
>do is to find out how Tech Writers are treated at other companies. I
>don't feel that the bigger company values its Tech Writers. If you DON'T
>feel that way, why? What does your company do to make you feel valued?

Maybe I've just had a run of bad luck with large companies, but
he treatment you describe is exactly the reason why I'm currently
ngotiating with a small one: I've been made to feel peripheral at
too many large companies. I don't need to feel I'm the center of the
universe, but, like anyone else, I do like knowing that my work is
appreciated.

My speculation is that most large companies have been around for such
a long time that the predate an awareness of the need for technical
writers. Too often, they operate on the assumption that documentation
is an after-thought.

With that attitude, they're not likely to think much of the writers,
either. Their writers won't be part of the development team, and will
have to ask questions that nobody else needs to ask, which marginalizes
the writers even more.

By contrast, the company I'm negotiating with is a small company
with ambitions. It hired me as a contractor because its partners
realized that too much time was being lost by not having essential
information written down. \As a result, any documentation I produce is
greeted with cries of relief.

That reaction alone helps. However, there's other reasons why I feel
welcome:

--I'm paid programmers' wages.
--if I need equipment or software, I'm listened to if I make a business
case.The same will go, I'm told, for educational requests once I'm
hired.
--I'm consulted about areas within or around my areas of expertise, both
about writing and design and about the software I'm documenting.
--The work I do is being shown to prospective clients as part of the
presentation package.

Of course, the company is progressive in general, with an extremely
flat hierarchy, and profit sharing that adds another 15 - 20% on top of
salaries.

In short, like most people, what I value is a feeling that my work
matters.
I find that I'm far more likely to have that feeling in a small company,
although I'm sure that there are large ones that give its writers the
same
warm and fuzzies, too.

--
Bruce Byfield, Outlaw Communications
Co-ordinator ,Vancouver Technical Communicators' Co-op List
Vancouver, BC, Canada
(604) 421-7189 or 687-2133
bbyfield -at- axionet,com or bruce -at- dataphile-ca -dot- com
www.outlawcommunications.com (update 8 June, 1998)

"No time for love if they come in the morning,
No time for fears or for tears in the morning,
No time for good-byes, no time to ask why,
And the wail of their sirens is the cry of the morning."
- Geoff Pearson