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Subject:Re: RE: Are best practices standards? From:Marilynne Smith <marilyns -at- qualcomm -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 27 Oct 1999 12:36:49 -0700
Sorry if this is late, but I ran afoul of Lyris.
Marilynne
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One response you can try is to ask the manager what tasks he or she was hired
to do. When they answer, you can say "and I am hired to do the technical
writing. You may be a fine writer, but <our company> hired me to do the
writing and you to do the <engineering>. " The acknowledgment that they are
perhaps good writers seems to take the sting out of it. It isn't a contest,
it's a simple matter of assigned tasks.
You can also point out that writing takes a bit of time and effort, and they
would probably prefer to spend that time and effort on their engineering task.
Marilynne
At 11:59 AM 10/26/99 , Ellen Black wrote:
>I think the reason so many tech writers have a terrible time with their
>bosses is:
>
>a) most doc managers do not have a technical writing background
>b) most people (be they managers or not) think that if one can speak then
>one can write
>
