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> ... my company has decentralized the Tech Pubs
> department with a reorg, and now we all report directly to
> engineering or
> operations managers.
>
> Since we lost the sense of a cohesive group, all my work has
> been really
> unfocused. I've been disinterested in working because it seems like no
> matter what I do, my end product will be ugly and unuseful to
> its readers...
I've worked in a company where us TWers (both of us) were assigned to
engineering groups, and you're right, it's hard. There's no departmental
cohesion, there's nobody to stick up for pubs who really understands
the doc process, ... Sometimes it can be a lonely feeling and
sometimes it's hard to get a handle on how to proceed.
*But* -- ahhhh, there's always a but, isn't there. ;-)
Nobody said you couldn't talk to the other writers in the company.
Nobody said you couldn't, informally, determine standards, peer
edit, or cry on each other's shoulders. And nobody said you had
to produce sub-standard work. AAMOF, when I talked to my supervisor
in that company, he said "we just assumed you writers would find a
way to get together anyway".
My advice: get all the writers together and go out to lunch. Talk
about the situation; see how everyone else is feeling; formulate
a plan to support each other; get on with life. You're decentralized,
not isolated. And it can work out okay if you give it a chance and
a little effort.
Good luck!
-Sue Gallagher
sgallagher -at- akonix -dot- com
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