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Subject:RE: About Responsibility and Fault From:kcronin -at- daleen -dot- com To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Tue, 8 Apr 2003 06:25:43 -0600
Robert wrote:
> In my line of work, I see myself as being responsible for providing the
> best document possible UNDER THE CIRCUMSTANCES.
VERY well put. Excellent post - you just articulated the way I approach my
job, and I've had similar success.
In my case the most frequent challenge I face is TIME. I'm often faced
with unrealistic deadlines. So I skip the part where I freak out over how
unfair it is to be asked to meet those deadlines, and set my sites on
getting the best possible work done given those restraints. Sure, if I had
more time, I could do an even better job. But I get it done as well as I
can within the allotted time. And like you, so far I've had no complaints.
Some tech writers can get overly altruistic, I think, killing themselves
in the quest for perfection and then being shocked when their extra effort
does not garner them any extra recognition or appreciation. I used to pull
regular all-nighters, working nights and weekends to publish documents
that would probably have been acceptable if I'd scaled back my goals for
them. I don't do that anymore.
NO company is operating under perfect circumstances, so everything
*everybody* does is usually going to be a compromise, yielding an end
result that is less than perfect. But if everybody does their best, the
end result will almost always be *good enough*. It took me a while to
figure that out.
I've been happier at my jobs since I made that leap. And I've actually
been more successful since I started taking a more pragmatic (and less
martyr-like) approach to doing the job *well enough*. I still bust my hump
to do the best I can. But only for 40 hours a week. And I walk right past
most windmills without even waving a lance at them.
Every job has its challenges, whether it's the difficulty involved in
collecting the information you need, or shortages of time and resources.
I've said it before: the fact that the work is hard is why we don't do it
for free.
Keep up the good work - you've obviously found a winning formula!
Keith Cronin
One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that
one's work is terribly important.
-Bertrand Russell
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