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Subject:Re: tech communication career From:John Posada <jposada01 -at- yahoo -dot- com> To:Roy Waggoner <rwfromkansas -at- yahoo -dot- com>, techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com Date:Wed, 28 Jun 2006 05:39:45 -0700 (PDT)
> 1) What is a typical day like?
Come in at 8:15am, catch up on some emails and by 8:45, starting up
my authoring toll and subject application. Spend the next three hours
wrestling with a single page of a 60 page manual of instruction on
how to install an application on UNIX, Linux, Solaris, and Windows to
make it clear and accurate.
Break for lunch at 11:30, get a salad and return to my desk with it,
where I'll spend the next thirty minutes filling out some forms that
are required to post a document to the corporate web site.
About 12:15, try to round up some reviews of a document I distributed
on Monday for the document that will be posted to the corporate web
site on Friday.
About 2:30, sit in on a weekly 90 minutes telephone conference call
with one of our largest customers that I cannot participate in,
trying to get hints of coming features that development won't tell me
about directly but will tell them.
At 4pm, spend 30 minutes on a weekly one-on-one meeting with my
manager trading information on any new requirements or projects
coming in the next week.
Starting at 4:30, going to 7pm, return to the installation document I
was working on when I came in in the morning.
Get home at 8ish, eat dinner, then go on-line for some research until
about 9:30, watch some news, sleep at 10, when the alarm goes off at
6am and a similar cycle starts over again.
> 2) What are hours like? Do you find it takes time
> away from your family beyond 50 hours a week or so?
My family is 90 miles away and I return home to spend Friday night to
Sunday night there.
> 3) What are some of the major pluses and minuses of
> the career?
Plus...I enjoy it and am told I'm pretty good at it.
Minus...it can be deathly dull, except for deadline time, when things
change by the minute.
> 4) What are typical entry level salaries and later
> salaries? Are you happy with your compensation?
>From about 30-40k to start, to over 100k after maybe 7-10 years?
> 5) What is most exciting to you about the job?
Every other Friday
> 6) How vital is a degree in technical communication?
I don't have one (in fact I have NO degree) and I'm at $100k
> Is competition for jobs intense? I ask this since
> while I have some technical knowledge, I am sure it is
Yes
> 7) How is the career undergoing changes, and in what
> ways will that impact the job market for technical
> writing?
Anyone with a copy of Word thinks they can do it and too few hiring
people know what to look for
John Posada
Senior Technical Writer
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
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