breaking into tech writing

[Barclay Blanchard <blanchab -at- SOLOMON -dot- BUCKHEAD -dot- COM>]

Cathy Quinones <quinones -at- MINDSPRING -dot- COM>
>Ok guys, what about those of us that have never had a tech writing job and
>are trying to break into this discipline?

I think the advantage that most entry-level writers have is that they're
willing to work for less pay, which oftens means more to a company
than quality writing.

Here's a personal story in case it helps you in some way...

I got into the field in a roundabout way.  I'd gotten a BA in English, tried
Navy Officer Candidate School (briefly), and gotten into a BS program
in math.  I started co-oping at IBM in a computer-based training (CBT)
department.  The 1st 3 quarters were far from glamorous: I was
providing phone support for students in the training centers who'd
gotten stuck at various points in the CBTs.  The next few years I was
doing grunt coding work (and trying to convince people to let me edit
some of the garbage we were sending out).  Eventually I got to rewrite
2 courses.  Then I was hired on (after about 5 years as a co-op and
after getting a BS in math and another in physics) as an entry-level writer
(at long last) and got to prove my abilities.  Sometimes it's a struggle,
especially in a big corporation, getting people to *allow* you to do what
you're good at.  Now I work at a small company where I'm the only
writer, and I don't often ask for permission to undertake projects I'm
interested in (like creating a web page): I just do them.
------>Barclay Elizabeth Blanchard<------
Senior Technical Writer and CBT Developer
OSoft Development Corporation, Atlanta, GA    (404) 814-6030
"Anyone who inhabits himself cannot believe in objective thinking.."--Hugh
Prather