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> Chet wrote:
> > I have had the same experience. 300 might not even be that much of
> > an exaggeration. I'd say that I generally see 1 resume that I'll
> > follow up on out of 20 to 30 that I receive. And it always amazes
> > me how many poorly written resumes I see from people who are
> > presenting themselves as writers.
Tracy wrote:
> What bothers me is people who have no experience who just decided to
> be a writer one day (probably the day they saw the ad). What are we
> doing wrong? Why do people think *anyone* can be a writer? Why does
> my boss pay our contract desktop publishers more than our contract
> writers? Why did our last opening for a writer draw resumes from one
> of our Systems Design guys and a woman who works at our print shop
> (if you can print, you can write?)
It may be that we're not a doing a good enough job furthering
technical writing or technical communication as a **profession** - -
this is more of a question than a conclusion.
On our last attempt at hiring writers, we got one from a man who had
written "procedures for carrying out duties while in the army" and
another whose sole experience was "wrote a manual on bowling." Honest
to God! And I'd say the bulk of resumes had misspellings, sloppy
format, etc. Very, very few had ever so much as taken a single
course in technical writing.
We've talked (and whined) a lot about the issue of certification on
this list, but I support it 100%. Until we start taking ourselves and
our education seriously, we can't expect our employers or the general
public to do so, either.
Jane Bergen
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Jane Bergen, Technical Writer
janeb -at- answersoft -dot- com or janeb -at- airmail -dot- net
"The difference between the right word and the
almost right word is the difference between lightning
and the lightning bug" (Mark Twain)
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