Harriet Whitlock became interested in the Web when she was a graduate student and teaching assistant in the English department at Rutgers University. She designed a writing course with cyber communities as its theme and developed a Web site for the course. One thing led to another.
First she was asked to help maintain the English department Web site, then to teach department staff members how to make and support Web pages. Next an ex-student offered her some freelance work marketing and then maintaining a Web site.
Ms. Whitlock is now A.B.D. in English and a full-time staff member at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, where she writes Web site content, training materials, documentation that allows departments to maintain their own Web sites, course handouts, and academic computing-policy statements.
Her job draws on several skills she gained in graduate school including “problem-solving, making information accessible, ordering ideas, researching, sounding authoritative even when you don’t feel it, focusing for a long time on a single task, working under pressure, making deadlines.”
Was it a big adjustment? “It has taken me a while to adjust to multitasking,” she says, “not to mention getting used to using terms like ‘multitasking’.”
Like Ms. Whitlock, other humanities A.B.D.'s and Ph.D.'s are making careers in technical and medical communication. These fields offer good pay, a strong job market with the probability of continued growth, and plenty of opportunity to learn new things.
Among the materials produced by technical writers and editors (or “communicators” as they are now called in this burgeoning field) are user manuals for computers, package inserts for prescription drugs, proposals for contracts between companies, scripts for instructional videos, articles in medical and trade journals, industrial research reports, help menus and explanations inside software, and advertisements for technical products.
While technical writers are expected to have some knowledge of the subjects they write about, experts usually provide detailed information. Technical writers and editors organize the information, put it into user-friendly language, select graphics, write sidebars, and impose a consistent format, checking back with experts to fill in blanks and ensure that no errors have been introduced.
“The greatest paradigm shift is to move from thinking of your document as ‘yours’ (personally unique, expressive of your ideas and style) to thinking of your document as ‘theirs’ (designed for the user, who wants to accomplish some task),” says Marjorie Davis, chairwoman of the department of technical communication at Mercer University, by way of e-mail. “It’s hard to get used to thinking of yourself as a collaborator and not a Lone Ranger.”
Though an increasing number of colleges and universities offer programs in technical communication, the field is open to those without specialized degrees. A survey conducted in 1995 by the Society for Technical Communication showed that 42 percent of its members studied English in college, almost double the number who studied technical communication.
The profession of technical communication seems to be growing significantly. The S.T.C.'s membership increased by 73 percent in the last decade, and the number of U.S. colleges and universities it identifies as offering technical communication courses more than tripled from 1986 to 1996. That expansion is good news for humanities candidates seeking technical writing and editing jobs as well as for those wishing to remain in academe to teach technical communication.
According to a 1999 salary survey by the society, the mean national salary for technical communicators holding just a bachelor’s degree is $50,520. Besides good salaries, technical communication has other advantages. An oft-cited plus is constant learning. To produce their work, technical writers and editors must keep up with new technologies, new medicines, and new developments in their fields. The writing can be satisfying as well.
“There’s an element of creativity involved in finding ways of organizing complex information so it is easier to understand and make use of,” says Tim Lulofs. Mr. Lulofs received a Ph.D. in English from the University of California at Davis, but the tight job market led him to look for work outside the academy.
A contact in a telecommunications firm led to a computer operations job there, and Mr. Lulofs gravitated toward training and later technical-writing work. He now manages a group of technical writers at Telcordia Technologies, a telecommunications software company.
“The reading, thinking, and writing required of graduate students in the humanities can serve them well in a technical environment,” he says. “Teaching experience is also helpful. It’s common for technical writers to be asked to help develop and deliver training.”
There are downsides to the job. “The work is very much deadline-driven,” Mr. Lulofs says, “which can be difficult for some people.”
Another downside has traditionally been the relatively low status of technical communication within the scientific world. Technical writers and editors working with engineers, physicians, chemists, and programmers have often been viewed as holding support staff or nonsubstantive positions. But some say that this is beginning to change, particularly in computer industries.
“More and more companies realize that they must remake the product to be more usable instead of spending millions on paper documentation that nobody reads,” says Ms. Davis. “The design team relies on technical communicators to build in usability from the beginning.”
One factor working against smooth transitions from graduate schools to corporate technical communication is a disconnect between the two environments. Many academics distrust corporations, question the value of their goals, and are unsure of what corporate workers actually do all day. The reverse is also true.
Chuck Campbell described this disconnect in his 1989 dissertation. Mr. Campbell got a master’s in English literature in the 1960’s before going to work as a technical writer. He kept one foot in the academic door by continuing to teach English courses while holding full-time technical-communications jobs.
“I felt there was a schism between my academic life and my technical writing life,” Mr. Campbell says. “So when I went back for my Ph.D. I used rhetoric and critical theory as a way to think about technical writing.”
Mr. Campbell emphasizes that although technical communicators need some technical knowledge, their primary tool is an understanding of rhetoric: how to structure material to enhance understanding, and how to present material clearly and persuasively. “The most important skills technical writers have are the abilities to analyze and argue,” he says.
To prepare for a career in technical communications, humanities graduates should identify an area in which they’d like to work and become familiar with the basic structure and terminology of the field. One way to do this is by reading Web sites of associations and companies, and lurking on technical-communication discussion lists.
It is also important to get some work experience or publications. Ron Fraser, a freelance technical writer, recommends using one’s own area of expertise as a way to segue into more technical subjects.
For example, graduate students or instructors could create Web sites for their courses, contribute articles on the cultural ramifications of some aspect of science or technology to graduate student journals, find work teaching technical writing (for which, ironically, one sometimes needs no technical qualifications), advertise one’s services as a dissertation editor to graduate students in the sciences, and so on.
It’s almost impossible to emerge from graduate school now without basic computer skills. Technical communicators need these and often more. Depending on the field, familiarity with statistical programs, Web authoring tools, desktop publishing software, and graphics programs can be an asset. If you have access to free campus computer facilities, now’s the time to use it.
One aspect of technical writing that some find attractive is that the wages can be high enough to make part-time and freelance work possible -- allowing workers to maintain the day-to-day autonomy to which academics are accustomed and leaving valuable time free for finishing a dissertation, preparing articles for publication, attending to family, or teaching a class or two.
It’s difficult to start a freelance career cold. Freelancers need ways to reach potential employers, and employers need a reason to believe that freelancers can do the assigned work. Most people agree that the best way to start a serious freelance career is to get a full-time job for a year or two to build contacts and experience. On the other hand, many people, like Ms. Whitlock, segue gradually into freelancing through chance interests and contacts.
Although there are already intense demands on graduate students’ time, it’s important to build preparation into your schedule, however minimally: one hour a week of relevant Web reading, one evening a week to play with Photoshop in the computer center. Whether your goal is a full-time technical-communication job or a freelance career, and whether this is a primary goal or a backup plan in case the academic market fails you, technical communicators agree that it is important to start preparing well ahead of the moment when you need this work to support you.
Gwendolyn Bradley, a doctoral student in English at Rutgers University, is a freelance writer.
ALSO SEE:
A guide to Web resources on careers in technical writing