Knowledge Work

Over at the TECHWR-L list, one of the members is getting set to deliver a talk on technical writing as a career to a group of home-schooled high school students, and asked for advice.

After answering the questions, I realized I had just written a pretty good blog post!

1. What students can learn now to help them prepare

Read everything you can get your hands on, and not just technical stuff. A budding tech writer needs to have a broad base of working knowledge. Over and over, you will be asked to come into a new situation cold and quickly become an “instant expert,” learning the process or product well enough to teach others about it.

So keep that cortex limber: be reading and learning all the time.And write. If you can find a good editor to work with, latch on to that person like a barnacle, and write (for publication if you can) as often you can.

2. What colleges are good to attend for this type of work (I know these don’t precisely correspond to those with “technical writing” as a major)?

Attend the *very best* college or university that you can (a) get into and (b) afford; your course of study matters much less than being challenged to write and think by good instructors and having intelligent peers to help you grow intellectually as well.

You don’t have to go to an Ivy League school, but be aware that the resemblance of most colleges these days to actual institutions of higher learning is purely architectural; make sure that you’re getting value for the dollars you and/or your parents are spending.

3. What salary range could they expect?

The STC salary survey provides good guidelines for what starting technical writers make in various parts of the US.

Note that these high school students, should they become tech writers, will be competing with tech writers in offshore locations who make in a range from $10-15K USD per year; to be successful in the long term, tech writers must develop their “soft skills” and also pick areas to work in that are difficult to outsource or offshore.

Getting a well-rounded understanding of the business world is an immense help; take some basic business classes at college, and read the Wall Street Journal at the library or take advantage of the cheap student subscription rates.