Re: Tech writing job market

["Marc A. Santacroce" <santacroce -at- ca -dot- astound -dot- net>]

I've just been through the job search maze, so please allow me to  pass 
on my observations (you can check my résumé at the URL in my signature 
block to compare my skills and experience with yours).

At the end of March, 2001 I finished  a one year contract at $75/hour in 
Silicon Valley. I got married in April, took a month off, and when I 
looked around...the market had evaporated. I had expected to be able to 
hire out at $85/hour (based on my skills, the March job market, and 
comparing rates with other writers). Reality check time!  I was out of 
work for eight months. I finally landed a five month $70/hr contract in 
November and was back on the street in March.

I used the full range of internet job sites and selectively milked my 
contacts. For the first month, I had no return calls, and no interviews. 
In the past two weeks I had two calls (telephone interviews), both 
leading to face-to-face interviews.  One call was through a contact, the 
other through monster.com. I just accepted a four month $65/hour 
contract beginning June 3 (from the monster.com lead).

I have not been working the job search as eagerly as I know I should 
have. I did not make cold calls, I did not tell everyone in the world I 
was looking, I did not say I would do any job, for any price. I did not 
go to many STC meetings, but did selectively meet with other 
contractors. I did turn down some $15/$25 an hour one-year jobs in the 
Sacramento market. I looked out of my immediate area, but did respond to 
job postings in the LA area which paid $35/$45 per hour.

My limited analysis is that the technical writing specific sites do not 
have a high yield. I think that is because if a hiring manager knows 
about the technical writing sites, they also know some technical writers 
who will either be interested in the jobs themselves, or can refer the 
manager to other technical writers. The managers who are no so familiar 
with our world seem to be posting/checking the more generic job sites. 
(Is this a good TECHWR-L survey question?)

I think what worked in my favor was that I was flexible, and had a 
killer portfolio that demonstrated a diverse background.

My .02

Marc A. Santacroce

Owner, Senior Technical Writer
ePubs, Inc.
925-518-0013
http://resumes.dice.com/santacroce


"Ready, Fire, Aim!"


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