RE: Information Engineers

["Melissa Nelson" <melmis36 -at- hotmail -dot- com>]

This is an interesting discussion. I have my bachelors in Technical and 
Scientific Communications and took both liberal arts and technical 
coursework. I also have a Masters in History of Science and Technology, 
obviously a more liberal arts degree.

As a technical writer, I usually say heavy on the writer and a light on the 
technical; however that has changed over the years and my technical skills 
have grown. Oddly enough, I contribute this to my masters much more than I 
do to my bachelors, even though my masters degree is much more in the 
liberal arts. I think this is due to the fact that I learned a lot about 
researching while working on my masters and I use this skill every day!!! I 
research what I have to write on, and in doing this I tend to pick up 
whatever technical skills are necessary.

Hope that made sense, just came back from vacation and am having a bit of a 
time with the re-entry. :)

Melissa








From:  Mary Arrotti <mary_arrotti -at- yahoo -dot- com>
To:  John Posada <jposada01 -at- yahoo -dot- com>, techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
Subject:  RE: Information Engineers
Date:  Tue, 1 May 2007 08:58:47 -0700 (PDT)
>   It may not be the norm but I've known liberal arts writers with more 
>technical understanding of a specific product than their CompSci writer 
>counterparts. Part of this related to how much effort each writer put into 
>learning new technology.
>
>   But there are few writers - even with advanced degrees - who can match 
>the technical or business knowledge of their SMEs - particularly concerning 
>what the SME has created or spends 100% of their time working on. If you 
>want to be considered on par or a valuable team player - a technical writer 
>usually has to demonstrate superior writing/doc skills when compared to 
>other team members. Producing inaccurate or poorly written docs doesn't do 
>this.
>
>   I've known writers who wrote less clearly & effectively than their SMEs 
>- what kind of value were they providing? What kind of job security did 
>they have?
>
>   There are writers who position themselves as helpers to the SME - who 
>basically say "It's not worth it for you to spend your time on this - I can 
>produce the docs since you have more important work."
>
>   I think of my role as more like "This is my area of expertise - I can 
>produce the docs more effectively than anyone else." Admittedly that sounds 
>a little obnoxious but trying to support this statement pushes me to 
>continually work on my skills - both technical & writing.
>
>
>John Posada <jposada01 -at- yahoo -dot- com> wrote:
>   I only believe it can be an either/or situation because where the
>writer comes from will have an impct on it. If the tech writer comes
>from an English or Journalism background, their writing skills will
>probably be stronger than their technical skills. OTOH, if the writer
>comes from an IT background, their technical ability will probably be
>stronger than their writing ability.
>
>Take two people; one with a masters in literature and one with a
>masters in compsci. Don't you expect two different strengths?
>
>
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