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Re: "Credentials are so 20th century" - "The degree is doomed" - Harvard Business Review
Subject:Re: "Credentials are so 20th century" - "The degree is doomed" - Harvard Business Review From:Julie Stickler <jstickler -at- gmail -dot- com> To:techwr-l <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com> Date:Mon, 8 Dec 2014 11:39:03 -0500
It will probably happen in software before it happens anywhere else. We
hired at least one developer straight out of high school, without even a
single college course. (He had already founded his own software company on
the side while he was in high school.) And we've had other developers who
have non-CS degrees (like music).
On Mon, Dec 8, 2014 at 3:40 AM, Lois Patterson <loisrpatterson -at- gmail -dot- com>
wrote:
> This article is somewhat related to the current discussion about testing
> technical writer candidates.
>
>https://hbr.org/2014/01/the-degree-is-doomed/
>
> As we know, the practice of some HR departments is to do straight filtering
> based on particular educational criteria. As many tech writers have varied
> educational backgrounds, this can be a significant problem when the
> educational requirements are narrowly defined. I'm not sure how quickly
> this suggested change to skills and aptitude testing, as described in the
> article, is going to occur.
>
> The article is worth reading for information about various quantitative
> techniques for evaluating candidates, although it is not, of course,
> specifically focused towards technical writers. But it may give some ideas.
>
> I also think it would be useful to think about how a prospective (or
> current) technical writer could build a basket of measurable skills that
> would establish competence. And although it might seem difficult to measure
> how a candidate would interact with SMEs, for example, I suspect there are
> ways to do that too.
>
>
> Lois
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Julie Stickler http://heratech.wordpress.com/
Blogging about Agile and technical writing
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