Re: engineers

[Rebecca Merck <Rebecca -dot- Merck -at- ONESOFT -dot- COM>]

Well, doesn't that beat all?

A couple of years ago, some personal events in my life drove me into a
little stint with a counselor, where I learned that I have some interesting
assumptions -- that whatever I can do must be easy to everyone, and whatever
I can't do is easy to everyone but me.

This woman sounds like the exact opposite, in some ways -- whatever is easy
to me is beyond you, and whatever you do that I don't is irrelevant.

I'd write some of it off to being young, being arrogant, and not having had
a chance to see what the value of tech writers IS.  Or, alternatively, of
having had some really bad experiences with tech writers who were not
contributing.

The lesson that comes to all of us sooner or later is that all of the parts
have to come together for a cohesive and successful project.  If the
software (part, appliance, whatever) is there but there are no instructions
(or bad instructions) for its use, the product will fail.  If there are
fantastic manuals but the product doesn't work, the product will fail.

But the REALLY important part has to do with customer perception.  You can
hand someone a diskette, CD, what have you, and it's impossible to know what
the value of the software is.  In a lot of ways, the customer's perception
of the worth of the product, and thus the ability of the product to bring in
revenue, has to do with the quality of the packaging, documentation, and
other elements that go into the final bundle of things that go to the
customer.

Perhaps one day this young woman will realize the value of the skill set
that allows people to actually make a profit!

-rjm

 From ??? -at- ??? Sun Jan 00 00:00:00 0000=