Re: Reality Check Time

[Kate O'Neill <kateo -at- CINEBASE -dot- COM>]

Mary Deaton spoke of a disparity in reactions to the compensation question
between the TECHWR-L and WINHLP-L lists. She then asked:
> Is that because many of the people on WinHlp-L are not
> classified as technical writers by their companies, but as developers? Or
> because they are programmers who also happen to do Help and are,
> therefore,
> being paid as programmers?
        [O'Neill, Kate]  I'm not sure if that contributes to it or not. I'm
skilled in online
        help development, and I've never been classified as a developer.
However, even
        before my career moved into management, I was making the upper end
of the
        range discussed.
        On the other hand, I've been doing pretty "technical" writing
(albeit not the
        molecular structure stuff) for a good while, and as John Posada
noted, being
        ready and willing to ask how high when people above me shout "Jump!"
hasn't
        hurt my take-home pay, either.
        On the other other hand, I'm in the Bay area, where someone claimed
that a cup
        of coffee costs $12 (and I thought smoking was an expensive habit!).
Since I have
        no idea what the state of the industry in Chicago is--despite my
hailing from that
        wonderful city of wind--I hesitate to declare any salary range
unreasonable.

--
Kate O'Neill: Manager of Documentation
Cinebase Software
kate -at- cinebase -dot- com ... direct -at- 650 -dot- 568 -dot- 7343

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