time consuming tasks (WAS: Re: Should my ego be squashed?)

[jboskey -at- wheels -dot- com]

     Genevieve - As a recent college grad now working, you are seeing that 
     technical writing isn't always as exciting as one thinks it should be. 
     :) I sympathize with your problem of having the documents to convert 
     (see my story below). Getting an intern would be great if you can find 
     one and if your company is willing. However, if no intern is 
     available, I fear you are probably right that you need to swallow your 
     complaints and convert the documents yourself. I'm not quite sure if 
     your company will get money for you doing this document conversion, 
     but if that's the case, they will be especially unhappy if the 
     conversion isn't done. Not doing the work may reflect badly in your 
     review, as you mention, and you don't want to be seen as some "high 
     and mighty" technical writer who only wants to work on "fun" things. 
     
     Especially since you are the only tech writer in the company, you do 
     run the risk of being called upon often to do "glorified typist" 
     tasks. However, tech writers are often perceived in this way, and you 
     will probably have to deal with such attitudes anyway, whether you 
     accept this conversion task or not. I think being seen as someone 
     willing to help out when asked (regardless of the task) is very 
     important and can only be seen by the company as a very positive 
     reflection of you. 
     
     Now, if such conversions are the ONLY work you start receiving for 
     many months, that's a different story. But accepting this one time, 
     helping-out kind of task (and not complaining too much) will be a 
     great thing to bring up at your review. :) 
     
     Good luck. Keep reading if you're interested in my sob-story.....
     
     At my last job (as a tech writing consultant) I was given the task of 
     re-formatting the Illinois Administrative Code. My company received 
     the Code as RTF files on a tape. The State wanted the RTF files to 
     become pretty pages with dictionary-style headers and footers (so that 
     if section IA.123 was the first section on that page, that section 
     number had to appear in the header.) Major pain when using Word - each 
     page had to be a separate section.
     
     After our programmers had done some tweaking of the files, I had to 
     open each RTF file in Word and run four different macros on it. (Note 
     I didn't get the chance to create these macros.) Then I had to look at 
     each page and double check the headers and footers and fix them 
     accordingly. If a section broke funny, I had to fix it and make sure 
     all headers adjusted correctly. There were some sections with huge 
     tables that wouldn't convert well, so I had to manually adjust column 
     widths on tables spanning pages and pages. Then I had to print each 
     section and eye-ball each printed page and reprint ones with problems. 
     
     I did this for the entire code, 5000 pages! We filled an entire 
     standard-sized paper box to bring it back to them. It took a month 
     solid. 
     
     Tedious? Yes. Boring? Yes. Annoying? Yes. I wore a path between my 
     desk and the printer. My co-workers were constantly complaining about 
     how much printing I was doing. I was a recent college grad and newer 
     hire, which I think is part of the reason I got this assignment. I 
     didn't like it at all, and it did very little to help enhance my 
     technical writing skills (I did learn a little about Word).
     
     But the client and my company were thrilled with my work. The State 
     was thrilled at how error-free the code was, how nice it looked, how 
     timely it was done. My manager sympathized with me that it was a 
     boring assignment but was extremely happy with the quality of it. It 
     showed that I was flexible, willing to less-than-wonderful tasks and 
     do them accurately and without complaining (too much!) I have used 
     this assignment when asked in later interviews what my worst 
     assignment was. But I make sure to add that it shows I am willing and 
     competent to accomplish anything.
     
     We can't all have perfect assignments every time. Knowing this one had 
     a definite ending helped me put up with it.
     
     Julie
     

______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Should my ego be squashed? 
Author:  Genevieve Burt <gb_techwriter -at- yahoo -dot- com> at i-mail
Date:    10/7/1999 7:44 AM

......
     
*BUT* I have also been given the task of converting 
dozens and dozens of old manuals from WP to Word (some 
of our customers just switched over, and they want 
magnetic copies of all their manuals in Word now). They 
donÆt want me to edit these old manuals for clarity 
(they need it), or to make them more user-friendly 
(they need that too), IÆm just supposed to convert them 
to Word with a smile.