I write a lot about content strategy and writing for the Web and I noticed a funny thing the other day. I was talking with a friend about an article he wanted me to guest write for his blog about helping out-of-work web content strategists find a job. We talked around the subject for a while trying to find a good angle and it occurred to me that it was no wonder we were having trouble – I don’t know any out-of-work content strategists!

That was kind of a revelation really. Even with the bad economy and double-digit unemployment, all the Web writers and content strategists I know are hard at work. The contractors are doing particularly well. But I DO know a few technical writers who have been recently laid off who are finding technical writer jobs hard to come by.

But the technical writers I know have great job skills. They can handle almost any kind of writing and are used to living under deadline pressure. It seemed odd that web content development and content strategy job skills would be in demand, but the closely related technical writer jobs would be drying up.

So we starting thinking – if technical writer jobs are going to be so hard come by, then maybe it’s time for my friends to take those technical writer job skills and put them to work elsewhere. This conversation got interesting fast. Before I started working in the Web content world, I had been a technical writer for ten years. So I have a deep understanding of the technical writer world, technical writer job skills, and how to take those skills and stop looking for technical writer jobs and move to growing areas of technical writing and on to other job areas such as the Web. I’m living proof that it can happen and that the change can be very profitable.

We came up with so many interesting article ideas that I decided to write about something else on his blog entirely and keep the technical writer jobs idea for myself as the subject of a blog. I think that technical writers have great job skills and I look forward to writing about how to best put them to use in a job that pays well and that they feel good about!

I’ll be covering:

• New and developing technical writer jobs
• Featured technical writer job listings
• Taking technical writer job skills to the Web
• Going freelance as a technical writer
• The technical writer jobs market

Plus anything else that pops into my head!

Learn more about how I used my technical writer jobs skills get a much higher paying job as a Content Strategist working on Web site development projects.

Content Strategy Jobs Board

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Technorati Tags: content strategy, freelance, Technical Writer Jobs

Lots of good technical writer jobs in the phrama field.

Technorati Tags: technical writer job specialties

I see this all the time, especially with freelancers. A good client comes to them with a new project that involves writing a lot of new content for their Website. This is a great chance to quote a slightly higher rate. If asked about it I just say something like this:

“That’s my rate for Web Content Development. Writing for the Web requires a somewhat different skill set, is aimed at an audience who is usually less technical in nature, and I find the review cycles to be much longer and more in depth, so I charge a slightly higher rate.”

 
It’s usually a quick negotiation, either that accpet the rate or not. It’s not worth losing a good client over it, but it never hurts to ask.
 
Something else I’ve done with great success is to use an old marketing trick of showing them a discounted price. In the quote I send, I’d show them a much higher hourly rate for “Web Content Development,” and then I’d apply a “Best Client Discount” that brings the price way down to just a little bit more than I was already making. This way they think they are getting a deal!
 
Whether you are a freelancer or on salary, you need to constantly be on the lookout for ways to increase your rate. There are only so many hours in the day, if you want to make more money, you need to find a way to increase your hourly rate.
 

Technorati Tags: freelance, hourly rate, Technical Writer Jobs

What I told her shocked her a little and made her a little defensive, but she eventually came around and called later to say she did well in the interview and thank me. I’ll get to what I told her in just a minute, but there is something you should know about technical writers. We have sort of a reputation for being… well, odd. Not geeky, that’s OK, but… strange. This used to come up in conversations all the time when I would go to STC events and talk to other managers. We would compare notes about who had worked with the strangest writers.

So what was my advice to her? It was simply – Don’t be odd in the interview. Being odd or strange in the interview was the very first thing I looked for when screening candidates. I knew I was going to have to work closely with this person for years and I’d much rather have someone with just OK skills that was easy to get along with than the technical writer rockstar who always seemed to have knives and pictures of knives around.

My friend who asked for advice was well known for going on and on about her cats. And she had a very, very strange sense of humor that would pop up at the worst times. I told her both of those things and she was a little mad and defensive but I calmed her down. I told her that once she gets hired, she can be herself, but keep the other stuff under wraps in the interview. Smile, be personable, show you know what you are talking about without bragging, don’t be odd, and you are 90% there.

The Thing No One Ever Tells You

I can’t stress this enough, and no one ever talks about it, but the number one thing that will get you checked off the list in an interview is being creepy, odd, and inappropriate. Look at it this way, you wouldn’t be there if your resume didn’t fit the job. So if you got the interview then you have the right skills. In most cases, what the hiring manager wants to do is verify that you know your stuff, then get a feel for how you would fit in the group.

The “brittle technical writer” in Dilbert was there for a reason. We have that reputation. So in the interview, show you know the job, be bright and personable, but don’t get too familiar. Don’t crack jokes, don’t talk much about your hobbies and interests. Technical writer jobs are hard to come by these days, so don’t mess up the interview by showing too much personality. There is plenty of time for all of that AFTER you get the job!

• The Technical Writer Jobs market increased by only 1.5 percent in 2008. That’s just 740 new jobs for the whole country.
• New Jersey and Michigan gained the most new jobs
• Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Denver, andPhoenix lost the most technical writer jobs
• The median salary got a small bump up to 61,620 USD

Once again, not a very encouraging report. Much of the growth was not in the traditional software development base, but in industrial equipment and goods. New jobs in Web writing and Content Strategy were up a lot more with a much higher median salary.

Technorati Tags: content strategy, STC, Technical Writer Jobs

No Technical Writers

Is it time for a little personal rebranding? If your current job title is “technical writer” and you are seeking work in the Web agency world, you might want to make some adjustments. My experience has been that hiring managers in trendy Web design firms have very little understanding of what technical writer’s jobs are like these days and what they do. Often it’s exactly the same kind of work that their own Web writers perform, just with a different job title.

Technical writers get painted with all kinds of negative images that are, for the most part, simply untrue. Agencies tend to want “creative” and “edgy” and have a pre-conceived idea about technical writers in these areas. 

This bias is clearly displayed and documented in a post on my content strategy blog where a company listed under job requirements, “No Tech Writers.” How’s that for blunt. I’ve found that it does little good to attack prejudices of any kind head on. If I was in this position and applying for a Web writing job at an agency I’d do two things:

• Adjust my job titles in my resume. If I have done any kind of writing for the Web, I’d list my job title/role as Web Writer/Technical Writer or Web Editor/Technical Editor. For some reason, the title technical editor does not seem to have as much of a negative connotation. I’d still mention technical writing in the longer job description, but I’d try to leave it out of the main heading. One good way to make this change is to change the heading text from “Job Title:” to “Role:’ – this way you can describe the actual work you performed without listing an arbitrary job title.

• Then I’d be sure to call out your web writing and editing experience boldly in your cover letter, while not mentioning the term “technical writer.” Hiring managers really do read the cover letters.

I’m hoping that this bias against technical writers is not a growing trend. I’ll keep an eye out and report what I find.

Learn more about how I used my technical writer jobs skills get a much higher paying job as a Content Strategist working on Web site development projects.

Agile Technical Writer Jobs

http://www.atlassian.com/agile/people/technical-writer.jsp

So be on the lookout for Agile technical writer jobs. This is where technical writer jobs and careers are heading, so the quicker you get on board, the further ahead you will be.

Learn more about how I used my technical writer jobs skills get a much higher paying job as a Content Strategist working on Web site development projects.

It seems that technical writing may be the next big profession to be outsourced. India has a surplus of well-trained writers, fluent in English, who are eager for work. And unlike call center operators, the Indian accent is much harder to detect in written software documentation and online help.

Indian is about to have to world’s largest English speaking population, so don’t expect things to get anything but worse.

If you find your company’s technical writing jobs are  being moved off shore, be the first to volunteer to be the editor for them! Even the best companies doing techical writing jobs off shore recommend that you have a native English speaker review and make final edits. This could be a good way to save your job.

Learn more about how I used my technical writer jobs skills get a much higher paying job as a Content Strategist working on Web site development projects.

Technical writer jobs - Empty newsroom

More proof that indeed, the journalists are coming to take technical writer jobs.

Here is an article published on Aug 5, 2009 called – Taking Journalism Skills to New Industries that describes just what I’ve been talking about. The writer answers a question from a young journalist who is frustrated with the lack of opportunity in that market and is trying to find a way to use his journalistic skills and experience in another, more profitable, way.

Q: “I still want to use my journalism skills, but in a different way…. How can I convince employers that my skills are transferable?”

A: “Look for all kinds of writing jobs: technical, grants, internal communications and public relations. Look for jobs where investigations, information gathering, analysis and synthesis are in demand.”

Of course the obvious answer is to look to other, more stable industries. Jobs in technical writing must seem very attractive at this point.

So expect more of this kind of competition as the year goes on. Journalists are used to a lower pay scale than technical writers as well so this will likely put downaward pressure on pay rates, at least at the lower end of the scale.

Just another reason to think about really specializing, taking your technical writer job skills to the Web, or going freelance.

Learn more about how I used my technical writer jobs skills get a much higher paying job as a Content Strategist working on Web site development projects.

Technorati Tags: competition, journalists, technical writing jobs

It took a while, but I finally got a clue as to what was going on from a friend who was a manager in a company where I was being considered. The hard truth was that I had priced myself out of the current market. Times were tight and there were plenty of people with OK skills who were eager to take the jobs for much less that what I was used to getting.

I think that this is happening now in the technical writer jobs market. Plus, the problem is being compounded by the collapse of the print media. Journalists of all kinds are fining themselves out on the street and looking for a new place to sell their skills. Technical writing is the first place to try for many with any kind of technical background. Especially those who started out as technical writers and then moved into other areas. They all head back to technical writing and cause the jobs market to get very competitive. This drives full-time salaries down.

Competing in a Tough Technical Writer Jobs Market

There are three ways to compete and win in this kind of market:

1- Beef up your resume, really call attention to skills that you have that may be in short supply, and duke it out for the best jobs.

2 - Lower your compensation expectations and compete on price in the short term until things get better.

3 – Go compete in a different league where things are not as competitive or where the overall pay level is higher.

If you decide to go with door number 3, I think that both the writing for the Web and Content Strategy markets are good choices, as is taking your technical writer jobs skills over into the freelance and contract market. The overall pay and competition are better in the Web writing and content strategy areas and working on contract let’s you apply for jobs all over the world, not just in your backyard.

Technorati Tags: content strategy, Freelance Technical Writer, Technical Writer Jobs