Technical Writer Jobs Market – More Competitive
When I was a well-paid senior technical writer back in the 1990s, we went through a recession and I found myself without a job. Laid off. Very confident of my skills, I expected to find something right away and I was very surprised when this didn’t happen. Companies would be impressed by my resume, call me in for a great interview, call me back for another interview, and then I’d never hear from them again.
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.
