If you have a group of stressed out and overworked technical writers and need to add to your staff, hiring the right technical writer can be a challenge. In his Considerations for Hiring Technical Writers, Philip Rastocny provides some tips on the hiring and interview process and what you might look for in exceptional technical writing candidates that will best fill the needs of your group of technical writers.

In Rastocny’s article, the scenario is this:

Your department is growing … things are starting to get out of control … your staff is about to mutiny. So it is time to expand your group. You already know what skills you need to handle the tasks, but what other assets can you get at the same time? Characteristics of a technical writer vary from individual to individual, and knowing what to look for before the interview process begins is half the way to hiring the right individual the first time.

Read: Considerations for Hiring Technical Writers
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According to research from PJA Advertising + Marketing and community site Toolbox.com active use of social media has become a vital part of many HR professionals’ careers. This research shows that HR pros now spend more time interacting on social media sites than in reading editorial content.

About one-half of respondents said a social media presence helped build their personal brand and made them more valuable as a job candidate.

Professional networks, such as LinkedIn and Ryze were tops for HR pros followed by best practice social communities, like Toolbox.com and StackOverflow.

Results Summary and Charts on eMarketer

HRmarketer.com has released its annual research report. It includes an analysis of HR buyer research and purchasing trends and their budgetary priorities in 2010.

The data in this report is based on responses from human resource and employee benefit buyers, hereafter referred to collectively as “HR buyers”, collected during October and November of 2009. The key trends outlined in this report tell us the following about HR buyers and their needs going into 2010:

• Thirty-one percent of HR professionals report their company will hire 10-20 percent more staff in 2010;
• Twenty-six percent of HR buyers plan on increasing their budgets for HR-related products and services in 2010;
• As a group, HR buyers plan on increasing their budgets by 25 percent in 2010 for corporate social networking tools, employee wellness programs, management and leadership development initiatives, performance management systems, and other training and development programs;

Read the full report…

by Karen O’Keefe

In the same way that some people adopted cell phones and “smart” phones right away and others didn’t, there’s a huge discrepancy right now between those who understand the value of social media and those who don’t. You may know bloggers, Tweeters, or “people who Facebook,” or have friends with profiles on LinkedIn. You may even have participated in one or more of these social-media activities yourself. However, chances are good you still have something to learn, especially if you are over 35-40, which is where the generation gap falls. Older people tend not to be users, while younger people do. However, the trend is growing in all age groups, with baby boomers stepping it up in increasing numbers (www.mashable.com).

If you don’t currently use any social-media tools, let me share something with you a recruiter told me during my own job hunt last year: Executives and hiring managers at all Fortune 500 companies have a presence on LinkedIn, and 70% of high-tech jobs are now found through LinkedIn. Furthermore, more than 30 million people in the US and 60 million worldwide are on LinkedIn (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LinkedIn).

If that doesn’t give you pause, try this: Of those people on LinkedIn, users with incomes of $250,000 to 350,000 are seven times more likely to have 150+ connections (http://socialmediastatistics.wikidot.com/linkedin).

What does this mean? In a slow economy, you need to use all the tools at your disposal, and social networking is both inexpensive and effective.

Let me tell you my own story. Last year, I moved to Portland, OR and needed to find work. What did I do?
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by Whitney Potsus

Quick! Answer the following questions without putting a lot of thought into them. We want your instinctive, knee-jerk first response.

• Do you enjoy going to work each day?
• Are you excited about the projects you’re working on?
• Do you look for excuses to be late, leave early, or be off altogether?
• Are you in a bad mood more often than not?
• Do you feel like you have control over your job?
• How long have you been feeling like this?

If you answered ……

• “No”
• “Not particularly”
• “Yes”
• “Yes”
• “No”
• “Can’t even remember”

.….. keep reading. Whether you realize it or not, you’re probably displaying half the classic signs of burnout.
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by Steve Capri

So you’ve given it a lot of painstaking thought. It’s decided. It’s time. Time to move into management. After all, you’ve worked hard to get where you are. You’ve paid your dues working through the various levels of technical-writing jobs, and survived all the promotional requirements to get through each position, and so on. As a senior-level professional, you’re at a crossroads. How do you prepare and are you absolutely sure you want to make this transition?

Clearly, not everyone is cut out for management. For some, the thought of being responsible for more than one’s own work is unheard of….sometimes even frightening. For others, management is a logical stepping stone into an entirely new career.

This article is a collage of ideas and experiences from some people who’ve made the leap from writer to manager. Although it’s not a step-by-step guideline, it provides some compelling insight as to what individuals might expect as they transition into the management ranks. Even if you are an experienced manager, you might find these ideas helpful.

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by Robert King

When you first ventured into the tech writing ranks, marketing the department was likely the furthest thing from your mind. You already had work to do, so marketing was somebody else’s job.

But now that you’re in a position where you are reading newsletters like TechCom Manager , you probably have some concern about marketing. You might even need to be a tech comm marketer to ensure your documentation department survives. To have internal and external customers solicit your services is not always a given, even within the same corporation. At the company where I am Tech Comm Manager, we have a decidedly free-market economy, where the business units can either use our services to provide manuals to their end customers or not. Consequently, marketing our department is actually in my position description. How we market our services to our internal and external customers is the focus of this article.
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by Christy Simard

At first glance, technical communication (techcom) and technical marketing communication (marcom) appear to be very different genres. Where traditional techcom strives to help people use products, marcom seeks to make people realize they need products. Techcom instructs, while marcom persuades, and this distinction affects everything from the genre’s focus, to its content, and medium.

On the other hand, when executed well, these two genres share important similarities. They both deal with technical, complex subject matter. They both pay close attention to their target audiences, and they both benefit from a concise, accessible writing style.

Given these similarities, it makes sense that many organizations get technical communicators involved in marketing work. But what are you getting into when the marketing department looks to your techcom team for help? And what do you do when a writer on your team expresses an interest in marcom?

In reality, it can be tricky to distinguish the opportunities from the risks. This article examines two challenging situations for techcom managers, pointing to the risks you are likely to face and the opportunities you might realize.

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by Ruth Nickolich

What does it take to start your own technical-writing business? Chutzpa! Insanity! I began mine by getting a loan from my local bank for my first computer to set up a home office. It was a Micron desktop 386, the fastest computer in town! That was nine years ago. I now have a nice office, a sizeable staff, and all the work I can handle, most of the time.

• Start Big or Start Small
• Develop Relationships
• Remain Flexible and Ready for Change
• Develop Relationships
• Go For It!

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By Kerri Harris

Effective communication is a manager’s greatest tool in rallying groups toward a common cause. From the annual department address to daily email, careful audience consideration is vital in determining how accurately audiences receive messages. Even the most engaging statements lose meaning when barriers to effective communication foster misconception and confusion.

While many managers typically hold listeners solely responsible for how they receive or interpret information, true leaders are more cognizant about potential communication barriers. As a result, leaders often question their assumptions about the “right” way to communicate and strive to better understand the ways their subordinates interact with one another.

For many years, scholars have studied barriers to effective communication based in simplified terms, putting culture and gender among the greatest inhibitors. While no individual is bound to set generalizations, specific characteristics can impact personal interaction and business objectives.

Through this article we’ll examine:

• Global Communication Barriers
• Gender Communication Barriers
• Tools for Managers to Overcome Barriers

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