While the field of usability has existed for decades, the number and quality of careers in the field have greatly improved in the last 10-15 years. The long-term prognosis for the industry is good: there are constant opportunities in almost every industry since new products and technology come out all the time, in usability as well as user-centered design, interaction design and user experience design.
#24693
How to Hire Technical Writers: A Manager's Viewpoint 
Hiring technical writers is an infrequent but important part of a manager's job. Clearly defining the job and the required skills is the first step. Then use all of your networks to find candidates. Read résumés to find those that best match your requirements. The interview team needs to be prepared to ask relevant questions that verify and expand on the résumé and samples. Compare the interview team's evaluations, then check the references of your best one or two candidates, and make a prompt offer.
Huettner, Brenda P. and Ken Jackson. STC Proceedings (1996). Careers>Management>Writing>Technical Writing
#26913
How to Interview and Hire People
Before you worry about interviewing, consider this: good interviewing does not make a good candidate out of a bad one. The higher the quality of the people coming in to your interviewing process, the higher the quality of those that will come out of it. Do not rely on HR or some other person to decide who enters the process. The more energy you, as a hiring manager, invest in recruiting, the better your results will be.
Berkun, Scott. ScottBerkun.com (2006). Careers>Interviewing>Management
#31713
How to Justify Hiring Technical Writers During Hard Economic Times
The marketplace for technical writers has often been challenging. In difficult economic times when companies seek to slash their budgets, it is often difficult for corporations to understand the need for a technical writer, let alone to understand the need to increase staffing in the documentation department. This article looks at the benefits of hiring technical writers, since their often diverse skill sets can be used across various departments in the organization.
Datta, Aparna. Writing Assistance (2007). Careers>Management>Writing>Technical Writing
#23110
How to Land a Career in Technical Writing
While technical writers are expected to have some knowledge of the subjects they write about, experts usually provide detailed information. Technical writers and editors organize the information, put it into user-friendly language, select graphics, write sidebars, and impose a consistent format, checking back with experts to fill in blanks and ensure that no errors have been introduced.
Bradley, Gwendolyn. Chronicle of Higher Education (2000). Careers>Writing>Technical Writing
#21261
How to Make Yourself More Marketable in a Small Company
In a time when corporate downsizing is the norm rather than the exception, technical writers must constantly increase and market their skill sets to make themselves more valuable to employers. Based on our experiences as technical writers in a small company, we will define why and how to market yourself:
Holman, Peter M., Susan Gonzalez and Jennifer Privette. STC Proceedings (1997). Careers>Writing>Marketing>Technical Writing
#27564
How to Manage Agile Development 
This whitepaper provides an Agile development overview full of techniques, best practices and educational materials.
Leffingwell, Dean. Rally Software Development (2005). Careers>Management>Agile
#26918
What follows is some advice for managers on how to manager people, especially talented people. I worked for nine years at Microsoft, sometimes managing projects, sometimes managing people, but always with a manager above me. I think I’m smart, but many of the people who have worked for me definitely were. Over the years I’ve experienced many mistakes and successes in both how I was managed, and how I managed others. There's no one way to manage people, but there are some approaches that I think most good managers share.
Berkun, Scott. ScottBerkun.com (2006). Careers>Management>Collaboration
#31714
How to Market a Documentation Department
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.
King, Robert. Writing Assistance (2006). Careers>Management>Technical Writing>Marketing
#20440
You have collected the pieces you would like to include in your portfolio. You have sorted through your collection and selected your best work. You have made entry cards for each piece to provide a good introduction for each sample. And you are ready to place your work, introduction page, entry cards, section dividers, and give-aways into your new leather portfolio. Where do you start?
Burnett, Rebecca E. Thomson. Careers>Portfolios>Information Design>Card Sorting
#19980
How to Promote Technical Communication Services in Your Organization
Successfully promoting technical communication services in organizations requires more than just the right brochure, the right slogan, or the right Web page. A technical communication team must first make strategic decisions about how it can most effectively contribute to the success of the overall enterprise. In this paper, I describe how our team successfully improved the perception of our value to the rest of our organization by adopting an attitude of service toward our internal customers.
Pollak, Bill. STC Proceedings (1999). Careers>TC>Workplace
#31302
How to Start a Business: Five Key Steps to Getting on Track
I received a slightly panicked call the other day from a colleague who had recently ventured out on her own after many years of working for others. She had been lured into self-employment by an opportunity that matched up her passion and her skills—but it wasn't going to pay all the bills. So she needed to get serious about starting up some kind of freelance business. But where to start? Although my colleague had taken the necessary legal steps in her state (notably, applying for a business license), she didn't know what to do next. She was, in her own words, paralyzed.
Steigman, Daria. Communication World Bulletin (2006). Careers>Freelance>Business Communication
#26910
The best advice for having a bad manager is to seek other employment. Don’t undervalue your happiness: it’s impossible to be happy if you work directly for someone you can’t stand. It may be difficult to find another job, but if you are willing to make compromises in other areas (salary, position, project, location, etc.) it will certainly be possible. Being happy and underpaid is a much better way to spend a life than unhappy and anything else.
Berkun, Scott. ScottBerkun.com (2006). Careers>Workplace>Management
#10876
How to Work as an Off-Site Technical Writer
Not all technical writers get in their car and drive to work every day. Some only work in the office a couple of days a week. Others don’t ever go into the company they work for. These technical writers work entirely from a home office, or in other words, 'off-site.' I’m one of those writers. However, I wasn’t always an off-site writer. For the most part, companies are still reluctant to let employees telecommute. Nevertheless, as more positions are outsourced, consulting is becoming the 'in' position.
#21302
For practical purposes, we may say that a tender is 'an offer to do work.' This article discusses quotations for work, standard terms and conditions and letters of agreement. The article is written within the context of UK legislation. It originally appeared in Communicator 7:1, Spring 2001.
Unwalla, Mike. TechScribe (2001). Careers>Writing>Business Communication>Contracts
#31920
Writing a bad résumé is easy. Writing a good résumé is hard. It will take time and many drafts. Because research scientists are often targeting several very different career paths simultaneously, it is important to have several different résumés that accent different skills.
Fiske, Peter. Science (1996). Careers>Resumes
#30253
How to Write Your Own Contract
This workshop is designed to help independent contractors write their own contracts.
Costanzo, Louis C., Terry S. Dick and Richard H. Weiss. STC Proceedings (1995). Careers>Consulting>Contracts
#24701
How To Write Your Own Contract
This workshop is designed to help independent contractors write their own contracts. Before attending the workshop, think about your current approach to the topics listed in the Workshop Outline.
#23029
How to Write Your Own Contract 
This presentation is designed to help independent contractors write their own contracts. Before attending the presentation think about your current approach to using contracts in your business.
Costanzo, Louis C., Richard H. Weiss and Joanne Smestad Claussen. STC Proceedings (1996). Careers>Freelance>Contracts
#10579
How Usability-Focused Companies Think
In our consulting work, we’ve noticed that some companies build usable products through the heroic efforts of one or two individuals. Although the end result is desirable, the products suffer when those individuals leave the company. Other clients have established strict processes that are supposed to promote usability. However, because the company has imposed these processes on developers, individuals follow them in letter but not in spirit — they just don’t buy into them.
#10536
Human Factors: Consultant Search
HFES is pleased to provide this searchable directory of human factors/ergonomics (HF/E) consultants and expert witnesses as a free service to potential clients.
Human Factors and Ergonomics Society. Careers>Human Computer Interaction>Consulting
#10543
#29653
Every technical communicator must develop a set of management skills appropriate to the task in order to excel as the leader of the communication team. This calls for multiple skills including being part diplomat, part technical expert, part salesman, and part turtle.
Bailey, Elizabeth. STC Proceedings (2005). Careers>TC>Project Management
#25808
A panel to familiarize students and faculty with what Human Factors professionals do in a variety of settings including academics and consulting.
Shapiro, Ronald G., Barry Beith, Joseph H. Goldberg, Joe Hale and John F. 'Jeff' Kelley. HFES (1994). Careers>Human Computer Interaction
#29577
The IABC Job Centre is resource for the communication profession, serving job seekers and employers in all industries and communication functions.
#19863
Idea Watch: A New Approach for your Professional Development
Our field is young, yet great books and great ideas by technical communication gurus abound. How many of us, though, are steeped in these works? How many of us can intelligently discuss the great ideas and latest research? If new STC members ask us which authors constitute the foundation of our field, can we tell them? If so, have we read them cover to cover? Can we discuss ideas more? This paper presents the professional development programs that two STC members began in the fall of 1999. After realizing that their programs might be of interest to others, they formed a SIG called Idea Watch. In addition, they have informally polled numerous gurus and drawn up a list of “essential books.” This list is presented at the conclusion of this paper.
Hansen, Heidi and Jennifer Square. STC Proceedings (2002). Careers>Education>Professionalism
