Engagement: Linking Employees to Strategic Direction

When considering the issue of employee engagement, communicators need to know what they are dealing with. Engagement is something that plays out on an organization-wide level, so communicators should understand what an organization is.

Potter, Lester. Communication World Bulletin (2005). Careers>Management>Public Relations>Workplace

Entrepreneurs and the 'F' Word    

Since most employees-turned-entrepreneurs have little formal training in finance, they may be less than confident about how to ensure that their finances are in order. Frick shares some of her experiences in learning how to manage her finances for her business.

Frick, Elizabeth G. 'Bette'. Intercom (2007). Careers>Management>Financial

Entrepreneurship ... Yes? No?  

Entrepreneurship is a process of planning, organizing and assuming a business venture risk. Downsizing, (rightsizing), mergers and acquisitions, 'glass ceilings', potential layoffs, company closings, stress dangers and unfair employment practices, are numbing descriptions relating to many current businesses. If you possess excellent work skills and habits, this should lead to early investigations into entreprenuerships, and analyze alternate risks vs. benefits. Countless false starts and heavy expenses can be avoided by visiting the local public or college libraries for entrepreneurial texts. Using the services of your local Small Business Administration office is most valuable. Over 16,000,000 small businesses in the U.S. can’t be wrong. A study of your future via the entrepreneurial route may surprise you!

Hamlett, James G. STC Proceedings (1996). Careers>Management

Estimating Resources in Technical Writing

Project management principles that can easily be applied to working as a documentation manager.

Prabhakar, Rahul. Blogspot (2006). Careers>Management>Project Management>Technical Writing

Evaluating and Managing Surveys

While surveys aren't the only research tool available to HR managers, they are the most useful one when 'hard' numbers are needed on how many people see things a certain way and when it's important to track differences among subgroups or improvement over time.

Sinickas, Angela D. Sinickas Communications (2004). Careers>Management>Assessment>Surveys

Evolution-Revolution: Toward a Strategic Perception of Technical Communication    

Although we tell ourselves that technical communication is important to the bottom line of organizations and all of the business literature reinforces our convictions that information is strategic to business success, few of us feel 'strategic' to the organizations we work for.

Carliner, Saul. Technical Communication Online (1996). Careers>Management

Excuses, Excuses, Excuses: A Manager’s Guide  

Sometimes it seems your employees spend more time thinking of excuses than actually working. In this workshop, you’ll learn how to respond to common excuses and how to avoid them in the first place.

Stevens, Dawn M. STC Proceedings (1999). Careers>Management

FACE Considerations in Upward Influencing in an Indian Workplace  

This study is a first attempt at using Speech Act Theory (SAT), as a way to analyze and explain how upward influence (UI) strategies are performed. Based on SAT and considerations of face, as explained by Brown and Levinson (1987), this study tries to explain UI strategies used by members within an Indian workplace. We carefully selected six examples of UI to demonstrate how SAT can be useful in analyzing UI strategies. We found that even the slightest change in the anticipated degree of willingness or receptivity of the receiver necessitates a change in the strategy to be adopted. Violations of sincerity conditions and/ or inappropriate threats to face create infelicitous conditions and may lead to failed attempts at UI.

Kaul, Asha and Charlotte D. Brammer. Association for Business Communication (2005). Careers>Management>International>India

Finding the Right Technical Writer

A no-nonsense approach to finding a great tech writer, even when you don't know what to look for.

Springsteen, JoAnna. CIO Magazine (2008). Careers>Management>Interviewing>Technical Writing

Five Questions to Ask Yourself While Creating a New Documentation Department

Being asked to take the reins of a brand new documentation department is a challenge that many professional technical writers relish, even though the training and development activities they participated in may never have prepared them for such a rewarding challenge. This article looks at forming a new documentation department and determining what's needed, when it's needed and what resources are available to help the new department carry out its mission.

Butow, Eric. Writing Assistance (2006). Careers>Management>Documentation>Technical Writing

Five Secrets to Successful Interviewing and Hiring

Frequently, technical communicators who have been promoted into management find themselves facing the need to interview candidates for open positions. While successful interviewing is key to finding the right match for open positions in the department, all too often interviewing skills are not a part of any management training programs that the interviewer may have completed - if management training was ever part of the technical communicator's career development program at all. This article unveils the secrets to successful interviewing and hiring.

O'Keefe, Karen. Writing Assistance (2006). Careers>Interviewing>Management

Five Things to Do While Offline

You still (should) have all your receipts, invoices, and other financial documentation at hand. Why not go through everything, to see if you have to make changes to your budget or financial setup?

Contract Worker (2008). Careers>Management>Financial

Focus Research on Your Most Valuable "Capital"

The entire concept of human "capital" seems to have arisen during the last several years of booming economy and scarce availability of skilled employees. When any resource is scarce, it's valuable. Now with the highest rates of layoffs being announced in the U.S. since 1991, let's hope the mindset of management is not on the order of getting the most out of the human "liabilities" they're forced to retain.

Sinickas, Angela D. Sinickas Communications (2001). Careers>Management>Assessment

From Independent Consultant to Business Manager  

Moving from being an independent contractor to being a business owner is a big step. It involves not only practical concerns, such as accounting, legal, and administrative ones, but also re-evaluations in goals and outlooks. Sometimes we need to work through barriers, or blocks, to achieving success as a business owner.

Fay, Brenda. STC Proceedings (1996). Careers>Management>Consulting

From Independent Consultant to Employer  

Making the leap from independent consultant to employer is a complex process. When you become an employer you are no longer dealing with the same tasks that are familiar to you. When we decided to combine our efforts to start a training and documentation consulting company, we overcame difficulties, but made mistakes along the way. If you have been pondering the idea of starting a business, we hope that our experience can better prepare you for becoming a successful employer.

Dianetti, Angela and Jill McCauslin. STC Proceedings (2004). Careers>Management>Consulting

From Manager to Individual Contributor — Would You Rather be a Worker Bee?  

Becoming an individual contributor again after being a manager can be one of the most important decisions of your career. I made the decision over two years ago, and it was right for me. Is it right for you?

Boutin, Carmie. STC Proceedings (1996). Careers>Management

From Sentence to Bullet: How to Style a One-Page Résumé for Traction  

The one-page MBA résumé has become, in graduate management education, the self-representational document of choice. Sentences are out, bullets are in, details remain. The key is how to detail the bullet to describe, define, and deliver, in non-narrative form, professional achievements and accomplishments. In this paper, I examine samples of raw quasi-narrative descriptions and suggest restyled improvements for single-line bullets that more clearly, precisely, and effectively represent how authors describe their achievements. The raw data come from a data set of some 400 résumés submitted as a task in a studio-based broadcast course on business communication. The authors are mid-level managers in Latin America enrolled in a global MBA program. The paper examines the content and form of the objective, summary, and professional experience sections of the résumé and provides a set of tips for written language use in the résumé.

Staczek, John J. Association for Business Communication (2005). Careers>Resumes>Management>Business Communication

Fundamentals of Leadership: Communicating a Vision

Great leaders are not always born that way. Unfortunately, many management training programs don't sufficiently emphasize leadership development, but instead focus on fundamentals and the day-to-day tasks that confront managers within the organization. This article takes a look at how having vision and then communicating it is the foundation of leadership and contributes to the makeup of a truly great leader.

Harris, Kerri. Writing Assistance (2006). Careers>Management>Collaboration>Business Communication

Getting Real Results from Employee Engagement

I remember the day I turned on the car radio and found out that my company was merging with a competitor. Over the coming weeks, every employee made mental and emotional decisions on whether to stay engaged with their work and the company, or to just to show up and collect a paycheck.

Schmidt, Jeff. Communication World Bulletin (2005). Careers>Management>Public Relations>Workplace

Getting This "Global Thing" Right…

CEOs overwhelmingly believe that revenue growth is their number one priority: four out of five CEOs (83%) now believe that revenue growth is the most important path to boosting financial performance over the next three years. And what do they see as the two key drivers for this growth? New and differentiated products and services (nearly two-thirds) and new markets (55%). Responsiveness is the new key competence, i.e., CEOs acknowledge that they need the ability to recognize, analyze and respond more effectively to continuously changing market conditions and risks. Reinstituting customer responsive organizations is high on their growth agenda.

Ray, Rebecca. LISA (2004). Careers>Management>International

Guidelines for Mentoring Programs  

A successful mentoring relationship benefits those involved through increased confidence and a sense of direction. The relationship provides a risk-free learning environment in which to offer career guidance. Mentoring relationships can develop between individuals within an organization, between individuals in two different organizations, or between students and STC professionals.

STC. Careers>Mentoring>Management

Handling Tough Situations: The Short Method

We discussed how to buy time when you are assaulted by an unpleasant surprise. Our argument was that few people respond well to challenging situations unless they have some time to prepare. Therefore, whenever you can, you should divide the task into four distinct phases: (1) minimal immediate response, (2) preparation, (3) problem-solving discussion, and (4) follow-through. Unfortunately, some situations don't let you postpone a full discussion. For such cases, you need the 'short method,' which condenses phases 1-3.

Reimold, Cheryl. IEEE PCS (2000). Careers>Collaboration>Project Management

Happiness is A Good Fit: Personality Typing Tools for Career Management  

Members of our profession have tended to manage their careers by choosing either technical or management paths, then following them. Increasingly, technical communicators are factoring their personality types into the equation. This paper examines how standardized personality typing tools used by career planners are applied to help team members to find a good job fit, build a highfunctioning team, salvage interpersonal conflicts in the workplace, and make a suitable career change.

Bailie, Rahel Anne, Liz Babcock, Conni E. Evans and Emma C. Hamer. STC Proceedings (2002). Careers>Management>TC

Hello, My Name is Doug and I'm a Workaholic

It's important to be able to distinguish between workaholics and people who are simply wrapped up in their work--either because they enjoy it so much or because, temporarily, they have decided to make it a priority to win a promotion or attain the kind of lifestyle that they want. For a workaholic, work is the end, not the means. While it may bring wealth or power, what matters most is simply working. Just as alcoholics drink because they must--not always because they enjoy it--so a workaholic is addicted to working even when there is no rational reason for doing so.

Davis, Douglas W. STC (2007). Careers>Workplace>Project Management