What is a technical writer, anyway?

I work for Giant Global Consulting Firm, which isn’t really relevant, as I stay cocooned in my little group’s Ivory Tower. I have been in the same group for 10 years. We create the reference materials that everyone in company uses (or should use). My responsibilities have ranged from just plain editing text to make it clearer; running teams of people editing; writing content and publishing it with xmlspy, FrontPage, wiki, etc.; and many other random tasks that needed doing.

Best part: Keeping up to date with new technologies.

Worst part: The corporate lingo, jargon, and general slaughter of the language. “Updation” is still my favorite example. Let’s take a noun and make it into a … noun! Go, team! However, standards have improved some. We spent a few years changing “client” to “sponsoring organization” and “user” to “business representative” – glad that era passed.

Corporate bingo and Dilbert were funnier when they weren’t so damn true.