Technical writing as a career

I'm also considering editing/sub-editing...I've worked as an editor of a paper before, but it was a weekly for a pop. 2,000 county. But I know AP style by heart, pagination, etc. How does one even get into that? The only problem is I'm not that crazy about journalism anymore.

Then we got bought-out by a crappy, badly-run, wealthier company that ran the business into the ground in short order and ruined it. Sic transit gloria mundi.

As for tech writing as a career, whenever I attended professional conferences the two main complaints were 1) that the Subject Matter Experts (the Smees) the writers depended on for technical information were grumpy, inarticulate louts who couldn't explain their way out of a paper bag and 2) the deadlines were totally unrealistic. Neither of these applied to my company, so I felt truly blessed.

The worst thing about being a tech writer in my experience was that when people asked me what I did, there was never a good answer, since what I did was totally opaque to ordinary people. Next worst was that after ten years I was bored to tears by it all and welcomed a good reason to hop out of it.

Lots and lots of people in biomed writing come from liberal arts/writing backgrounds and got into biomed because the pay IS good. Also, lots and lots of these people work as freelancers, which can be either good or bad depending on your need for stability, benefits, etc.

When I'm in a hiring situation I don't give a whit about what styles people are familiar with--only that they can write. The rest (house style, subject matter, etc.) can be mastered pretty quickly if you're bright!

don't become a sub, then. please.

I did some of this. The contract work was great because it's all about creating documentation where there isn't any, so it's rather like project management. I could finish a job in a finite period of time and move on, having felt that I'd achieved something.

Being full-time/permanent is considerably more mind-numbing because most of the time you're just updating stuff.

You can get this kerrazy idea in your head (as I did) that it will lubricate you for the kind of writing you want to do in your spare time. It does, undoubtably, but it also drains your will to write a bit, particularly in weeks when the research is complete and you're just chucking words into documents. Fewer negatives than positives, though.

Have you revived this for a reason, Adam? ;P

(yes, I am looking at a sideways move from IT helpdesk/admin into tech writing. I figure a combination of a Dip Arts in writing and 10 years in IT should give me a leg up).

Actually I was looking for something completely different and stumbled upon this.

We've talked about your situation; you won't have any trouble at all. It's how you frame your previous work that counts.

We've talked about your situation

Eeek! That wasn't meant to look like 'WE'VE DONE YOU SO CHUT UP' kind of thing.

Hahaha I know! Its ok ;)

Ha, I went to school for this. I've slid into a pretty sweet job in scientific publishing, but now the idea of working in most "real" tech comm jobs makes me shudder.

"Real" as in "corporate". Most people from my degree program went to work for like IBM writing online documentation for their servers and shit. As far as I know a good portion of those people have been laid off. I would think if you want to make a career of it, you've almost got to consider working for yourself, more or less.

Yeah, my best jobs were contracts.