STC CWC Member Forum

April 2 CIC Coffee Meeting

2013-05-06T16:43:16Z

Lora, a BCIT student, joined myself, Jake, Janice, Autumn, and Jacqui at Blenz Coffee in Metrotown Mall at 7 p.m., Tuesday, April 2. Welcome Lora.

We talked about networking, volunteer postings, and resumes. It seems there are some companies that don’t reply or acknowledge when they receive a resume. They just seem to be collecting resumes. Not very thoughtful of them!

Janice has been busy with a quite a few interviews and Autumn has been busy networking. Jake talked about his experience with localization.

Jacqui told us about her paid blogging experience. The discussion on paid blogging brought up the question “How much should a writer charge for blogging?”

We might have an answer to this question and discuss some other issues at the next meeting – Tuesday, May 7, 7 p.m. at Blenz, Metrotown. Hope to see everyone there.

March 5 Contractors Meeting

2013-03-26T21:18:28Z

Thanks to Barry, Autumn, Janice, Mellissa, & Jacob for joining me at that coffee place that I can never remember the name of.

Janice told us about her interview at a local organization. This interview was the second for this job. Her first was by telephone and the second was in person. Hope she makes it to the third. We’ll have to wait for the next meeting to find out more.

Autumn told us about her informal interview which was more like an informational interview. Networking, networking!

We discussed other issues such as:
• the differences between a contractor and an employee; and the advantages and disadvantages for each
• designing your resume for the job - Mellissa read an interesting article on doing resumes as an infographic. Autumn heard of inserting logos of companys the employee worked for in the resume.
• volunteering - the unrealistic qualifications demanded for a volunteer for some postings, advantages of working as a volunteer
• knowing programming for some writing jobs – what programming some writers have and how they obtained it. It appears there are a few ex programmers around who turned writers.

Mellissa gave us an update on the upcoming and exciting program nights.

Discuss Trendspotting: The comic as a technical communication tool

2008-12-07T17:54:27Z

Use this thread to discuss the article Trendspotting: The comic as a technical communication tool.

Technical writing survey: what should the profession be called?

2009-09-21T19:22:20Z

What do you call yourself? I’ve heard and seen a bunch of job titles, including:

*Technical writer
*Technical communicator
*Information architect
*Content developer
*Content strategist
*Instructional designer

Abelard Consulting, a technical writing consultancy in Australia, is running a survey to find out what we call ourselves. Participate here: http://www.abelard.com.au/survey.html. The survey closes on October 15, 2009.

And, of course, feel free to pipe in on this lovely forum.

Web Content Development

2013-03-12T13:39:40Z

I want this form to be for technical and creative writers interested and/or working in the world of web content development (aka. writing for the web). Introduce yoursleves, your interests, topics of discussion, as well as dialogue on issues like job opportunties, networking, pricing, etc. Web content in this case can be anything from podcasts to blogs to producing an “about us” writeup for a local dog bakery website!

Translation, Localization, and Internationalization

2013-03-12T13:33:29Z

I want this thread to be for technical writers interested in cross-cultural communication through translation, localization, internationalization, and writing for international audiences. It’s a niche market and skill set that is becoming evermore increasingly important to technical communication, and I want more dialogue on the subject, regardless of whether you work in/with Japanese, New Zealand English, Uyghur, or Klingon. If any of the above sounds like its up your alley, feel free to introduce yourselves, job opportunities, general website links, conversation topics, etc.

February 5 Contractors Meeting

2013-02-17T17:49:34Z

Autumn, Melissa, Barry, Moise and Jackie joined myself for the February meeting at Metrotown.

We talked about different aspects of job hunting. This included the ever popular topic of employment agencies, leaving some of our portfolio behind after the interview (not recommended), keeping up with the different methods of job hunting, and networking on LinkedIn.

Some popular sites to look for jobs are Elance.com, Craig’s List, and Vancouverwriting.com.

We also discussed the unfortunate problem of a personality conflict with a supervisor.

Come join us next time, March 5 (7 pm) at Blenz Coffee, Metrotown.

Linda

Write the Docs conference, Portland, April 8 and 9, $55 earlybird price

2013-02-08T12:52:54Z

I’m going! This will have a significant open-source component to it. The speakers are different than the typical ones we are used to hearing.

http://conf.writethedocs.org

January 8, 2013 CIC Meeting

2013-01-15T17:16:12Z

We welcomed 2 newcomers at our Jan. 8 meeting. Janice Jones & John Deeley joined Autumn and myself at Blenz Coffee in Metrotown. We found lots to talk about. Some topics were:
• Marketing oneself for a marketing and/or communications position
• Volunteering
• Writing programs at institutions like BCIT and Douglas
• Writing resumes - chronological and functional
• Requirements for grant and proposal writers
• Looking for work
• Protecting your personal data and files with good passwords
• Signing up for STC membership
Also, Autumn told us about the mentorship program at the YWCA she is involved in.
The next meeting is Tuesday, February 5, 2013. Come and join us.

Dec 4 CIC meeting

2013-01-07T15:43:16Z

We had a nice and comfortable turnout for our Dec 4 meeting attended by Autumn, Jake, Susan, Mellissa and Linda.

For those looking for internships, monitor Freshgigs.ca as they sometimes advertise for internships. Fortis periodically advertises for a tech writer so that is a company to monitor.

Jake is trying to locate proposal writers to present in a future program.

I looked for suggestions on possible courses or new software to learn to add to my resume. Some suggestions were InDesign, Captivate, Framemaker, Flare, Adobe’s Technical Communication Suite. If anyone can suggest others, please let us know including where I can get various training. Someone suggested checking out Lynda.com.

See everyone January 8.