Case studies: Technical author: Stephen

Stephen's academic years included a degree in zoology, some postgraduate research, and a teaching certificate. Working life really began in a post as a logistics manager in a manufacturing company. When the company's future began to look bleak, he was forced to reconsider his options and decided on a significant career change.

The UK government was offering grants for students attending a new MSc course, in 'technical communication and human-computer interface', at South Bank Polytechnic (now South Bank University). This course had two broad themes: it taught 'technical communication' and it gave a good grounding in IT, particularly programming.

I would suggest that many technical authors spend only 10%, say, of their time writing new material. The rest of the time is spent on other activities, typically involving information collection, publication design, reviewing and testing draft content, and general administrative tasks.

My MSc course certainly began with a study of writing. We went back to the basics of grammar, terminology and style. We learnt how and why the style and content of technical publications needs to differ from the publications typical of creative writing or conventional journalism.

My first authoring job took me to France and the start of a decade living and working in mainland Europe and the USA. In that first job, I really learnt how to work collaboratively with other authors and how to work with a software development team. Cultivating a good working relationship with developers or engineers is so often the key to success for an author.

After starting as a permanent employee, I subsequently worked as a freelancer in a range of organisations, from start-ups to blue-chip multinationals. In recent years, I've worked as the head of technical communication at 3di Information Solutions Ltd, a UK company that offers documentation, translation and localisation services.

If you don't have a formal qualification in technical authoring, finding your first position can be difficult. A prospective employer is likely to want to see proof that you have some real talent in writing and that you already have a reasonable level of skill in using software to produce and format text and graphics. So it's useful if you have examples of any reports, guides or other documents you've produced.

The best way to understand the work involved in technical authoring is to join a professional society. For technical authors in the UK, the key organisation is the Institute of Scientific and Technical Communicators (ISTC) . The ISTC organises an annual conference, publishes regular magazines and newsletters, has a web discussion group, and organises informal local meetings of members. This kind of community interaction is important because many technical authors, whether permanently employed or working as freelancers, find themselves working as the sole author in their organisation.

I continue to find technical communication interesting. It's such a wide field that it's impossible to feel that you've mastered every aspect, and there are always new developments that oblige you to reconsider what you've learnt in the past. The downside of the business remains remarkably constant - the work of technical authors has a low profile and is often overlooked. As a technical author, you'll never become famous or rich, so you'll have to settle for more intellectual forms of satisfaction. But if you can face a life without excessive wealth and if you feel you have good communication skills, technical authoring might well be a career worth investigating.