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Once you take an interest in technical communication
and documentation you'll quickly discover that's it's an "endless
country," really. There is so much to learn and track since both the
market and the technology changes constantly. But this does not mean
that you can learn things randomly and become a successful technical
communicator. Actually there's a better way that I call the "Learning
Pyramid" which requires you establish a wide base of learning first and
keep on building the upper layers on top of such a strong foundation.
Each layer of this pyramid supports the more specialized layer
established on top it. LAYER 1 -- THE BASE: Establish your
basic linguistic skills, appropriate for the language you are writing
with. For example, for English speakers and writers, it is important to
learn the basic difference between "Active Voice" and "Passive Voice,"
or to learn the different types of clauses and the difference it makes
to start your sentences with a dependent clause, etc. LAYER 2 -- INDUSTRY LANDSCAPE:
Next, you need to learn the landscape, so to speak. You need to learn
where technical communication stands with respect to other industries;
different types of business writing and documentation opportunities
that exists out there; various career paths as an author and manager;
various kinds of hi-tech and low-tech documents, etc. LAYER 3 -- TOOLS: Now
you need to learn how to use the tools of the trade like the Microsoft
Office Suite; FrameMaker; all kinds of help authoring software; graphic
editing software like Photoshop and Illustrator; HTML editors like
Dreamweaver; the almost endless variety of online resources, etc. LAYER 4 -- BUSINESS SKILLS:
The last and perhaps the most important layer of the "Learning Pyramid"
consists of the knowledge of business and marketing practices that you
need to learn to become a successful communicator. This layers requires
you to learn not only how to work as part of a team in a hi-tech
company (for example), but also how to market and negotiate your
services if you are working as a freelancer. Once you have all
the layers in place you'd still need to go back from time to time and
do some minor repairs and updates since everything in life needs
maintenance, including even our basic linguistic skills. But the more
you do it, the easier such maintenance work becomes. If you start
establishing your wide base today you'd be amazed the kind of
professional heights you can scale with your "Learning Pyramid"
tomorrow. It's your dependable ladder to success. If you are interested to read more about technical writing as a career and how it can help you earn a steady living, visit http://www.learntechnicalwriting.com
Join the thousands who are already helped and inspired by this
information provided by a Fortune 500 Senior Technical Writer. Visit
today and claim your free report "How Much Do Technical Writers Make?" Dr. Ugur Akinci is a Fortune 500 Sr. Technical Communicator http://www.technicalcommunicationcenter.com
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