A Week in the Life of a Technical Writer

Crystal

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Wednesday

Review My Documentation

Today, my manager, Robin, reviews my pane wallpaper documentation. We discuss the suggestions from the context experts and talk about how to resolve them. For example, one of my content experts suggests I add screenshot of the pane wallpaper dialog box, and Robin suggests I add a table that outlines the differences in pane wallpaper functionality based on what operating system a user has installed. After our meeting, I take the screenshot and create the table. I then send the document back to the engineer for another review.

Attend the Recruiting Brown Bag Presentation

Because technical writers at NI work in different groups and document different products, it is always nice to get together as a group and share our ideas. One way we do that is by having brown bag presentations during lunch about once a month. At the brown bag, one writer or a group of writers presents to the attendees. Some of the brown bag topics explain internal help tools that writers create, while other topics discuss emerging trends in technical communications. Other brown bag topics highlight the hobbies of different technical writers. At these brown bag presentations, technical writers teach their peers about nature, jewelry making, and even home brewing. Today I'm going to my first brown bag presentation. Neerja and Robin are presenting about recruiting, which is something I'm interested in.

Meet Carrie

Meet Chris

Meet Robin

Meet Erik