In This Issue

Articles

• New Year, New e-News Design
• Where is Our Chapter Going? President’s Update by Debbie Shapiro
• Report on Leadership Day by Leah Guren
• 2007 Convention Update
• STC Membership: What's In It for You? by Debbie Shapiro
• STC Israel Forums: New Features For A User-Friendly Experience by Debbie Shapiro

Announcements

• STC Israel Surveys Our Community
• 2006 Competition Gets Record Number of Entries
• Next AC Meeting: 29 October 2006
• Upcoming Events: Usability, Style Guides, Authorit, And More
• New Single-Sourcing Forum Moderated by Gershon Joseph

New Year, New e-News Design

At the last Administrative Council (AC) meeting, we discussed the need for better dissemination of information to our members and colleagues. To that end, we have decided to change my newsletter to members into an e-News format that gives you the latest updates on our activities and what is going on behind the scenes of the chapter, as well as keeping you up-to-date with STC in general.

This means that you will be receiving a much longer, HTML-format email from us. We hope that you will enjoy this new way of communicating our activities and news to you.

Do you have comments or suggestions? Please let us know.

Where is Our Chapter Going?

When I began my term of office, one of the first things the AC did was to write a Vision and Mission for our chapter.

STC Israel Vision
To make technical communication a respected profession in all business sectors of Israel

STC Israel Mission
Promoting professionalism in technical communication in Israel

A vision and mission help us to set the course for all of our goals. Our vision helps us look to the future. Our mission provides direction in getting there. The vision and mission are like the rudder of a ship. As the rudder guides the ship, so our vision and mission help the AC in guiding the ship of STC Israel.

Just before the New Year, many of our decisions and activities were challenged on a national Internet forum. As the AC discussed these issues, we realized that we need to better convey the reasoning behind our decisions to you. We have been steering the rudder, but have not succeeded in conveying to you—our passengers—the direction in which we are headed.

Clearly, we all want our profession to be respected within all business sectors in Israel. Accomplishment of this goal would result in a strong support system for us within our places of employment, in addition to more jobs openings for our unique skills.

The question remains: how do we get there? Saying that our mission is to promote technical communication in Israel is a strong statement, only if one understands what professionalism is and how it is viewed in our culture.

Recently, my company invited a cultural conflict expert to speak to our employees.'  The focus of the talk was the differences between Israeli and Western business cultures. One of the major differences presented by the speaker was the concept of professionalism. In the West, professionalism is strongly related to education and experience. However, Israelis view professionalism as "getting the job done" and fame. Thus, an experienced, educated, and unknown technical communicator could be passed over, with the job going to a less experienced, poorly educated, but well-known job applicant. (Keep in mind that well-known means famous in the eyes of the person doing the hiring, not necessarily the professional community.)

As I thought about these issues, I wondered: how do we sell ourselves in a way that communicates to the Israeli business world? In other words, how do we hook into the fame element of Israeli professionalism and become known?

The good news is that STC Israel is in an excellent position to make this a reality. First, we have many members who are known throughout the country, and even internationally. Second, technical communicators in Israel enjoy a higher status than our colleagues in many countries, including the US (at least we've all heard the stories). Third, STC Israel is a chapter in a larger well-respected international organization. This gives us more clout, credibility, and resources. Our goal is to get this information out to the business community.

As we look toward our chapter's 40^th year, the AC has decided to focus on the following initiatives. We believe that these initiatives will benefit you by meeting the definition of professionalism from both the Western and Israeli points of view.

• Hiring a public relations professional to help us reach different business sectors

  We are currently looking for a public relations professional to help us promote our services in the broader Israeli community. We want to reach technical communicators in other sectors, such as those who are not mother-tongue English speakers, or those working in related fields such as instructional design, translation, or graphic design. Now is the time to do this as we celebrate our 40^th birthday as a registered non-profit organization in Israel, the oldest STC chapter outside of North America. In combination with the 2007 convention, the publicity gained will be a positive reflection on all technical communicators in Israel, especially our members.

• Fostering strong relationships with our colleagues overseas

  Our relationship and involvement with chapters and colleagues outside of Israel bring prestige to our chapter and our members.

  • Our chapter was recently asked to participate in a focus group on the state of technical communication in Israel. The information gained from that group will be used by STC to help meet the needs of members at a global level.
  • Our treasurer, Meir Fishburn, has been asked to provide his thoughts as to how business and finance should be handled in STC.
  • Past President Paul Bernstein has been asked to meet with the STC Board of Directors to discuss global issues and the global direction of STC.
  • As a result of increased sensitivity to non-North American members, due, in part, to our activity, STC has announced that dues will be reduced for STC members residing in Israel.
     

  In other words, STC Israel is having an impact on how technical communication will be related to in the future. But this did not happen by accident. Several factors have contributed to the increased prestige directed towards our chapter, and to our members. These include:

  • Past communication from chapter leaders over the years to STC leadership.
  • Leah Guren's attendance at Leadership Day last spring and her face-to-face discussion with members of STC leadership.
  • My own discussions and communication with STC leadership.
  • Our support of the Region 2 Conference via a refundable loan, together with Paul Bernstein's success in attracting sponsors to the Region 2 conference in London this month.
     

  The message that has been received and is now bearing fruit is: "Gee, those people in STC Israel are talented and have a lot to give. Let's see what we can do to get them more involved and to learn from them."

  In Israeli culture, this translates as professional fame: Brag about the accomplishments of your chapter, and that you are a member of STC, and you will indeed impress your Israeli colleagues.

• Conducting a national survey on the status of technical communication

  By the end of November, you will receive an invitation to participate in a detailed survey that will look at technical communication in Israel. What are we doing? Who are we? What are our salaries and benefits? This will be the first comprehensive survey that attempts to look at all aspects of technical communication in Israel. Getting a more accurate picture of our members and local colleagues will allow us to better support your needs.

• 2007 STC Israel Convention: The Proactive Technical Communicator

  The title of our convention reflects the direction we need to take as professionals in our field. To that end, we will be importing at least one, and possibly two, outstanding experts in their field. This gives you a strong justification for your employer to pay for your attendance at the convention: learning from internationally famous professionals so that you can get your job done better (the job-well-done and fame factors again).

This has been one of my longer articles, but I hope that by now you see how excited your AC is about the future of STC Israel. I hope that this has given you a better understanding of the direction in which we are headed.

I am excited about what lays ahead for the profession and for STC members in Israel, and wish each of you a happy and healthy New Year.

Debbie Shapiro
President, STC Israel

Report on Leadership Day

On 6 May 2006, I attended Leadership Day at the STC conference in Las Vegas, Nevada.'  As in the past, the day started with announcements and presentations for all attending leaders, and then moved into small workshops on a number of different themes.

I consider the following items the most important information for us:

• Leadership Community Resource (LCR)

  The LCR is a new initiative that should allow community problems to be addressed more quickly and effectively. It creates a triage system to determine the severity of a problem and assign it to the correct individual or group. It also uses more skilled, senior members as mentors and parts of the problem-solving system, rather than relying strictly on STC leadership or administrative staff.

• New Executive Director

  The STC's long search for a new executive director was finally successful. We were introduced to Susan Allen Burton, who was able to attend for the day. She is a professional organization executive with a great track record. I had a chance to talk to her about some of our issues and concerns, particularly problems with the new tiered payment policy, our lack of support at the Society level for things like TC promotion in Israel, etc. She seems to be a very bright and competent person, so I think we can look forward to good professional management.

• New STC Strategy Map

  If you haven't seen it yet, it is a segmented wheel marking out the six key focuses of STC. You can find details of this and the LCR on the STC website.

  Here's a quick preview of the six key focuses:

• Telling our powerful story
• Implementing a strategic business model
• Growing relationships and choosing partners
• Making money
• Growing and supporting our leaders
•   Improving practice through research and education
• Session on Running Conferences

This session was particularly useful. I picked up some great handouts, particularly the timeline for planning, and have passed them on to Zev and the convention committee.

Leah Guren
Secretary, STC Israel

2007 Convention Update

First, we would like to thank Zev Frutkoff and his team of volunteers for their hard work for the 2007 convention. Plans are developing and we expect the Call for Proposals to go out in early November. What can we tell you now?

• We are currently negotiating for a venue. We are looking at 4 June 2007 at the Daniel Hotel, Hertzlia.
• NEWSFLASH: Patrick Hoffman, a pioneer in wordless documentation and an expert on globalization and localization, has agreed to be our opening keynote speaker.
• Paul Bernstein and I will be discussing sponsorship possibilities for our convention with sponsors of the Region 2 conference while we are in London. Since Paul has already gained their respect and trust through their sponsorship of the Region 2 conference, the likelihood of these sponsors helping us with our convention is quite good.

We will be updating the website shortly with more convention information. In the meantime, if you would like to help (and there is still a lot to do), please contact Zev Frutkoff.

STC Membership: What's In It for You?

I don't know how many times in the past month I've heard the following comments: 'Membership in STC Israel is so expensive. It's just not worth it to me.' 'What do I get for my money?' 'STC Israel is doing nothing; this is a waste of money!'

To be truthful, I'm really getting sick of hearing these statements. Maybe it just comes down to a matter of simple faith. I believe that if people are committed to their profession, they owe it to themselves to be members of their professional organization, if such an organization exists. I would choose to be a member of STC even if there were no events on a regular basis, no free posting of my resume on the chapter website, no upcoming convention, and no local colleagues with whom to network and discuss issues of common interest. If all I received were the publications and a membership card, I would belong. But I believe in the cause. I believe in doing whatever I can to learn more and do a better job—even if no one at work ever knows or notices.

So I have a problem. Since I believe this so strongly, how can I convince you that membership in STC Israel is worthwhile? What is it that will make the difference for you? Consider these:

• the prestige of being part of an international organization
• free attendance at all regular events
• free posting of your resume on our website
• special discounts (a minimum of 10%) for courses and seminars offered only to members of STC Israel
• a certificate for your employees for professional education based on events you attended
• markedly reduced entry fee to the 2007 convention
• being the first to learn the results of our upcoming 2007 technical communication survey
• the chance to develop and stretch professionally by volunteering to create a newsletter, work on the website, or develop leadership skills by participating on a committee
• reduced membership fees for Israeli residents
• the increased prestige received at work when colleagues find out you are a member of a professional organization

I guess I'm not going to try to convince you to join. You either believe it is important or you don't. However, if you would like to try to convince your boss to pay your dues, we've posted an article on the website that we hope will help you.

In the meantime, it's that time of year: time to renew your dues if you are already a membe, and time to join if you aren't.

STC Israel Forums: New Features for a User-Friendly Experience

At the risk of being less than politically correct, let me tell you that I've had many conversations with people who tell me that they are not subscribed to Techshoret, or that they are but don't read their emails from Techshoret.

As I thought about this, I wondered why our members and others do not take better advantage of the forums if people are so dissatisfied with Techshoret. In fact, just a few days ago I responded to someone, 'If you are so dissatisfied with Techshoret, why aren't you using the forums? They are easy to use, easier to search, and have absolutely no advertising.'

A long discussion ensued. The gist was that many people want 'push mail' or just don't understand how to work with the forums, which differ from mailing lists in many ways. So we've done our research, enabled a digests feature (which is as close to 'push' as a forum allows), have some new forums and moderators, and will be filling you in on different features in this and future articles.

How do the forums differ from online tools such as Yahoo groups?

• Easy access to messages by topic and thread

  The forums are similar to Bulletin Boards, but with many additional features. Each forum provides an open discussion area for everything related to a particular topic (such as Single-sourcing, Word, STC Israel events, etc.). All you have to do is reply to the topic and the response is automatically stored with that discussion.

  You can choose to receive an email each time there is a reply to a particular topic, or receive a daily digest that summarizes whatever postings you are interested in, together with a quick link to the posting.

• Easy search engine that can search any or all forums
• User privileges open to all who register
  • Post attachments
  • Post new topics or reply to topics
  • Receive a daily or weekly digest of all new postings of interest to you
  • Private email for correspondence with other forum-registered members
  • Edit or delete your own posts
• User privileges open only to STC Israel members
  • Post your resume/CV. The forums are crawled by all major search engines. Thus, posting your resume/CV means that you are also likely to appear in the results of an Internet search.
  • View member/only forums. Certain forums are not open to the public. View and post topics on the STC Israel business forum. Latest minutes of business meetings, a copy of our by-laws and more are provided for the convenience of STC Israel members. (Members must advise us when they join, so that they can be given the appropriate permissions.)
• No unwanted advertising on the pages themselves or related emails
• No email harvesting. Your email is displayed only if you want it to be displayed. STC Israel does not give out, distribute, sell, or rent any email addresses on the forums or from our membership lists.
• Minimal moderation

  Only people who register can post on the forums. Since all applications are moderated, this limits the potential of a user joining the forums who might abuse the privileges.

  Since people are posting in topic-related areas, minimal moderation is required, and a topic can continue for as long as the people want. Moderators will not call an end to the discussion.

  Moderation basically consists of deleting off-topic or abusive postings. Only in the case of an extreme abuse of the forums are user privileges revoked.

So how do you get started? Visit the Forums home page and look around, or go straight to the registration page. Once your membership is approved you are ready to post.

If you want to be advised of new postings on the forums, be sure to select the digest options that you want. 

If you are a member of STC Israel, be sure to apply to join the STC Israel Usergroup, so that you can post your resume for free.

STC Israel Surveys our Community

In honor of our 40^th year as a chapter, we will be conducting an extensive survey of Israeli technical communicators. This survey will provide valuable information on the status of technical communication in Israel, who we are, where we are, the kind of work we do, and perhaps of greatest interest, how we are paid and the types of benefits received.

This survey will be completely anonymous. The data on personal information that you give (voluntary) will be stored separately from the actual survey data, assuring 100% anonymity.

Once the data has been collected and analyzed, we plan to have a special festive evening at the beginning of the year to present the results. Please note that only STC Israel members (and non-members who participated in the survey) will be invited to this event.

The data will be made available to the public at a later date. We also hope to see the data presented in one of STC's publications.

Stay tuned for more information.

2006 Competition Gets Record Number of Entries

This year's STC Israel Technical Communications Competition is now closed. We had a record response this year with 14 separate entries: eight in the Online Communications Competition and six in the Technical Publications Competition. The entries are now being processed for delivery to judges both in Israel and in North America. We expect to receive the results sometime in December 2006.

Thank you very much and good luck to all our entrants!

David Schor
Competitions Manager

Next AC Meeting: 29 October 2006

The next AC meeting is planned for Sunday, 29 October, at 17:30. Our new venue (Office-4-U in Tel Aviv) is proving to be quite convenient and we are happy to see more people joining us.

The final agenda will be sent out a week before the meeting. If you plan to attend, please be sure to let our VP, Menahem Rosen, know, so that we can reserve a large enough meeting room for all of us.

We look forward to seeing you there and welcome all of your comments, suggestions, and ideas.

• November: Celebration of International Usability Day
• November/December: Creating a Style Guide
• December and January: Working with AuthorIT by Miriam Lottner
  One of the sessions will be a premium event with attendance priority to STC Israel members first.
• February: Festive opening of our chapter's 40^th Birthday Celebration with the first presentation of data from our technical communication survey.

New Single-Sourcing Forum Moderated by Gershon Joseph

Gershon Joseph of Tech-Tav has been kind enough to volunteer to moderate a new single-sourcing forum. Single-sourcing is the hot topic. Do you have questions about XML? Heard about DITA but don't know how to find out more? Confused by terms like content management system?

These and all related topics can be discussed freely on the new Single-sourcing forum. So take and look and get your questions answered.