Society for Technical Communication—Israel Chapter

What does it take to be a technical communicator? I am asked this question frequently-both by frustrated tech pubs managers, wondering why it is so hard to identify new talent, and by neophytes looking to break into the field.

Over the years, I have attempted to identify some recognizable characteristics. Thus, were we to play Dr. Frankenstein and create our TC from a grab-bag of traits and skills, our Ideal TC Candidate would have:

• excellent communication skills (both written and verbal),
• a strong grasp of English grammar, syntax, and punctuation,
• a good technical background (or at least an aptitude for technology),
• the ability to learn quickly,
• good logic and analytical skills,
• an attention to detail,
• a sharp eye for layout,
• the ability to meet the all-crucial deadline, 
• a grasp of theory and application, and (naturally),
• a solid, working knowledge of all necessary software tools.

If our ideal TC possesses these characteristics, it doesn't take a great leap of reasoning to see that someone lacking all (or even most) of these characteristics hasn't got the proverbial snowball's chance in....

Yabbut. (For those of you not familiar with the slurred speech patterns of the North American adolescent, yabbut traces its etymology to yes, but.)

Yabbut... In truth, my list of desirable traits works well on paper, but it fails to explain why the most unlikely people sometimes succeed whereas more obvious candidates fail. In other words, the human factor is what reduces logical equations to nonsense and tech pubs managers to tears. 

We once had a dog, Zen, who was not the brightest pup in the litter. Let's be blunt-he was as dumb as a rock. This was a dog who would get trapped in corners because he couldn't remember how to turn around. A well-meaning, sweet-tempered and affectionate fellow, but hopelessly, painfully, embarrassingly stupid. At the age of three, Zen was diagnosed with a severe, degenerative disease. The vet estimated that Zen would last the year-18 months tops. Almost nine years later, after a happy, busy life full of embarrassing episodes of unimaginable stupidity, Zen finally passed away, defying logic, common sense, and medical science. Had he known about gravity, he might have been stupid enough to mess that up, as well.

Those of you who have managed tech pubs departments may have had the TC equivalent of Zen. Perhaps Zen was a writer you inherited or mistakenly hired. Zen couldn't write his way out of a wet paper bag, never mastered the product, and repeatedly inserted into your documents countless mistakes in layout, organization, and consistency. Eventually, realizing that you couldn't train Zen to think, you let him go-only to discover that, rather than slinking off to a shameful retirement, he is still happily working in the field, cranking out horribly inept documentation for someone else. 

The opposite situation is equally inexplicable; namely, why do some bright, seemingly capable candidates fail to survive the rigorous demands of our field? 

The person who can successfully explain these phenomena, and can further go on to identify TC-aptitude characteristics, will earn the gratitude of tech pubs managers and trainers everywhere. Maybe the folks working on the human genome project can locate the TC Gene, leading companies to start requesting blood tests (or worse, breeding their own).

Until then, I'll take my chances with my list.