Want to be a Writer BUT Not Poor?
Consider Technical Writing
I’ve been a writer since the second I was gifted my first vibrantly pink, leopard-print Lisa Frank diary — complete with a lock & key. I chronicled the fascinating day-to-day of a pre-teen in the 90’s, and that’s when I knew that I wanted to be a writer when I grew up.
For me, that meant being a journalist, I guess. In college, I enrolled in multimedia journalism but was disappointed to realize the program still heavily focused on broadcast: how to speak, how to smile, how to dress. Not a whole lot of writing, or the kind of writing I wanted to do anyway…
I was lucky to have an older cousin who had a successful career as a reporter for a major news outlet. I leaned on her for career advice and the life she outlined for me was not one I wanted. Essentially, I’d work insane hours at insane times of day, all for little to no pay.
I was already a struggling full-time student balancing multiple low-income jobs just to pay rent. Why in the world would I continue an education path down a road to more of the same?
Yet I knew I still wanted to be a writer, but I wanted financial stability and a good life. Was it possible?
That’s when I discovered technical writing.
What the hell is technical writing, you may ask — a question I hear often.
What is a Technical Writer
Tech writers are writers all the same, but the content we write is dense with technical data, processes, and industry specific jargon. Technical writers work with engineers, scientists, software developers, medical professionals, and a zillion other professions to communicate their smarty pants information.
Engineers, generally speaking, have extremely detail and process-oriented minds. What they don’t have, generally speaking, are great communication skills. Especially when it comes to explaining a complex matter to a non-engineer person, AKA a normie.
Enter the technical writer. We are communication experts; we know how to speak to the dumb-dumb audience of normies because we are normies. But, we’ve also learned how to understand the technical mumbo jumbo that comes from these brainiacs.
0 Comments