Technical communicators strive to make users more successful. I am honored to serve STC, whose goal is to make technical communicators successful in a variety of ways, including advocacy, education, and recognition; and by providing publishing and leadership opportunities.

Director At Large Nicky Bleiel is leading the Recognitions area in 2009-2010. She is a Senior Member of the Society, and member of the Pittsburgh chapter and Usability and User Experience SIG.

Nicky is Lead Information Developer for Doc-To-Help at ComponentOne. She focuses on providing information in ways that improve the user experience, but is still efficient to produce. She also develops training courses and delivers training.

She has been a technical communicator for fifteen years; with experience designing and writing for software products in a variety of industries; including media sales, industrial automation, simulation, and pharmacy. A popular speaker, she has delivered presentations STC conferences and meetings, as well as WritersUA, tcworld, LavaCon, and DocTrain. Topics have included embedded help, tools and technologies, user assistance design, single sourcing, wikis, Web 2.0, and convergence technical communication. She has been published in STC's Intercom and Tieline, conference proceedings, and on the Web.

Nicky is a past president of the Pittsburgh chapter. She has been an STC Pittsburgh Technical Publications judge as well as an International Student Technical Communication Competition judge. Her Society honors include an Award of Merit for online communication.

Nicky earned a B.A. in Journalism from the Pennsylvania State University, where she was a member of Kappa Tau Alpha and the University Scholars Program.