The Thirty-Year Club

By Kevin Cuddihy

The true measure of any organization is its members, so to help celebrate STC’s 60th year I chatted with 11 of our longtime members. All 11 members have been with STC and in technical communication for 30 years or more, and their answers show how both the Society and the profession have changed over the years. Participating in the interviews were (with year joining STC in parentheses):

• Larry Kunz (1983)
• Ann L. Wiley (1983)
• Steven Jong (1982)
• Carolyn Rude (1981)
• Carol Barnum (1980)
• Christopher Juillet (1979)
• Linda Oestreich (1979)
• Nancy Hoffman (1978)
• Annette Reilly (1977)
• Ann Blankinship (1972)
• Thomas Milligan (1967)

“My STC Family”

STC’s Member-Get-a-Member campaign encourages members to invite friends and colleagues to join the Society; the marketing material claims that most people join simply because someone asked them. Our longtime members back this up, naming former bosses and coworkers as their initial entrée into the Society. These people often became mentors, introducing them to chapter members and encouraging them to attend the Summit or even present. Joked Oestreich, “My boss and my boss’s boss both belonged, and they pressured me into it.” And Kunz’s first introduction to STC was being invited to join a panel at the 1983 Summit. “After attending the conference and meeting fellow professionals from all over, I was hooked,” he stated.

Once they joined they kept coming back. To a person, they all discussed how important STC has been in their careers and in their personal lives. Said Wiley, “the friendships and volunteer opportunities made it impossible to think of leaving.” Hoffman referred to what she called “my STC family” in explaining why she renews her membership year after year. And “the people” was a common answer to that question as well. Juillet echoed Hoffman’s phrasing, calling STC “my extended family,” while Milligan credited the learning opportunities at monthly meetings and extolled the networking value, saying, “The networking helped me work 45 years with never missing a paycheck.” Blankinship rolled it all together: “STC has meant job referrals, professional development, and just plain fun!”

The generosity of other members was a common theme as well. Reilly recalled how the biggest names were often some of the most helpful. “I found the most renowned experts, like Lola Zook, Della Whittaker, Dex Nilsson, and Austin Brown were the most helpful and encouraging for newcomers.” That level of giving only inspires the recipient to give back when they have the opportunity. Milligan, for example, has regularly spoken with college students and younger STC members about “the real world,” and has helped some of the local colleges define courses and degrees for technical writing.

Memories

With such an emphasis on their fellow members, it’s no surprise that the fondest memories of most of the participants involved their colleagues. The personal connections—the friendships, the mentorships, the professional advice—highlight their time in STC. Rude spoke of her efforts mentoring, explaining, “I was faculty advisor for a student chapter of STC. I loved the way the organization gave students a chance to learn about the field, develop their professional and leadership skills, and meet and work with professionals.”

Barnum recalled a specific memory: “I remember the first time I met STC [Past] President David Armbruster. I felt really welcomed by a complete stranger when he grabbed me and gave me a big bear hug. It wasn’t until I got to know David better that I found out he did that for everyone!” And Wiley didn’t even want to try to narrow it down. “Naming just a few would leave too many people out,” she stated. “Sometimes this happened at a special event with a group, and sometimes in a chance exchange with just one person. There are a lot.”

And as proof that the memories never end, whether it’s your first year or your 30th, Jong pointed to two favorites. He named his best memories as “The first time I presented, in Boston in 1982; and thirty years later, receiving a President’s Award in Rosemont. The audiences were actually about the same size, but in Rosemont when they stood up, they were applauding!”

The Evolution of a Society

Over the years these longtime members saw a Society—and a profession—that evolved greatly. Reilly pointed to the biggest change as “STC has adapted to the Internet and virtual communities, allowing a worldwide membership to develop.” Barnum applauded the switch to a broader field, extolling “the expansion of technical writing to technical communication to user experience and so many other ways of relating to the umbrella of technical communication.” Wiley cautioned, however, that “the greatest strength is also the biggest challenge—addressing the entire, broad field of technical communication. The field has grown so broad that SIGs have evolved to address everything. I believe we can use the SIGs to meet the challenge.”

The increased emphasis on professional advancement was also a repeated theme. Oestreich lauded STC’s increase in education efforts. “I think the education department has really become valuable and is providing great opportunities for members,” she said. “The workshops, online seminars, certificates, certification, etc., all combine into a wealth of resources for those who choose to use them.” Hoffman agreed, highlighting “the amount and quality of educational opportunities we offer members.”

And Juillet pointed to certification as his choice for the biggest change for the better. “I’m gratified that our organization has, at long last, embarked on a program of making available certification credentials for those who practice in the field.” Blankinship recalled that Society members were “debating the merits of certification when I joined 40 years ago.” But now, she celebrated, “certification is finally in place.”

The Evolution of a Profession

In addition to the evolution of STC, these members discussed the evolution of the profession over the decades. From technical writing to technical communication, computers the size of a building to mobile devices that fit in the palm of your hand, they’ve seen it all.

First and foremost, as Reilly pointed out, is that “technical communicators are widely recognized as professionals, essential to market any kind of software or consumer system.” Milligan discussed a change from technical writers having “technical knowledge and limited authoring education, to … limited technical knowledge, but a BA/BS degree in writing.” And multiple participants mentioned the expansion of the field. Rude pointed out “how much bigger it has gotten in terms of types of work people do within the overarching umbrella of technical communication. I like the increasing comfort with usability that technical communicators embrace, and I love the strategic nature of new developments for technical communicators in content strategy, information architecture, digital media, and much more.”

Juillet concurred with Rude. “Today, many if not most technical writers handle their projects from start to finish, writing on keyboards using publishing tools, developing illustrations themselves using graphics design tools, then pushing off to a printer or, increasingly, directly off to PDF and ‘help file’ formats. Where I began was as a ‘writer.’ Where I ended was as a publisher and project manager.”

And Jong highlighted the increased speed of production. “When I started I had colleagues who still drafted with paper and pencil. We physically cut and pasted material. (Have you ever seen a roll of change bar tape?) If we wanted a line drawing, we had to submit a form to the art department and wait. From signoff to books on the shelf, the production cycle was thirteen weeks.” He continued, “We have since embraced computers as much as any other group of workers, and today I can produce a huge volume of textual and graphical material on my own, from start to posting on a website, in just a few days.”

Kunz put the timeline even quicker. When asked what from today’s world the “first-year-on-the-job you” would be most surprised by, he pointed to the fact that, “I can publish something, worldwide, in minutes—and then make updates to it, again, in minutes.”

“The More Things Change … ”

Even with all the changes in the profession, some pointed to consistencies and the feeling that sometimes, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” Hoffman recalled one specific instance. “I’ve seen constant swings between the concepts of generalization (the need to be trained in all areas) and specialization (the need to be an expert in a certain area to serve a specific need). People keep changing their minds about which is best.”

Others fondly recalled days of yore, discussing what they wished might come “back in style” in technical communication. While speed of work has increased, Jong wondered if it might be too fast. “We all have the tools to turn out comparatively huge volumes of material today, but product cycles have become so short that the ‘good/fast/cheap’ triangle looks like a javelin.” Oestreich expressed a similar sentiment. “Striving for quality rather than quantity is something that I think we’ve lost and that I’d like to see return.”

Rude reminisced about times where professionals worked together more. “I think academics and practitioners used to work more closely together and that we need to recover our connections for the field to be as strong as possible,” she said.

Not everyone looked back through rose-colored glasses. Asked what he missed from earlier in his career, Kunz bluntly said, “Nothing. I really can’t think of anything in tech comm that was better in ‘the good old days’ than it is today.” Barnum responded the same, simply stating, “I like where the profession is going.”

Final Words

As the profession evolves, STC evolves with it—to meet the needs of members and to meet the needs of the field. But the core of STC still remains its members. What can you learn from the experiences of these Society stalwarts? Blankinship perhaps said it best. “I advise members to remain members as the years pass and throughout the ups and downs of their careers. If you attend events in person, you make closer friends and network more effectively. Don’t just rely on electronic media to network with others. Take a leadership role in an STC chapter or other community. The experience you will gain can serve you the rest of your life.”

In the Year 2073

We asked our cadre of longtime members to predict what technical communication would look like in another 60 years. Here are some of their predictions (names withheld to protect the outlandish). Go to http://intercom.stc.org and make your own predictions!

“Evolution from a content creation role to a content curation role, as content flows from every part of the community; better understanding of the business value that tech comm can provide.”

“I don’t do well with predictions, but I might guess that the separate lines between various organizations, which are already blurring, will be gone. I like the current joint effort of UXPA and STC as one example of this merging or blurring. Nowadays, it’s hard to decide which conferences or training to take or which LinkedIn groups to join, as there are so many to choose from. Media for these is changing, too, so that we may see more virtual conferences or perhaps localized events.”

“It will be far less text, mostly video clips showing what to do. It will be context sensitive. ‘I see you are having trouble . . . can I show you the easiest way to accomplish that?’”

“Communication always will be necessary, technical as well as nontechnical. Its applications will take on different forms. It probably will not be called ‘technical communication’ and it might not be called ‘communication’ at all.”

“We won’t call it ‘technical communication’ because the term doesn’t quite capture the innovation and significance of the work.”

“I’ve learned better than to make these sorts of predictions. It seems trite to suggest that, ‘Well, the field will continue to grow and change,’ but it will. If I could offer one piece of advice to anyone entering this field, it would be, ‘Embrace change as if your career depends upon it—because it does.’”

“Looking back to 1953, the essential vision of hypertext was already published and television was just beginning to be common in homes. The following 60 years saw a gradual evolution in both information processing and network communication, leading to the facilities we have today. Over the next 60 years we should see a gradual increase in access to and ease of using communications technology. We may hope access will increase for all people in every part of the world, and that the message will always be clear, concise, accurate, and appealing to the audience. Technical communicators will have plenty of work each of the next 60 years!”

“My prediction is that we will be an even more global industry. Simplified/plain English will be the norm in all technology communications and only those who write and edit individually (not related to a corporation) will have the luxury of being creative. Borders will be even less obvious, and offshoring won’t be an issue because we will all be equals and getting work done across the street will be as easy as getting it done around the world.”

“There’s always the hope that the engineers will design self-documenting systems, but I don’t believe we can ever stop telling each other how to do things better.”

“White-collar workers will work worldwide but rarely leave their homes. Before people can work in such a market, they will have to be educated, apprenticed, and certified. But this will be commonplace and expected of everyone, in all fields of endeavor, by employers, consumers, and practitioners alike. The universal delivery platform will be the contact lens, and the information product practitioners create will be at the level of Hollywood’s best CGI today. Because universal encyclopedias will constantly offer information about everything we see or interact with—you’ll never walk past a rock or a plant without knowing exactly what it is!—that level of information will be expected of all objects. Therefore, it will be unimaginable to offer any product for sale without associated information. Someone reading this today will still be working in the profession 60 years from today, and will remember reading this.”