I adore meeting members in person, especially community leaders who do so much for the Society. Last week I had the privilege of meeting with leaders from three Southern California chapters (Orange County, San Diego, and San Gabriel ValleyInland Empire). The main purpose was to talk about the 2011 Sacramento conference and how the chapters can encourage members to attend, but the conversation was broad and far-reaching.
Everyone who had been at an STC conference commented that the conference is a highlight of the professional year—and a lot more fun than they had expected. Lance Robert made the observation that there is nothing quite like being at a meeting where you can strike up a conversation with just about anyone, knowing that they do what you do, and learn something to boot. The group came up with quite a list of what their chapters can do to promote this event, including personal testimonials about the conference and how cool Sacramento is, podcasts, articles in newsletters, promotions at chapter meetings, and personal phone calls. They might even organize group transportation.
I reported how each community will be able to have their own page(s) inside the STC website as part of Project Phoenix. It is our hope that most communities will find that the new STC website gives them enough functionality that they will no longer need to have their own, separate websites. In some cases, however, a specific community may wish to have their page on the STC website link to their own site.
There was some feedback that the blue “refreshed” STC logo does not duplicate clearly, and some interest in whether STC will be getting a new logo as part of Project Phoenix. (My answer was a very definitive, “Well, maybe!” The board will review some concepts in November but may choose to stay with the current logo.)
The leaders offered some suggestions on what STC needs to do to show that STC is social media savvy. For example, STC needs to start collecting Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn handles for members as part of the member directory. I have asked the membership staff to make this happen—albeit with the current AMS it may take some time for this to happen, one of the many reasons why STC needs to move to a new system sometime in 2011.
Finally, there was a passionate conversation that STC has a business opportunity to teach basic writing skills to engineers, computer geeks, and other non-technical writers. The purpose: to make them understand what's involved so that they can work well with technical communicators. In addition, we'd market STC to them as a way to increase the visibility of the field. Blog readers: What do you think? Should STC branch out in this way?
STC's Kathryn Burton (third from left) meets with (from left to right) Michael Opsteegh, Mike Sanders, Doris Towne, Linda Oestreich, Lance Robert, and Roger Hunnicutt.
Before considering whether or not to branch out into teaching basic writing skills to engineers and such I need to know what strategy you’re going to employ. It’s a subject that sounds great from a techcomm point of view, but one that is likely going to be near-laughable from any other viewpoint unless the selling angle is solid. So, sell me.
To the idea: “Finally, there was a passionate conversation that STC has a business opportunity to teach basic writing skills to engineers, computer geeks, and other non-technical writers. The purpose: to make them understand what’s involved so that they can work well with technical communicators. In addition, we’d market STC to them as a way to increase the visibility of the field.”
The writing undertrained professional is an underserved and massive market. They think they write just fine. WE can show them otherwise and market STC at the same time. The upsides of this are we can reach a huge market and educate them about good writing, marketing the name STC at the same time. We can be the Grand Poobahs to them (lol) and make some money for STC along the way. We can also network with employers and show them what STC means to the writing profession. That is, we can demonstrate why STC certification could mean something in a job description. Finally, this could be a source of growth for STC membership (a a non-writer professional) at a time when more members could help us reach a level of critical mass to make STC certification successful.
The downside? Are we willing to accept those who believe technical writing has morphed into a skill set of all professions and not one unto itself? I say let them believe this! And then let them pay us to support them through lower level training. And we can chuckle all the way to the bank – metaphorically speaking, of course.
I am not shooting from the hip on this. Earlier this year, an associate and I gave a brown-bag, one-hour lecture on minimalist writing at a large company in Redlands, California. There was standing room only (~100). Most were not writers. Most did not know of STC. They loved it! So I believe this market is underserved and we can take advantage of this.
To convince those skeptical of this concept, I challenge you to offer a one-hour writing seminar for free at a large company in your area and see what happens. You might be very surprised to find tremendous interest, and thus “an opening” for further marketing and networking of our brand.
Best, Mike
Mike, I would love to know more about the content of your brown-bag lunch. What three things would it be most helpful for engineers to learn?
I agree that engineers are a large, under-served market. But STC would have to market technical writing skills as a way for them to save time in what they’re currently doing, rather than loading them with a new task. We need to be careful that we don’t give managers the impression that basic technical writing skills qualify engineers to be technical communicators. The product engineer is the worst person to write the customer-facing documentation, because the engineer is too close to the product.
Mike, thanks for the info! Andrea, thanks for the shared concern!
When I say “sell me on it” I don’t mean “show me a need” but “detail me a solution”. That is, how to effectively market this kind of training with STC as a champion. I know it can be done (did something very similar to this with a past employer, in several contexts) but I want to see a plan if this is truly to be a STC business opportunity and not just a “good idea”.
I applaud the idea of selling the STC to a wider community by teaching to “engineers, computer geeks,” etc. We’ve done a great job in the STC of preaching to the converted (i.e., other technical communicators/writers/editors), but the STC needs to reach a wider market. The best way to do this is to venture into their areas. This is where the STC can create more value for the professional Tech. Communicators.
Thank you!
Thank you, Karen, for your support of this idea.
To Bill’s point, I suggest STC Corporate create an exploratory team to investigate the marketing potential of non-writer professionals and targeting them as a significant market. This way, we can give the good idea a fair shake.
On paper, I do not see why this market is not viable, but then I am neither an expert on STC marketing nor its strategic planning at the global level. That said, does anyone really believe STC will survive with a strategy of simply targeting the writer market? My experience has been the writing community holds onto its dollars fairly tightly. All I am seeing are dropouts. I have been involved in many other business associations, including a the role as VP and President of a PMI Chapter, and I see muich more generous members in these groups. The broader “non-writer professional” market would be more generous and has more dollars to give.
So my suggestion is STC form an executive team to instigate the idea, create some focus groups and get feedback, and do some sample marketing – actually market to this group. The proof is in the putting. I think STC will be amazed with the results. I would be happy to be on the team.
Best, Mike
Andrea, I would be happy to send you my simplistic slides from the brown bag lunch. Please send me your email address. But I warn you, they are embarrassingly crude for a reason – the audience. That said, I have had engineers, managers, programmers, admins, developers, executives, analysts, and scientists tell me it changed their lives. Why? Because 1) no one is teaching this underserved market about even the simplest writing concepts, 2) the market is increasingly foreign born, and 3) previously good writers are being influenced by bad writing on the job daily.
Do you remember when Apple came out with the iPod and iTunes? This is where we are with writing for the non-professional writer. Let’s go get the market.
Best, Mike