Villegas Views: Wait, There Are Activities Outside of STC?

I attended the popular tech comm conference, LavaCon Conference on Digital Media and Content Strategies, in Portland, OR, this past week. It was a great event full of talented content managers, content strategists, technical writers, and other technical communicators gathered together to learn and talk about topics focused specifically on content management and strategy issues.

At an end-of-the-day reception following the first full day of the conference, I was chatting with several attendees who I had known either through social media or had seen at the STC Summit last May. The reception was held in part of the main ballroom of the hotel, where several of the vendors were located. We happened to be standing in front of the STC booth that had been diligently manned by STC's Liz Pohland during the day. One of the people I chatted with was an active STC veteran. She commented how happy she was to see an STC booth present at this event. When asked why (and I'm paraphrasing her here), she said that very often STC chapters focus on spreading the word about the many benefits of the STC solely within STC events. By attending and having a presence at non-STC events, such as LavaCon, it's an opportunity to share information about STC to people who may not know about the organization.

Granted, I can tell you that many of the people I saw at LavaCon were people I had met at the STC Summit, but I think this member made a great point. I know people who are in the tech comm field who aren't even aware of STC, and yet work firmly in technical communication. There are many conferences that focus on specific topics within the realm of technical communication, and that's a good thing. It's perfectly fine that they are happening, as they help us to further hone our skills and knowledge. But do all these organizations offer what STC offers? Networking with a broader group, job leads, and access to world-class publications are among the benefits that STC can offer. Sure, some of these organizations can offer similar things, but not to the same scale. There's nothing to say that we can't belong to more than one professional organization, and include STC as one of them.

Now you may be thinking, “Gee, Danielle, this is a great plug for STC. This almost sounds like a public service announcement on their behalf.” Perhaps, but it's not meant to be that. When this member talked about how we need to extend our reach at non-STC events, it seemed to me that she, too, was talking about what I had said in my last article about the stewardship of technical communication. Reaching out to people at non-STC events is an opportunity to grow our technical communication community beyond its current boundaries. What's wrong with that? Absolutely nothing.

From my own experiences with STC so far, I have found that inclusion in this professional association has been highly beneficial. While I have plenty of non-STC professional connections, it's the STC connections that keep me going. I know I haven't participated as actively as some members. Even so, my only regret is that I didn't start my involvement in STC sooner. I waited until my last year as a grad student, when I could have started a year or two before. Seeing STC friends at non-STC events only helps reinforce the strength of this community, knowing that it's worth helping it to grow and participating in it. Inclusion in this group has helped me grow and changed my outlook on my technical communication career. I would hope that by reaching out beyond our STC cocoon, we can spread our wings like a butterfly and take what we experience within STC to the rest of the world.