Culture Program Consultant Roxy Greninger reflect’s on what makes STC’s culture so rich after attending the 2018 Technical Communication Summit and STC Rochester’s Spectrum conference for the first time.
By now, you’ve probably heard of STC’s 2018 Opening Keynote speaker, Carla Johnson, but have you heard FROM Carla? Perpetual Innovation: How the World’s Most Innovative Teams Surface Great Ideas to Deliver Exponential Outcomes.
STC Rochester is hosting its regional tech comm conference, Spectrum, March 25-27, 2018 at Louise Slaughter Hall at the Rochester Institute of Technology. This year’s theme is “Hack into Your Flow.”
STC’s Rochester Chapter holds the fantastic Spectrum conference every year. The conference will be held 25-27 March 2018, with a theme of Hack Into Your Flow, and the call for proposals is now open. Proposals must be submitted by 8 December.
Attending Summit was the culmination of several years’ worth of effort to move into the tech comm field, and was confirmation that I had arrived as an “official” technical communications professional. As a first-time attendee, I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect from Summit (I was hoping to get a more comprehensive overview of the Tech Comm field–if such a thing exists).
I was interested in meeting people from across the country who practiced different aspects of technical communication and learning more about the variety of opportunities available. I was looking forward to the many educational sessions at Summit, because I was hoping to discover my specific area of interest. Although I’ve successfully entered the tech comm field, I am still trying to find my niche. I hope to specialize in a specific area of technical communication, but I need to learn about these areas of specialization. I was also looking forward to meeting other attendees.
The 2017 STC Summit closed Wednesday with a special event, a taping of a future episode of the YouTube show Fix My App, hosted by Richard Brevig with a team of UX experts: Lorelei Brown, Geoffrey Robertson, and Vera Rhoads.
Wednesday morning – the final day of the Summit – kicked off with another pair of Spotlight talks, today from Todd DeLuca and Ben Woelk. Todd spoke about the impact that the person providing service has. For example, he said, if you go out to dinner you’re most likely to remember your server rather than the chef and cooks. While technical communicators may be the chefs and cooks of the products we work on, Todd encouraged attendees to try to find ways to be involved with the service and delivery of products to customers. He said service is “COMP-limentary: Chemical, Opportunity, Memorable, and Personal. “I’ve gotten more credit being the deliverer of information that I ever did writing it,” he said.