Technical Communicators: What's in a Name?
Technical communication? What is that? The moniker is becoming increasingly popular around the world to describe those who we may have referred to in the past as technical writers or technical authors. So why the change? Technical writer and technical author were perfectly good descriptions.
Yes they were, but like in most specialisms, times are changing. The role of the traditional tech writer is no longer just about producing handbooks or user instructions. It does still form an important part of the skill, but communication is now a much wider specialism.
Think of the different media being employed - everything from paper to CDs, video and online help. The modern Technical Communicator needs to be competent in so much more than just writing and understanding the technical subject matter. Nowadays, they need a firm understanding of the publishing medium as well, and increasingly this means electronic publishing methods and the mark-up languages behind them, like XML, HTML or SGML.
Technical communication is no longer all about the output. The customer and the user is at the heart of the task. The expert technical communicator will be able to understand their customer's needs and to structure information accordingly. It's not about books any more. Information is the key. The presentation of important information to users can have a significant impact on the operation, costs and profitability of products, systems or even whole organisations. It's imperative then that the Technical Communicator adds value to the information through the delivery media, clarity, completeness, structure, accessibility and inter-linking of the information. An understanding of how the information will be used is vital, meaning the Technical Communicator must be familiar with the end user's goals and expectations.
More and more, the Technical Communicator is asked to refine and enhance information delivery to provide benefits and savings to the users.
Keeping the Technical Author or Technical Writer tags could be doing these specialists a disservice. The need to ensure that the right information is communicated in the right way at the right time means that this discipline is much more than just writing, it's technical communication.