Murf the shmoozer

I pride myself on my ability to fake laugh so well that no one knows and I'm looked at as a ray of sunshine. Despite this and unbelievable to anyone that knows me, I'm not an extravert so I don't feel that I am a good shmoozer even if Big A may say otherwise. One of the things that was taught in the Technical Writing program I recently completed was the importance of networking. This topic was brought up again at a recent U of M tailgate in which I finally found a topic in which Uncle Ed could go on and on about. He brought up good points about the importance of networking so I took what he said and checked around my current employer to see if they had any technical writing/documentation specialist positions. They did. Using my research which also included their title and income (which is published yearly), I contacted one senior technical writer in the IT department. I explained that I recently completed the certification program and would love to chat with her about the field in general, how it has changed since she's been in it, etc.

This past Friday morning, I had the chance to meet with her and it was very informative. Her technical writing is a bit different than what was taught. The industry uses a program called Adobe FrameMaker. I'm usually very good at picking up new software programs but FrameMaker was a tough one. I still don't feel very confident about using it. She currently writes strictly for the Internet so she actually writes in HTML which is then designed and put on the website by the programmer. We covered many topics such as how she got started, how she handles having to write for users while not having direct access to them and any advice for me in my job hunt (while making a point of not saying anything about asking if there was an opening or anything remotely related to that which goes against the rules of networking). She made a few good points: that my job description may no longer suit my job title and perhaps my department would want to remedy that (which I don't have much hope for since I broached this topic in July and got moved to a different area with the same title and pay) and most importantly, I actually do have experience compared with others who are just completing the program and only have their schoolwork to show in their portfolio. The experience is a big thing for me since it seems by the look of many job postings that employers are looking for a 'senior'. She also agreed to look over some things that I've already written which I'm excited to hear her thoughts on.

45 minutes later, I left feeling very optimistic about everything. Now I have to continue this by finding more people in the field and letting everyone get to meet Murf.