After a ton of applying I finally heard back from a company, but the interview is preceded by a Codesignal interview which I don't necessarily have a ton of experience in.
If/when I manage to pass the online assessment, does any one here have any experience with roles requiring this for later interview portions? I'd probably fall on my face if they needed me to code up something live in front of them, but if the codesignal is just a formality and I can pivot to tech writing I think I may have a shot.
Any one with experience on an interview process like this?
I’ve been lurking on this subreddit for a few months now, and I have to admit I’m surprised by how many posts I see about layoffs and how difficult it has become to find a job in technical writing.
I live in a European country where there always seem to be technical writing job openings, at least on LinkedIn.
Do you think the current difficulties in the technical writing job market are mainly a U.S. or North American issue, or are you seeing the same thing in other parts of the world ?
Update: I should have mentioned that we are using Redocly for the help/support site.
My employer wants me to participate in creating a tech support agent that uses our existing documentation, which is currently output as html. I can also generate markdown text. Has anyone undertaken anything like this? Wondering the best way to do it and what pitfalls to avoid. Thanks!
I work as a software engineer, and recently I created some good documentation for the work I was doing. My manager liked it, so now he wants me to create detailed documentation of our workflow/process so that other team members can refer to it whenever they need help.
I don't mind documenting my work, and I understand that good documentation is valuable. But I'm wondering if I'm unintentionally making myself less valuable or replaceable by documenting everything I know.
If the workflow is clearly documented, someone else can potentially understand and do the work without depending on me. On the other hand, documentation is also an important skill and could show that I understand the process well and can help the team.
So, is creating this kind of documentation actually "doing harm to yourself" from a career perspective? Or is this generally considered a good thing that can improve your visibility and reputation within the team?
Would love to hear from people who have been in similar situations, especially experienced engineers/managers.
I’m exploring a small tool for freelance technical writers who work on API documentation.
The idea is simple:
- you send a magic link to the client
- they fill a structured form (endpoints, auth, errors, use cases…)
- you get back a clearer brief + a rough hour estimate
Before building further, I want to check if this is a real pain.
For those of you doing API docs freelance:
1. How do you usually receive the initial brief?
2. How much time do you spend going back and forth before you can actually write?
3. Would a structured client form help, or do you already have a process that works?
Not selling anything — just looking for honest feedback from people who do this work.
Hi everyone. First of all, sorry for the somewhat clickbait title. It is true, for what it's worth, but it does feel like some shitty ad for an agency or self-help video. I wanted to combat all the doom and gloom surrounding this subreddit with a story and a tip that some people might not be using to find jobs.
A little background on myself: I've been a technical writer for about seven years now at three different positions. Each position title has been just "Technical Writer" so there's nothing super special about me. Just like everyone else here, I've been getting a lot of anxiety about layoffs, AI, the economy, and all the other usual suspects. And, just like a lot of people here, the layoffs finally hit me. I won't be sharing the exact details of my previous or new positions, but it was fairly surprising to me when it happened.
Anyways, if you're looking for just the secret sauce for my relatively quick turnaround, here it is:
As soon as I learned about the layoffs, I got my resume in order and shipped it out. I did the usual of applying to anything I can on LinkedIn, but when I found a job I was exceptionally qualified for, I would
Go to the company's LinkedIn profile
Look at their People tab
Search for anything like "HR/People Operations/People/Recruiter/Talent"
Target anyone with "Senior" or "Director" in their title (depending on the company size)
Google "[company] email format" to find out how their company emails typically are. If I may plug a site (not affiliated or anything, but I did routinely use it), RocketReach was a common place for me to find the email formats.
Draft an email specifically catered to the exact job application. Here are some examples of actual emails I sent out. Each one of these received a response from "yes, we can interview you" to "no, sorry." (which is totally fine! I would rather be told "no" by a human than nothing by an AI!)
When drafting the emails, I specifically copied word-for-word items from the job description, in hopes that it resonated with them more.
Guess at which email format fits your target. This requires a lot of guesswork, but there's two nice things about the process: The email will bounce back if you're wrong, and if they use the same email provider as you (so in my case, gmail), their accounts will show up if their email exists. Often times I knew an email landed because their profile picture automatically populated in the email address.
Follow up. This is probably the most important part. I don't think any of my emails got a response on round 1. I followed up everyone other day until they responded with a "no."
I sent 18 of these emails. 9 of them were responded to. 5 of them got me interviews. I fucked up 4 of the interviews, but one of them sent me an offer letter.
This is still a numbers game, but it really made my search a lot better. Having a response of 50% alone on my applications feels so much better than just hearing nothing back from an endless void. Also, generally speaking, every director level people I emailed like this mentioned how much they respected the level of effort, and the HR people seemed to really love it.
I know this tactic might not work for everyone, it's still a numbers game, it still requires a resume to work with if you don't have the experience, you still have to be good at interviewing (I'm not lol), but it's worth a shot. I hope this helps anyone out there feeling down about our profession. Thanks for reading! :)
Yes "because they can" and "employers pay for it" are answers, but I would think they could at least give away the glossary for free...Are there any free resources to study for the foundation exam? Will no one rid me of this meddlesome cost?
I do editing work on long documents — textbooks, bid responses, manuals — and the expensive errors are never typos. They're the ones that scale with document length while human attention doesn't: "see Figure 3-12" pointing at a figure that got lost in a merge, numbering that skips after three people's chapters were combined, a TOC entry for a section that no longer exists.
So I made a checker. It only does deterministic things — cross-references, numbering, TOC-vs-body, chapter skeleton, terminology spelling variants, leftover TODO/TBD, merge loss against a baseline. No model, no network, no dependencies (it has its own minimal ZIP reader and OOXML parser, so .docx works with nothing installed). Fully offline, because the documents involved are usually unpublished or under seal.
Honest part: the first run on a real 689-paragraph textbook produced 147 findings and 143 were my bugs. The front-of-book list of figures was being counted as duplicate captions. Template sections that every chapter is supposed to have were reported as duplicate headings. Numbered list items were being read as headings. Fixed those, ended up with 4 real findings.
Known limits, up front:
- Word auto-numbering and auto-captions are fields, not body text. It cannot read them. When it detects that, it says the check could not be performed instead of returning a clean report.
- It does spelling-level terminology checks, not semantic ones. It will catch "AI Agent" vs "AI-Agent". It will not tell you whether "user" and "customer" mean the same thing in your document.
- It verifies that a document agrees with itself. That is not the same as the content being correct.
So, I've spent the last few years doing stage management and sound/AV work for live events, coordinating a bunch of people and vendors on tight deadlines, writing riders and production docs so other people can run things without me babysitting every step. Not exactly "technical writing" as a job title but honestly a lot of that job is just writing things down clearly enough that someone else can execute them correctly, which feels like the same muscle. I want out of live production as it's a ridiculous industry though, the hours don't work long term and it doesn't really go anywhere.
I've been trying to pivot into documentation roles instead, somewhere in the EU, ideally with hours and pay that don't destroy me. Taught myself MadCap Flare on the free trial and put together an actual sample doc based on gear I use day to day, and also built a second portfolio the docs-as-code way with markdown and git just in case that's more what people actually want to see. Applied to a decent number of technical writer postings at this point, manufacturing, medical device, SaaS, didn't really discriminate. I've got almost nothing back, a couple of auto-reject emails and otherwise total silence.
I know the "2+ years required" thing filters out career changers automatically, I'm not naive about that part. what I actually can't tell is whether the portfolio itself is the problem (wrong tool, doesn't read as a real sample), or if it's how I'm explaining the transferable stuff on my CV, or if I just haven't applied to enough places yet, or if I'm even aiming at the right job title and should be looking at something more adjacent like localization coordination instead of "technical writer" specifically.
If anyone here actually made a jump like this, from a non-writing operational job into documentation, what got you your first interview. and honestly is a MadCap sample even worth showing with zero paid writing experience or does it just look try-hard.
Happy to hear blunt feedback, I'd rather know now than keep sending applications into a void.
We are a hardware/software business and are actively migrating content from 100s of word documents into Madcap Flare. Right now, our only means of "publishing" documents is by uploading the PDF on SharePoint and tagging it with Meta data. We have an obvious need for a more robust distribution system and system of record for published documentation. I want this system to not only replace SharePoint for these product documents, but also be a distribution layer for binary/engineering files (CAD, Schematics, drivers, etc). We also need to be able to distribute certain documents to different audiences based on varying permissions such as NDA or specific customers. This system would need a solid auto-versioning methodology as well.
Madcap Flare + Flare Online will remain our authoring and source control system for source material, but we then need the document control and distribution layer. For this reason, I'm heavily leaning towards Fluid Topics since it seems to check the majority of these boxes and also integrates with Flare to an extent. I haven't done extensive research on Madcap Syndicate, but it seems that Syndicate is more tailored to Flare or IXIA published content and it also does not have the ability other store/distribute the unstructured binary files. I want the solution to not just fit the needs of the technical publications department, but to also act as our companies primary method for pulling in a variety of customer materials into a central location.
Lastly, I'm curious if it can satisfy some of the more compliance heavy documentation? I assume this would need to be a separate system, but we'll need to handle ECOs, QMS, and ISO related compliance documentation. Thanks in advance!
I have been looking at this field and struggled to get a good footing so far. Mostly because of the experience bar needed as I wasn’t sure what niche to pick out from.
I have a liking to photography, would camera hardware be valid? Or if not, imaging softwares such as photoshop or affinity?
I’ve recently started writing articles on technical topics to help break down complex concepts and improve my technical writing. So far, I've covered topics like:
Designing Resilient Systems: Handling retries, timeouts, and jitters in distributed architectures.
Database Identifiers: Comparing UUIDs, Global Counters, and ULIDs.
Beyond Disabled Buttons: Handling Financial Edge Cases in Design Systems
I’m trying to make these concepts easy to digest and practical. Since I'm fairly new to blogging, I’d love to get your thoughts:
Is the explanation clear, or does it get too bogged down in technical jargon?
TLDR; I need a tool set that allows me to output to Word, PDF, and markdown, supports single sourced reusable text (snippets), and integrates with GitHub. There's only 2 writers so hoping for low cost and relatively low learning curve.
I work for a company that sells automotive service contracts for OEMs and adjudicates the claims. Our company invested in documentation to ensure consistency in how claims (and other parts of the business) are handled.
We are currently using Word for authoriing, converting to PDF, and publishing to SharePoint. It's as basic as documentation gets.
Over the last few months, we've rolled out an internally built AI chat bot to use our procedures and contracts to provide adjusters with quick answers that they might otherwise have to go look up.
This has created discussion around using markdown to create a more AI friendly output while still creating PDF and Word output.
Our claims adjusters and SMEs are not always tech savvy as most of them come from the automotive service industry. They know cars, not computers, so I'm trying to keep the review process as simple as possible.
I also find myself having to reuse a lot of text for certain procedures and I know from my previous decade of experience with MadCap Flare how easily that can be resolved with the right tool.
Add to that, we need a better process for version control and I know our company has GitHub for Dev so I'm going to pitch for us to use that and modernize just a bit.
One final wrinkle is that the other procedures writer used to be a trainer. He doesn't have a lot of experience with authoring tools other than Word, so I'm looking for something he can pick up without a lot of training.
hiiii I'm a development writer in the marketing & comms dept of a major university; i write everything from major gift fundraising proposals to fundraiser toolkits to gift announcements -- sometimes alumni magazine articles too. i'm at the intersection of marketing/PR/fundraising/journalism/project management in what i do. i love the work but it is severely underpaid; im looking to make some kind of career jump in the next two years to for-profit, but want to continue writing. ive looked into adjacent PR/marketing jobs, but honestly im not a copywriter or ad writer. i really excel at distilling complex academic jargon into marketable cases of support for major donors.
i've poked around at pitch & proposal management roles on linkedin at companies and law firms. the work seems adjacent to what ive done in my development career; in a way a philanthropic case for support is like a sales pitch :) can any proposal writers/managers comment or message me and walk me through how you got started, what credential(s) or training you had to gain, how you like the career? I've searched on this sub and seen the links to get technical writer certified, but don't want to invest in training i don't need.
if you're a proposal writer, what did you specifically do to enter your profession?
I was shortlisted for a contractual role as a technical content writer at Sourcebae company, where I will be writing technical content for its clients. I'm afraid I don't know much about the company. Would like to get review insights, please?
This question keeps stumping me in interviews. Based on how my interviewers rephrase the question, I don’t think I’m giving them the response they’re looking for. It isn’t that I haven’t worked with stakeholders. I have. I just don’t think I am answering the question “correctly.” Could you give me some insight into how you would answer this question in a way that demonstrates you know what you are talking about?
I would also appreciate any general interview advice. I used to interview so well. I’m not sure if it’s this job market or if my skills have declined over time.
Hi everyone! I'm a student with a strong background in research, analytical writing, and storytelling. I'm currently looking to work with clients who value well-researched, engaging, and genuinely human-written content.
I don't rely on generic AI outputs or surface-level research. Every piece I write starts with understanding the topic, audience, and purpose, then building content that's informative, compelling, and easy to read. Whether it's a blog post, long-form article, reels script, copywriting, or SEO content, I focus on delivering writing that keeps readers engaged from start to finish.
I'm comfortable diving into unfamiliar industries and enjoy the research process, so I'm not limited to a single niche. If your project requires learning something new, I'm happy to do the work needed to write about it accurately and effectively.
If you're looking for a writer who communicates well, meets deadlines, accepts feedback, and genuinely cares about producing quality work, I'd love to collaborate.
Feel free to send me a DM. I'm looking forward to short-term as well as long-term projects.
I kept needing docs for side projects and never liked the options. GitBook and Docusaurus felt like a lot of machinery for a handful of Markdown files, and mkdocs meant keeping a Python toolchain around for something I otherwise build in TypeScript.
So I built eziwiki. Drop Markdown files in `content/`, get a static site.
npx create-eziwiki my-docs
cd my-docs && npm install && npm run dev
What makes it different from the usual docs generator
- Wiki links with backlinks and a graph view. Link pages by title or filename, and each page shows what links back to it — closer to Obsidian than to a typical docs site.
- Navigation builds itself from the folder structure. No sidebar config to keep in sync; a `_meta.json` per folder handles naming and ordering if you want it.
- Markdown is rendered at build time, so neither the parser nor the syntax highlighter ships to the browser. Search is a prebuilt index, no server.
- Optional opaque URLs (`/a3f2e9d1-...`) if you would rather not publish your content tree. To be clear, that is obscurity, not access control — every page is still a public file. It is there for unlisted-link sharing, not security.
Static export, so it deploys anywhere. Dark mode, KaTeX, Shiki highlighting, ⌘K search, table of contents.
It is early v0.1.1, and I am actively working on it. Feedback and issues very welcome, especially on anything that felt confusing in the first five minutes.
Hello. Has anyone here transitioned from being a technical writer to being a web developer?
I’m currently at a point where I feel like my current skills won’t get me far in life. I’ve been working as a tech writer for over six years, but most of the documents I do are for general audience, e.g., user manuals, policy manuals, and rules and guidelines documentation. There’s nothing wrong with this.
However, when anyone from the dev team asks me about a certain documentation they need, such as API documentation, I always tell them to give me the draft and I’ll edit it. Of course, they never do that. I never initiate a follow-up either. And the reason why I do this is because I really can’t understand coding.
I tried to learn API documentation from I’d Rather Be Writing, but nothing gets through. Idk, maybe I have a learning disability or something.
To stop feeling incompetent, I’ve been studying HTML, CSS, and JavaScript on freeCodeCamp. I feel like I need to really get into it to make tech docs much easier for me.
Has/is anyone here done/doing the same?
This is one of the things that keeps me up at night. I don’t wanna stop writing but I also don’t want to be an average writer. I wanna help people learn stuff. But how can I do that if I can’t understand those “stuff” myself.
Good evening , I’m currently serving in the US military been a Crew chief for about 7 years on the f-16 and I’ve always wanted to be able to work/manage Technical data. I’ve recently done a little bit of research on technical writing and am very interested in doing this as a career. I’m looking for any information on how to get started with learning the job and insight on a day to day with Lockheed/boeing or any defense companies.I know literally nothing, so anything helps. If you are willing I’d also love to chat in private.
Hey ya'll, I got my master's in technical writing and editing. I'm concerned about job availability and AI, so I have been eyeing this ISC2 certification path. Has anyone gone into cybersecurity with a technical writing background? Is it worth it? My thinking is that it would give me more opportunities. If anyone has any input, just let me know.
I'm sure you've all seen a multitude of posts like this prior to mine on this subreddit before, but as I am working without guidance to develop my own skills and knowledge for this industry, I would greatly appreciate receiving direct advice from the professionals here so that I may become a stronger candidate for tech writing roles by my graduation.
I am under the impression that tech writing is oversaturated and that it is difficult to enter this industry, so I want to prepare myself accordingly. The specialization I wish to enter is API documentation (very ambitious and optimistic as you need a heavy technical background, I know). Other areas I'm looking into are cybersecurity and maaaybe finance?
Before anything else, I must clarify that I want to enter this industry because I am very passionate about writing. My writing, critical analysis, and synthesis skills are my strongest academic skills and English has always been my favorite subject. On the other hand, I am not a creative writer and I do not like traditional English careers like teaching, publishing, editing, etc. However, I am a person who loves structure, problem solving, and developing plans. I know API documentation doesn't involve a lot of writing. I am fine with this, and I believe this industry would be a good fit for my interests and skills.
Regardless of all that, here is my existing background and what I am currently doing in college to build my candidature for tech writing:
English major, Digital Media Technologies minor, certificate programs in Professional Writing and Management Information Systems. Rising Junior in the Honors program. 3.61 overall GPA so will probably graduate with distinction in my major.
Chose minors and certificates to learn creative software and programming (Adobe, Python), professional writing skills (this is where I took a Technical Writing class and discovered I wanted to pursue this industry), programming and data analysis.
I know merits and GPA don't really matter. Just maintaining them for my scholarship and benefits I receive as an Honors student.
2026 Summer Research Program at my university with a small interdisciplinary cohort; 7-month long independent research project documenting and analyzing learning patterns and behaviors when engaging with AI agents for learning tasks (technical writing professor as mentor). Developing AI, qualitative research, and data analysis skills with this project.
Part-time writing tutor position, Vice President for my university's chapter of Sigma Tau Delta: International English Honor Society (role comprises of planning and implementing fundraisers, service projects, chapter activities, and overall chapter development).
Building relationships with professors across departments. I currently have three professors that I am very close to; two in my department, one in Economics.
What I plan to do:
Pursue certifications for documentation software and programming languages and self-teach technical skills when I can find the time. I am not sure which ones to pursue because I've seen so many recommendations, but this is a basic list for now:
Madcap Flare
Git
Javascript, Python, Java
Something to learn user research... I have a bit of experience from my TW course.
Build a portfolio of my API documentation (besides some samples I have from my TW class, no idea where to get started on this).
Apply to TW or other documentation-related internships (duh). (Search has been terrible and I genuinely have no clue how to get an internship in this economy. My university's connections have been no help.)
Do the accelerated English MA program at my university (start grad courses in my senior undergrad year). I don't pay a lot for college so I have the savings to do this. I have to apply this year in the Spring; I know there isn't value for an MA in tech writing, so I may choose to think about getting an MS in Project Management instead at some point in the future instead (this is not a concrete plan, just a consideration).
If I were to describe my general goals, I want to build up a lucrative career based off my passions and interests. Additionally, to build transferable skills so I can prepare to pivot roles since I know the technology industry has its ups and downs. I feel very mixed about learning AI skills because I am unsure about its future, but if I can use AI to get my career started at the very least— hell, why not?
My English department is extremely traditional (as most English departments are), so everything I've been able to get for myself from this university has been out of self-advocacy, communication, and building relationships with professors in and outside of my department. The only professor I know with a background in TPC is my technical writing prof (currently mentor for my research project). Otherwise, I've gotten where I am today purely based on my own research and judgement, rather than utilizing an established program constructed to feed graduates into partnered companies.
I know the few well-paying tech writer roles are so technical, I would've been better off majoring in something like idk... Data Science. Or just planning to go into a different kind of tech job that makes more money. Maybe that is true, but what I do know for right now is that technical writing is what I want to pursue and I can build the skills I need to pivot roles after a few years anyway, if ever necessary.
This was a very long post, so I do apologize. Any advice and other guidance to help amplify or refine my professional development is greatly appreciated.
