atw: Re: Accreditation (another longish contribution)

All:

Like Jill, I have been a spectator of many failed attempts to get 
accreditation up and running in the past.  They all failed for the same 
reasons: the diversity of activities and deliverables that come under the 
tech. comms umbrella.

First, do you count subject expertise (e.g. nuclear fission) as part of a 
writer's skills?  Or do you just accredit writing skills as such, and the 
ability to write procedures, refrence, and conceptual content.  What about 
skills in running a CMS?  Do high skills in programming in macro 
languages, Visual Basic, and FrameScript count?  If you are manager of a 
technical writing team, do project and people management skills count? 
What about good graphic design and typography skills? 

It seems to me you are going to need grades of technical writers, but what 
skills you put in each grade aren't really cut-and-dried.  Or perhaps you 
have a shopping list of skills, with the basic writing, illustrating, and 
indexing skills mandatory and contributin 50 percent to your rating.  The 
remaining 50 percent would consist of points for programming skills, 
version management, typography, etc., so the more you had, the higher your 
rating.  Or perhaps there is a weighting system, where the mandatory 
writing skills are lightly weighted but more advanced skills are more 
strongly weighted.

Many tertiary institutes now give credits for life skills or life 
experience, that is, recognition of skills and experience learnt on the 
job.  When I started as a magazine and book editor, and later as a 
technical writer, there were no formal courses and hence no certification. 
 But I bet I could lecture on almost any subject in the courses now 
available.  So you are going to have to figure out some scheme for 
verifying and accrediting life experience.

Regards,
Hedley

--
Hedley Finger
Training Content Developer and Tools Specialist
MYOB Australia Pty Ltd <http://myob.com/au>
P.O. box 371   Blackburn VIC 3130   Australia
12 Wesley Court   Tally Ho Business Park   East Burwood VIC 3151 Australia
<mailto:hedleyDOTfingerATmyobDOTcom>
Tel. +61 3 9222 9992 x 7421,   Mob. (cell) +61 412 461 558

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