From the President
November 2017
Hi everyone, I hope you’re all having a productive month and you are continuing to champion the role of technical communicators in your organisations. Sometimes it can be tough being a lone wolf in a big organisation, but that’s what TechCommNZ is there for – to provide support, inspiration, friendship, and opportunities. At least, that’s what it means for me!
There’s plenty going on with TechCommNZ at the moment, and some exciting options for study in 2018.
Dave Gash: CSS Novice to Ninja
November brings to us the last round of workshops for this year. I’m excited to learn from Dave Gash again and have a day getting deep and colourful with CSS. On a side note, Dave is involved with a pretty interesting project around documenting the technology of the web. Check out this site to learn more or get involved.
Salary Survey
Every year TechCommNZ asks our members to take part in the salary survey. This survey is vital in giving us a good picture of technical communicators in New Zealand, not just to analyse current rates of pay, but also to find out what’s changing, and to look at trends. It only takes 5 to 10 minutes to complete and you’ll go in the draw to win a Prezzy card in time for Christmas! Information about the 2017 survey will be coming soon, so keep an eye on your inbox and https://techcomm.nz/.
Feel Like Studying in 2018?
Last month the Christchurch branch hosted an excellent and well attended presentation by Ara and the University of Canterbury, showcasing study options that will be available from early next year. If you were unable to attend the presentation check out the TechCommNZ blog for the run down.
It’s really exciting to see the return of Ara’s excellent information design programme, starting with the revamped Graduate Certificate in Information Design, available from Semester 1, 2018. This will be followed up with the full Graduate Diploma in Information Design and Management, offered in 2019.
On a slightly different note, the University of Canterbury is offering a Master of Writing from Semester 1, 2018. It looks to be quite a flexible course, allowing you to specialise in the type of writing you are most interested in. It’s certainly great to see a writing-related masters qualification available in New Zealand, even if it doesn’t have a pure technical communication focus.
While we’re on the subject of studying, I’d also like to mention the Master of User Experience Design offered by the Victoria University School for Design. This full-time programme looks like a great segue into UX for those with or without a technical communication qualification.
Of course many of you, like me, will be stuck slaving away at the corporate coal face. But don’t despair! Next year, TechCommNZ will be offering an interesting programme of workshops and webinars, with a focus on Plain English, design, eLearning, and more.
Plain English Awards
Finalists have just been announced for the Plain English Awards 2017, with the winners to be announced on November 23. TechCommNZ has sponsored the Best Plain English Technical Communicator category for a number of years and will continue to sponsor this excellent and relevant competition.
As a first time judge this year, I found the process very interesting and it was a good chance to analyse and critique others’ work, and learn from what others have produced and from the comments of the other judges.
ITX Conference: July 2018
Put the dates 11 to 13 July in your calendar now! ITx 2018 is coming and TechCommNZ is proud to be involved! What’s ITx you ask? Well… ITx is New Zealand’s technology “super conference” where 13 organisations hold their own mini conferences streams. TechCommNZ will be hosting a stream on one of the days and we are very excited to be a part of this.
It’s based in Wellington at and it’s going to be awesome. We are really lucky to be able to take part in this next year. It’s a fantastic opportunity to promote technical communicators and also bring in some great speakers for you to hear.
Thanks
Meredith