A View from Number Two

This month’s meeting and workshop promise to be both fun and informative. The key word for me this month is “collaborate.”

I think back to the start of my technical editing career, during the days when collaboration meant marking up hard-copy printouts and reading specs in shared folders on the LAN. This was not a problem. After all, I worked in a single office where face time was a matter of walking down the cube corridor.

Fifteen years later, however, my company’s writers and developers are now spread across continents. Assembling content requires different tools and a whole new mindset that we are still figuring out.

Even for companies without time zone challenges, effective collaboration is a must. As Forbes.com contributor Jacob Morgan put it, “organizations cannot succeed without connecting their employees and their information. Making collaboration work isn’t an option[;] it’s THE option.”

While our two-part event features collaboration, it also exemplifies its practice within our STC community. Our Future Technical Communicators (FTC) chapter secured Bernard as a speaker. Topic ideas flew back and forth via the administrative council list; excitement grew as Christopher joined the mix and the workshop particulars were ironed out.

There were some anxious moments, but the result is effectively a mini-conference that we are sure to be proud of. Special kudos to Jordie Rutledge and Karen Lane for their intrepid organization efforts, and to Alex Garcia for his help in navigating the UCF funding process—not to mention ordering the barbecue!