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Good point Gene and I agree. The connections between systems is probably
where I need to focus more. On this project, there is an added wrinkle
because when I'm talking about doctrine, I'm mean military warfare doctrine
which in itself is quite complex. We have system engineers who have the big
picture and are amazingly talented. We also have specialists in all areas
as well as developers, testers, and so forth. It is a really solid team.
As a writer, I have to be a specialist and generalist at the same time and
that can be challenging. I agree that having a good sense of the
connections between systems is probably a place where I can add even more
value, especially when I look at it from the user's point of view.
On Tue, Jan 17, 2012 at 12:56 PM, Gene Kim-Eng <techwr -at- genek -dot- com> wrote:
> My experience has been that the path to becoming an SME where it counts
> the most for documents is less about learning the details of each small bit
> of a product or system and more about learning how all those bits work with
> each other. You probably have no chance of ever learning enough
> "doctrine-specific" engineering knowledge about every part of the system
> when none of the engineers do either, but if you work at picking up enough
> to figure out how the bits interact at the system level you'll probably get
> better results where documents are concerned, and if the company doesn't
> have actual system engineers, you might even end up learning things that
> nobody else has worked out before and become a bona fide system SME.
>
> BTW, when I rated myself as a 3-4, I was thinking about our own
> "doctrine-specific" knowledge and comparing myself to some of the detailed
> exchanges I see here about OLH and web authoring tools. I'm sure the
> majority of people who post here could probably run rings around me when it
> comes to hands-on use of the "tools of our trade," as evidenced by the fact
> that I've never gotten a job offer from anyone who wanted me to take a
> writing/editing test. :)
>
> Gene Kim-Eng
>
>
>
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