The lost goals
Feb. 2nd, 2022 05:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bloodygranuaileSeveral years ago when I was working at Pearson I was generously allowed to walk off with a large number of textbooks, presumably in exchange for them not paying us very much. One of the textbooks I acquired was the fourth Canadian edition (why, I do not know) of Technical Communication, which, unsurprisingly, is a book about technical writing. This then sat around on my shelves for ten years while I vaguely intended to read it. Last year I somewhat more specifically intended to read it, but didn’t, which I rediscovered when I was putting together my 2022 goals after having immediately forgotten about all my 2021 goals the second the merger was announced. Therefore, I finally started reading it in bits and pieces, to see if anything in it might be useful to me.
Frankly, some of it is and some of it isn’t. I always find it somewhat useful to review stuff I already know, if only to remind myself to think consciously about things I might be doing on autopilot, but I think I had been hoping that there would be more information that was really specific to technical writing/editing, whereas a lot of it was more about regular writing and research skills and general office communication norms that would likely be applicable in pretty much any field. But there was some useful content on graphics and data visualization, and some chapters specifically dedicated to different types of memos and reports–including one for site reports, which might come in useful since I’ve been having some difficulty tracking down any written training materials whatsoever to help develop instruction on site report writing. So overall I think it’s a useful reference to have on hand and I’m glad I finally read it, but it wasn’t a particularly mind-blowing or enjoyable read, even by textbook standards.
Frankly, some of it is and some of it isn’t. I always find it somewhat useful to review stuff I already know, if only to remind myself to think consciously about things I might be doing on autopilot, but I think I had been hoping that there would be more information that was really specific to technical writing/editing, whereas a lot of it was more about regular writing and research skills and general office communication norms that would likely be applicable in pretty much any field. But there was some useful content on graphics and data visualization, and some chapters specifically dedicated to different types of memos and reports–including one for site reports, which might come in useful since I’ve been having some difficulty tracking down any written training materials whatsoever to help develop instruction on site report writing. So overall I think it’s a useful reference to have on hand and I’m glad I finally read it, but it wasn’t a particularly mind-blowing or enjoyable read, even by textbook standards.