[Sigia-l] Frustrated Mid-Level IA job seeker

[andrew at friendlymanual.com]

Quoting Kathleen Tucker <ktucker24 at hotmail.com>:

> Another suggestion was to get into a company working as a technical writer
> (my previous career) and try to get yourself into the IA department.
> These are suggestions that lead to nowhere, because once an employer hires
> you as a business analyst or technical writer, that's what they want you to
> do.

Hi Kathleen,

I came to IA through Technical Writing and Business Analysis so I can assure you
that it does happen. I was lucky in that my private web design passion led to
commercial user experience design and thence into IA through
usability/accessibility. I was also lucky in that I worked in an area that
suited talented generalists (I guess we call them versatilists now) and needed
people who could adapt at a moment's notice. The headaches faded with time but
the CV was well stuffed :)

Maybe the advice would be "get work as a tech writer or BA in a place that needs
versatilists and be prepared to spend 30 hours a week studying to keep up with
the changing needs of the organisation".

Hope this helps,

Best regards, Andrew Boyd

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