Who Are We, Y2K PMC Statistics News & Views Feature Article

by Alan Muirhead Alan Muirhead (muirhead@voicenet.com) is a senior validation consultant with Taratec Development Corporation and a past editor of News & Views. Originally published in News & Views January 1999 issue. Copyright 1999 STC-Philadelphia Metro Chapter. For permission to reprint this article, contact the Managing Editor.	Quickly now, what word processing software is used by more than 90% of PMC? OK, you probably know that one. Do you know how much your fellow technical communicators make on average? How many people further their skills with ongoing education? This year's survey of the PMC membership builds on previous results from 1997 and 1998. Returns were lower than in the past, with just thirty-three responses from a membership of 465. This means the statistics based on responses aren't too robust, so these results are indicative, not conclusive. However, of the chapter as a whole we can say this: membership is up: 465 in March, 2000, vs. 424 in February, 1998, and 434 in January, 1997 62% are women, vs. 63% in 1998 and 64% in 1997 (a steady decline?!?!) more than half the chapter (57%) has been in STC less than five years, the same as in 1998, vs. 62% in 1997 somewhat more mailing addresses are in Pennsylvania than in the past. In Figure 1 the size of the solid circles is proportional to the number of addresses in each zip code. Location of mailing addresses 2000 1998 1997 PA 73% 67% 67% NJ 16% 17% 18% DE 10% 14% 13% Figure 1: Geography of STC-PMC membership. Salaries About two-thirds (20) of the respondents work in full-time "permanent" jobs. Their average salary in this year's survey was $51,900, compared to $50,800 in 1998 and $47,560 for last year's national survey by STC. Additional details on salaries are in the table that follows. (Note that in the national survey, both women and men averaged higher than the overall mean, which could be explained by a few people who apparently did not report gender; still, it makes one wonder.) Average salaries 2000 PMC 1999 STC 1998 PMC overall $51,890 $47,560 $50,800 women $52,070 $50,500 $48,960 men $51,670 $52,150 $54,860 Salaries increase with experience as shown in Figure 2. One-third (13) of the respondents identified themselves as contractors (work through an agency) or independent consultants (find their own clients). Eleven of the thirteen contractors/consultants were women. The survey asked for the hourly rates that they charged in January 1999. Answers ranged from $20 to $180 per hour, with half of the group falling in the $40-$50 range. (Note: when analyzing the 1998 survey, I converted the reported rates for the contractors/consultants into an annual salary, assuming 1800 hours in a year. I didn't do that for the 2000 survey, since several respondents said they worked part time, but if I had, the PMC salary averages for 2000 would have been significantly higher.) Education Over the last couple of years PMC has established a dialogue with local educational institutions that offer degrees in technical communication. Accordingly, this year's survey included extra questions about educational background and interest in continuing education. An interesting finding is that obtaining a degree in technical communications is not the preferred route to becoming a technical communicator (see Figure 3). The most popular field of study was the humanities, including English and other languages. Technical communication and journalism followed. Study in scientific areas is less common. Everyone responding to the survey stated that they had participated in some form of continuing education; one-third said that this happened at least yearly. Employers paid the costs for more than 75% of the people who identified themselves as direct employees, whereas the consultants/contractors (with one exception) paid their own education costs. The most common format for continuing education was seminars and workshops delivered outside company surroundings; two people specifically identified STC workshops as training sources. Several people have taken advantage of distance learning opportunities over the Internet. Format for continuing education outside seminars 27 in-house training 13 formal classes 10 distance learning 6 self study 4 More than 85% of respondents said they would be interested in attending classes at a local college. The most commonly mentioned topics of interest were web design and HTML, online help, usability, and design. What we do Over the last four years, more and more technical communicators are focusing on software documentation as shown in Figure 4. However, less than half of this year's respondents (42%) said they work for companies or organizations whose primary business is software, showing how pervasive information systems and software has become in all organizations. In fact, PMC members work for a wide variety of organizations: engineering and financial (including tax) companies accounted for just 15% each, and no other category (hospitals, biotech/pharma, chemical, computer hardware) had more than 6% response. Most of what we do is write: fully two-thirds of respondents gave their primary job function as writer; 20% are editors; others are web developers, information designers, supervisors, and indexers. Where and how does our work appear? Many said they publish in more than one medium, but there may be a move away from hard copy: Type of output 2000 1998 print 85% 94% online 55% 60% web 39% 36% cd 24% 19% A total of twenty respondents (60% of the total) said they produce some form of online help. Articles in News & Views over the last year by Cheri Lockett Zubak and Craig Marion have discussed the various techniques and viewers for presenting online help, including WinHelp or HTML help viewers or embedding help directly in the application software. The crosstab below shows the methods reported in the survey (e.g., nine use WinHelp only, four use WinHelp and HTML). WinHelp HTML embedded WinHelp 9 HTML Help 4 3 embedded 1 1 2 Toolbox Yes, Microsoft Word was cited by 100% of the people who filled out the toolbox section of the survey questionnaire. Other frequently cited applications are listed below (the number of people responding in a category is shown in parenthesis). Compared to previous years, Word, RoboHelp, Paintshop Pro, and Visio have become even more dominant. Last year web design did not have enough response to be significant; interestingly, a write-in-Homesite-was the second most frequently cited application for web design. hardcopy publishing (31)
Microsoft Word	100%
FrameMaker	39%
PageMaker	29%
WordPerfect	10%
online help (17)
RoboHelp	82%
Doc-to-Help	18%
Forehelp	12%
web design (12)
FrontPage	67%
Homesite	25%
Hotdog Pro	17%
PageMill	8%
illustration (19)
Paintshop Pro	63%
Visio	58%
Corel Draw	26%
PhotoShop	21%

In the catch-all "Other tools I use...", PowerPoint, Access, and Acrobat were the applications receiving more than one citation.

As the software is dominated by programs running on PCs, it is not surprising that 93% of the people returning the survey use PCs (some add workstations and mainframes to the PC); just 6% use Apple Macintosh. Computers, email, and web access are ubiquitous: only one respondent did not have a computer at home, and only one person reported that they did not have web access at work. Use of the Internet is varies: two-thirds say they log-on less than three hours per week, but 20% use it more than ten hours per week. Nearly half have been to the PMC web site three or more times in the last year, although twelve per cent of the group still have not checked it out.

A survey like this one can help you benchmark yourself alongside your peers. By characterizing the marketplace and the most common skill sets, it also can give some direction to educators training the next generation of technical communicators. I hope you find it useful. Please send me any suggestions for improving the survey (and increasing the response rate!) for the future.

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Last updated: October 10, 2000 (mvh)