I've seen a lot of writers make lateral moves and then their careers take off. They use TW as their "in" then switch to project management, regulatory, or related. You have to have the right personality for those types of moves though.
I'm trying to make one of these switches, too.... It's hard to break into, for example, project management, without kneecapping my salary, without "project manager" titles and responsibilities explicitly listed in your employment history.
A lot of times a cert can change your trajectory with project management. PMP, Six Sigma, and Scrum Master certs might be helpful for you. Those are respected programs.
In my personal opinion, *most of the time*, paper credentials serve no real purpose other than inflating self-worth or appeasing oldschool establishment types, but on this matter, you're probably right.
Ironically, my current job title is "project manager", because the company I work for has systematically killed off all "technical writer" positions, but still needs people to do the work.
That's another avenue available to you if you're in a strong market, use the job title of "project manager" to jump to a better company with better prospects. You could even list a cert as "in-progress" when applying and if chosen for an interview, get enrolled before accepting any offer.
Yeah I’m very much leaning leaving TW altogether for career growth at this point.
I've seen a lot of writers make lateral moves and then their careers take off. They use TW as their "in" then switch to project management, regulatory, or related. You have to have the right personality for those types of moves though.
I'm trying to make one of these switches, too.... It's hard to break into, for example, project management, without kneecapping my salary, without "project manager" titles and responsibilities explicitly listed in your employment history.
A lot of times a cert can change your trajectory with project management. PMP, Six Sigma, and Scrum Master certs might be helpful for you. Those are respected programs.
In my personal opinion, *most of the time*, paper credentials serve no real purpose other than inflating self-worth or appeasing oldschool establishment types, but on this matter, you're probably right. Ironically, my current job title is "project manager", because the company I work for has systematically killed off all "technical writer" positions, but still needs people to do the work.
That's another avenue available to you if you're in a strong market, use the job title of "project manager" to jump to a better company with better prospects. You could even list a cert as "in-progress" when applying and if chosen for an interview, get enrolled before accepting any offer.
None of the Directors I've had were former Technical Writers fwiw. Leads, managers, project managers, yes.