When I was a technical writer in the dark ages, we created paper manuals in really large three-ring binders, and we spent hours maintaining them. There were times when there were 40-50 three-ring binders stacked in my cube. We no longer use blue editing pencils, Xacto knives, or wax to paste up page designs.

Our training materials or process documents are about the largest documents that we create now. Most of our work includes test plans and lots of job aids/quick reference guides. My technical writer is now developing online and computer-based training with multimedia. We also do some business analysis with a lot of editing and proofreading.

Roles, tasks, and technology are ever evolving. We process and use information differently than we did even three years ago. However, some things that haven't changed are the core competencies. These skills include:

• good, clear writing
• spelling
• proofreading
• knowledge of your audience
• ability to organize materials
• translation of technical material to Plain English

Even though we don't do things the same way (or even not at all any more), the basic skills are still important.