STC Usability SIG Newsletter
Usability Interface

Include the Usability SIG in Your Professional Development Plan

By Karen Bachmann, Usability SIG Manager

Saul Carliner’s "Employment Trends for 2003" (intercom, January 2003) projected a somewhat bleak outlook for the technical communication job market in 2003. It ended with the positive predictions for long-term career opportunities. For usability professionals and advocates, whose role is less familiar to many companies, this outlook can be disheartening. So what can you do now? Prepare your personal professional development plan.

When job markets are tight, people naturally want to reduce spending to keep more in reserve. However, now is the exactly the time you should not only maintain your professional development budget but also make as much extra investment as you can. Consider a common marketing professional lament about companies cutting marketing budgets when they should be increasing spending. Those companies that continue to market during the lean times will be the ones that customers think about first when the economy begins to improve. The same logic applies to continuing to invest in professional development: When the right opportunity becomes available, you will be in a position to know about and take it.

A professional development plan is not just a list of New Year’s resolutions to take this training course or research that trend, but a careful assessment of goals for your career—near term and long term—and the specific activities that will help you achieve those goals. Such a plan will help you allocate those scarce resources of time, money, and energy to the right activities. It can also help you discover more opportunities for employment even in troubled times.

The kinds of goals you set depend on your unique situation and needs. If you are new to usability, your goals might include designing and conducting a usability test for a current project or learning about the benefits, limitations, and techniques for heuristic analysis. For current usability professionals, goals could be gaining one new usability client or publishing an article on your research or professional experiences.

With your goals set, determine what activities will help you reach your goals. Some activities to consider include:

• Reading one journal or online article each week to keep current with research,
• Attending an STC telephone seminar on a usability topic,
• Pursuing a degree in usability,
• Attending a meeting at a local chapter of a professional society for a related discipline that interests you,
• Participating in usability communities locally and internationally (the latter includes discussion lists and other interactive online activities),
• Attending a local networking event once a quarter to interact with your peers and to meet potential employers,
• Mentoring a younger member of the profession (you might be surprised at what you will learn),
• Publishing a case study article about a successful usability project,
• Presenting a session about your techniques for approaching usability tasks at the STC annual conference.

We all know the importance of doing these types of activities. A professional development plan can encourage you to follow-through on achieving your goals. Of course, even doing all the right activities cannot guarantee that you will to achieve every goal. However, this approach will likely put you in a better position to succeed regardless of the current economy than people who do not actively manage their professional development.

While I am undeniably biased, the fact that you are reading this article suggests that you probably agree that professional societies are a good resource for professional development. The Usability SIG can help you achieve your goals by providing education and learning resources; publishing articles about the profession; and providing a professional community through discussion lists, local SIGs, and meetings at the STC annual conference.

As I’ve mentioned in other articles, we continue to look at new ways to effectively and efficiently meet your professional development needs. We all know the importance of doing these types of activities. A Professional Development plan can encourage you to follow through on achieving your goals. Of course, even doing all these activities cannot guarantee that you will achieve every goal. Please contact me at karen@seaconinc.com if you want to know more ways to be involved.