The document summarizes the results of a survey of 393 technical communicators. It finds that: 1. Most technical communicators are women aged 40-60 working in hi-tech, manufacturing, or healthcare. They spend a third of their time authoring content and a fifth reviewing content. 2. Small companies have technical communicators who author more content and interact more with end users than those at large enterprises. 3. Over 70% of technical communicators own smartphones, with higher rates among younger generations. About 45% currently publish content for mobile or plan to. 4. Mobile publishing is more widely adopted than social media for engaging end users, though some industries are leading in both mobile and

1. STC 2013
Who is today’s technicalcommunicator?
Kapil Verma| Sr. Product Manager, Adobe

2. Dilemma

3. A few questions we set out to answer
through the survey..
Who is a technical communicator and
where does she work?
How does she do her work?
Is she leveraging the latest technology in
her work?

4. Who is a technical communicator?
68%
32%
Baby
Boomer,
56%
Gen X,
40%
Gen Y, 4%
~70% of technical
communicators are women..
..and is comprised mainly of
Baby Boomer and Gen X
Source: Survey to STC members, N = 393
Baby boomer: Born before 1962; Gen X = Born between 1962-1982; Gen Y = Born after 1982

5. Where does she work?
Small
Medium
Large
Enterprise 30%
23%
25%
22%
Across small and big
companies..
Source: Survey to STC members, N = 393
Small=1-99FTE; Medium=100-999;Large=1K-5K;Enterprise=>5K FTE
..and few key industries
make up the majority
Other
18%
Fin-Serv
6%
Utilities
6%
Remaining
20%
Hi-Tech
28%
Manufacturing
9%
Health/Pharma
7%
Education
6%
Top 4
50%

6. Time spent on various activities
Author
Review
Publish
Curate
Convert
33%
19%
8%
5%
5%
Meetings 12% Fixing content issues 8% Others 10%

7. Small companies spend more time on authoring
and less in meetings 
36
8
29
14
Author Review Publish Curate Content
Conversion
Fix issues Meetings
% of time spent on various activities
Small
Enterprise
Source: Survey to STC members, N = 393
Small, N = 85; Enterprise, N = 118

8. Words written per week and SME collaboration
<500
1K
2K
5K
21%
32%
25%
17%
5%
# of words written per week
Distribution of respondents by word range
Average
<5
10
20
54%
SME collaboration
Distribution of respondents by # SME collaborate with
Average
30%
9%
5%
NONE 3%
Enterprise
professionals
collaborate with 1.5x
more SMEs than
their peers in small
companies
1.6K 6.4

9. Technical communicators are leveraging variety of
channels to interact with the end users
None
29%
1 to 4
29%
5 to 10
16%
10 to 20
8%
20 - 50
9%
> 50
9%
End user interaction
Distribution %age by # end user interaction/month
• Average: ~13 interactions per month
• Small companies have 1.5x # of interactions
compared to Enterprises
78%
58%
53%
21%
8%
45%
Email
Meetings
Phone
Online Forum
Blog
Other
Channels of interaction
% of respondents using medium to interact with users
Source: Survey to STC members, N = 393
Small, N = 85; Enterprise, N = 118

10. Smartphone ownership
Don’t own a
smartphone, 29%
34%
13%
10%
6%
5%
Own a smartphone
71%
Source: Survey to STC members, N = 393
Small, N = 85; Enterprise, N = 118

11. Some interesting facts about smartphone
ownership
77% of Gen X & 87% of Gen Y own a smartphone Vs. 64%
for Baby boomer generation
71% of women own a smartphone Vs. 64% of Men.
iPhone is more popular women and Android among men
~80% of professionals in hi-tech companies own a smartphone
Vs. 54% in manufacturing and healthcare
Overall, Tech Comm has higher smartphone ownership of
~70% compared to 54% for general US population
Source: Survey to STC members, N = 393; comscore research for overall US population smartphone ownership, Feb’13
Small, N = 85; Enterprise, N = 118

12. Publishing to mobile devices
41%
13%
32%
13%
Publishing
to mobile
Planning to
Not decided
No Plans
45% will have
content on
mobile
Publishing to mobile
Distribution by status of mobile publishing
• Industry differences
• Hi-Tech (53%)
• Education (63%)
• Manufacturing (43%)
• Healthcare (36%)
• No significant difference based
on company size, generation
and gender
Source: Survey to STC members, N = 393
Numbers in parantheses, represent using or planning to publish to mobile

13. Social Media usage to engage with end users
Currently
using
17%
Planning to
15%
Not
decided
14%
No plans
54%
Column1
Use of social media in end user engagement
Distribution by status of mobile publishing • Most popular social media sites
• Industry differences
• Hi-Tech (38%)
• Education (42%)
• Manufacturing (31%)
• Healthcare (25%)
• Generation differences
• Baby Boomer: 28%
• Gen X = 37%
68% 62% 29%
Source: Survey to STC members, N = 393
Numbers in red represent using or planning to leverage social media to engage with end users
32% will be
using social
media

14. In conclusion..
1. Mobile publishing expected to gain more traction in tech
comm. space, more than social media
2. Small companies produce more, spend less time in
meetings and interact more with their end users
3. Some industries are early adopters
4. Newer generation and their attitude towards new
technology is going to change the face of tech comm.

15. Thank you! .com/adobetcs
@KapilVermaAdobe
blogs.adobe.com/techcomm