Tribute to leadership

I reconnected to Rusi Brij through LinkedIn last year. He was my first manager who introduced me to technicalcommunication. He was in charge of marketing and publications in Sonata and called me to interview for thepost of Technical Editor. I had never heard of that role before and he suggested that I try it out with anassignment. He felt that I would be suitable for the job with my combined background in Literature andComputer Software, rather rare two decades ago. I tried it out, liked it, and stayed on.I was thrilled to connect with him and decided I’d call him on my next visit to the US, which was in June thisyear. I hadn’t been in touch with him over the years and there was too much to catch up over email. On May 22

, I got the sudden andsad news that he had passed away. He had cancer but most people didn’t know that. I never did end up calling him. Thank you, Rusi, forhelping me determine my career. I wish I could tell you about STC and everything.Rusi was a gentle soul and what I remember about him most was that he was a good human being. A valuable lesson in management thatis rarely taught in classes. Leaders shouldn’t lose sight of it despite difficult times, changes, challenges, and threats. A lot of things can belearnt in B-schools, but the most important attribute of a leader – integrity - cannot be taught. That stays with you across jobs, people, andprojects. Build it, maintain it, and it will stay with you regardless of organisation.The other lesson I learnt from him was to identify talents and skills quickly and provide the right opportunities. Too often, managers arecaught up in their ego and do not cultivate leadership talent as they fear a threat to their position. With layoffs becoming commonplace,insecurity sometimes rules over good judgment while developing people. The mediocre or the sycophants rise more quickly, which is ashame.I pondered over the knowledge I had gained from Rusi, but not quite realized till now. I remembered a couple of my other managers whocontributed a lot to my leadership development.Rich Cahalan was the COO of Trillium in the US, where I joined as a Technical writer/Instructional designer. He gave me the opportunity torise as a leader and provided me with the required authority and helped to remove obstacles in my path. A valuable lesson in fairness,where the fact that I was an Indian did not matter and I eventually became the Director of Documentation and Training with a mostly American team plus a few Canadians and Indians. Probably the most rewarding stint in my career so far.Most of my initial management training was on the job by emulating all that I appreciated in Dave O’Brien, VP, and my next manager inTrillium. I learnt from him the true importance of career growth through professional development plans, professionalism, creating a funand rewarding work environment with high productivity, thinking out-of-the box, moving from operational to strategic management, andmany other tips. After that, I was hooked on management and leadership, and continually strove to improve in these areas in various jobs, taking classes,and reading. Leadership is so abstract and dynamic that no one can really claim to have mastered it. I have had many managers in mylong career, and have acquired many things from them—BKMs (Best Known Methods) and WKMs (Worst Known Methods)—both form animportant part of education.For all managers and leaders—here’s a 20-point summary of the wisdom gleaned over the years:Be a good human being1.Be fair2.Have integrity3.Develop good judgment4.Discard ego if it’s blinding you5.Don’t be insecure6.Recognise talent quickly7.Provide or create the right opportunities8.Encourage career growth through Individual Development Plans9.Encourage professional development through training and industry activities10.Strike a balance between the individual, team, and company—you have a responsibility to all11.Cultivate good leadership12.Don’t encourage sycophants13.Don’t play favourites14.Delegate with authority15.Remove obstacles16.Be professional17.Create a conducive work environment—the rest will follow18.Be open to new ideas19.

Continually hone your leadership skills20.For everyone out there, a few final points:Learn from your managers (good points and bad).1.Develop your leadership skills irrespective of position. I recommend reading a book called, “

You don’t need a title to be a leader,

” by Mark Sanborn.2.Do recognise and thank good managers who have developed you or coached you. Management is often a difficult and thankless job, and some sincere (not sycophantic) appreciation can be motivating.3.In this year’s conference, we will have a separate Leadership track focusing on management and leadership topics and workshops. I amon the Content Committee and will be working on this track. If you have suggestions and requests for topics to be covered, do submit it inthe form given on the conference web site. You can even win a prize!So don’t wait till it’s too late. Submit that idea. Make that call. Show your gratitude.

— Sandhya, President - STC India Chapter

Open-Source Software for Technical Writers

— Harjot Singh Dhodi

When the question of cost-cutting arises, one area where companies find it tough to compromise is on thelicensing cost of the tools. In most cases, the cost is billable to the client because requirement is of theclient's. Sometimes however, where there is no specific requirement for a particular tool, the cost is borne bythe service provider. For companies that are struggling in the current times because of the economicslowdown, an option that might not compromise on product quality is to switch to open-source software.In this article, I will talk about open-source publishing tools for the writing community.Recently, I came across several good open-source software that you can use for technical writing and graphic designing. Some of theseare:

Dia -

Dia is an open-source diagramming tool that is similar to the commercial Microsoft Visio, but less powerful. It can beused with Linux, UNIX, and Windows under the GPL license. With Dia, you can drawing entity relationship diagrams, UMLdiagrams, flowcharts, network diagrams, and many other kinds of diagrams. It is also possible to add support for newshapes by writing simple XML files and using a subset of SVG to draw the shape. Moreover, Dia can load and save diagramsto a custom XML format and in other formats such as EPS, SVG, XFIG, WMF and PNG.To try your hand on this tool, visithttp://www.gnome.org/projects/dia/.

Inkscape -

Inkscape is an open-source graphics editor, with features similar to Adobe Illustrator, CorelDRAW, or Xara X. Ithas many advanced SVG features such as markers, clones, alpha blending, and so on. With its streamlined user interface,Inkscape is very easy to use. The Inkscape Web site has knowledge-base resources, documentation, and a Wiki for productsupport.To try your hand on this tool, visithttp://www.inkscape.org/download/?lang=en.

OpenOffice.org -

OpenOffice.org is the leading office software suite for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations,graphics, and databases. The product suite is available in multiple languages and can be used on all common computers.The tool is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux platforms, and replicates much of the functionality of Microsoft Office Wordand Excel. In addition, it reads and writes to Microsoft Office formats and supports the OpenDocument Format (ODF) 1.2standard. Moreover, with this tool, you can maintain compatibility with Microsoft Office users by setting the documentoptions to be saved in Microsoft Office formats.To try your hand on this tool, visithttp://download.openoffice.org/.

GIMP -

GIMP stands for GNU Image Manipulation Program. This tool has features similar to Adobe Photoshop. With thistool, you can run a simple paint program, do quality photo-retouching, run online batch processes, render images for massproduction, and convert the file formats of images. The tool is expandable, extensible, and can be augmented with plug-ins.The GIMP Web site has product documentation.To try your hand on this tool, visithttp://www.gimp.org/.

Scribus -

Scribus is an open source, award-winning program that creates professional page layouts on Linux, UNIX, Mac OS

X, OS/2, and Windows platforms. Scribus has professional publishing features such as CMYK color, separations, ICC colormanagement, and versatile PDF creation. It has a community that assists beginners and professionals through a mailing list,IRC channel, Wiki, contracted support, and bugtracker.To try your hand on this tool, visithttp://www.scribus.net/.

Eclipse Help System –

Eclipse was originally an IBM product but now falls under the open-source category. The EclipseHelp System has a powerful IDE that includes its own help system based on an XML table of contents that reference HTMLfiles. With this tool, you can build easy-to-use and searchable help documentation.To try your hand on this tool, visithttp://www.ibm.com/developerworks/opensource/library/os-echelp/#resources.The aim of this article is to spread awareness and promote the use of open-source software among writers and designers, withoutcompromising on the work quality. However, sometimes the software can cost more in terms of time, support, troubleshooting, andconfiguration.

About the Author

Harjot Singh Dhodi

is an Associate Consultant – Technical Writing Group in

GlobalLogic, Noida

. His experience in technical writing is close to six years. He can be reached at harjotdhodi@gmail.com .

Editor's footnote: Not all open-source software applications are free. Open-source software might have restrictions on commercial use.

The Voice Speaks

— Sharada Palagummi

I learnt that a verb is the most essential part of speech. So, I thought investing a little time to learn to use itbetter (if not master it) might not be a bad idea. But then, there are so many aspects of a verb. Can I eversay

I learnt

it?I can try one proven (presumably by the British) method: divide and conquer. I will start with the voice of averb, the much-talked-about aspect of a verb.The general opinion on the Active Voice and the Passive Voice seems to be:

Go for the Active Voice.Go for the Passive Voice.

I want to know exactly whodoes what. Make that clearto me.

Oh, don’t bother me withwho is doing it. Just tell mewhat happens. “Brevity is the soul of wit”.Even one word is one toomany. You don’t need to worry. Ihave time to read all that iswritten and I am intelligentenough to figure out what ishappening.Do not obfuscate. Come tothe subject directly.OK, tell me what the matteris and then tell me who isresponsible for it.Now, let’s see how it works in the life of a reader of technical content.When you save a document as a Web page, thetextures and gradients