Guest post by Peggy Harvey.

In today’s world of technology changing in the blink of an eye, ongoing professional development isn’t an option for technical communicators, it’s a requirement. Over the past decade the field of technical communication has grown and gained more respect as a legitimate profession, and the complexities of the job and skill base required of technical communicators have also increased. Some of what’s new we can learn on the job—if we have a job—but sometimes we need to obtain the skills to stay vital in other ways.

When it comes to professional development in tech comm there are a lot of options. If you’re gainfully employed, enjoying what you do, and just need to brush up on the latest tool, then probably just a training seminar or a short online class is all you need. But if you’re not employed, or employed in a different capacity than you’d like to be, then you might want to consider a bigger educational commitment to make yourself more marketable as a technical communicator in today’s world.

In 2008 I stepped out of the working world to go back to school to earn my master’s degree in technical communication. While I’d started my career as a technical writer in a software development environment, I’d changed roles along the way, and by 2008 I was wondering how I’d gotten on the train I was on and, more importantly, how I could get off of it. I decided earning an advanced degree was the right decision for me, so in January, 2009, I took the plunge and started graduate school as a full-time student.

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Twitter has different uses for different people. For me, it’s primarily a professional development tool.

I follow a number of technical writers. I also follow the #techcomm hashtag. I keep Twitter open while I work (to this point, we’re allowed to do so). When someone I follow posts a link on a subject that I’m interested in, or an interesting link is posted to the #techcomm tag, I copy the link to my tasks list in Gmail with a few words from the person’s tweet so that I remember what it’s about.

I usually don’t follow these links while at work for a couple of reasons. First, I’m in the middle of working and don’t want to derail myself by clicking the link; second, the links are typically shortened, and I have no way of knowing where they’ll go (at least not with Twhirl, the Twitter client I’m using). I don’t want to follow a shortened link to a questionable site at work, so I leave them for reading on my personal machine at home so I’m not taking any professional risks.

It is a bit annoying, though, when you’re following a hashtag, and after one person tweets with that hashtag, a bunch of other people retweet. Then you get a broken record clogging things up. But that’s the price of following a hashtag, I suppose.

Out of the people I follow, @dmnguys is the most prolific poster of links to tech comm information and related subjects, such as user experience design and usability. Thanks, Scott and Aaron. I don’t read everything, but you give me a good variety to choose from.

Sometimes I post something that’s just a thought I find humorous. But most of the people I’m connected to via Twitter are technical communicators, so Twitter is a way for me to interact with people in my field with whom I may not interact otherwise. I probably don’t offer them as much as they usually offer me, but over time, I hope that will change.