Paying Your Dues

Our level of experience is one of the most important aspects in the setting of salary level. Generally, we estimate experience based on the number of years a person has been working with a particular activity. In the 2001 WinWriters Salary Survey we asked the respondents how long they have been involved with the following three activities: technical communication, general user assistance development, and Windows Help development.

As might be expected, there is a clear increase in salary as the overall years of experience increase. Entry level annual salaries for individuals with three or less years experience are roughly two-thirds of the salaries for those with ten or more years experience.

The best way to bump your salary at a given experience level is by enhancing your foundation technical communication skills with skills specifically targeted at general user assistance and Windows Help development. While the type of Help being developed for Windows applications is currently in flux, Windows apps are still dominant in the PC software arena.