[wsostt]

I would add that good writing is required for all career advancement.

Senior engineers or architects may do more design than coding and the design needs to be conveyed likely as writing and hopefully a couple diagrams.

Managers absolutely need to be good writers to communicate effectively, advocate for their team, and tell the story of the team’s work.

If you’re an engineer and want to have a higher level job than you have now, getting better at writing is only going to help. I’m not saying it’s a MUST because I’m sure there’s some outliers, but it won’t hurt.

[MisterBastahrd]

If you want to get ahead, writing will not get you very far. I'm not saying that the skill isn't important, but it's down toward the middle of the list in terms of importance. Most managers are average to terrible writers. And yet at the same time, they invariably tend to be better than average verbal communicators, because being able to connect on a social level is vastly more important than being able to connect through prose. You don't have to trust me on this, just look at how political elections are won. Candidates don't submit long articles to the press that support their positions, they get up on a stage and attempt to connect with crowds on an emotional level. It's no different in business. Senior management wants to have managers who can verbally motivate their employees with a short chat and a pat on the back instead of some essay.

[MattPalmer1086]

That may be true if you see getting ahead as meaning becoming an ever more senior manager. I do agree that social and verbal skills (and political) skills are important there.

My own verbal and political skills aren't great. I am not a manager! Writing well has been good for me personally in terms of being able to organise my own thoughts better, and to be succinct in a way I can't when I speak.

I find my opinion is consulted frequently partly because I can summarise complex issues and present it in a way others can work with.

[crabkin]

I'd be pretty surprised if good verbal communicators aren't usually good writers. I think politicians persuade people not by the clarity, conciseness, or coherence of their speech, but by the substance of their speech. If communication itself could be abstracted from the substance of what is communicated, then it wouldn't be true I think to attribute the success of certain politicians to their ability to communicate so much as their ability to choose what to communicate.

A writer has to be interesting though, every piece of writing we consider well written has a quality of gripping the mind. I'd argue then, that politicians though they may not be in the habit of writing long academic style treatises or "interesting" articles, perhaps it can be argued in the past they largely did, still if they are in part elected on the basis of their speech, must possess the same ability in writing.

If you don't believe me then how is it that Trump's tweets are works of art, "I have never seen a think person drinking Diet Coke,"The Coca Cola company is not happy with me--that's okay, I'll still keep drinking that garbage.", etc... Crude, in bad taste, whatever you say. Another example is Obama, who honestly has a gift for writing in the conventional sense.

[jackson1442]

I think it depends who you ask. If you watch most populist speeches, it’s all in the performance. How they move their hands, their bodies, they create an almost theatrical narrative by how they get loud and quiet throughout the speech.

You can also have incredibly skilled orators where it’s all in the substance, but you can really only do that if you message actually has substance to it in the first place.

[diatone]

This is an interesting position to take. I’ve been back and forth with my N+1 about the utility of sync vs async comms to lead, and I can never nail down a result I’m happy with. Like, sync comms is effective for ladder climbing as you say. But it has failure modes in remote-first teams of ICs across time zones that async comms don’t have. Async comms inherently scale further, too. Maybe their reach is is greater but the impact is lower? I wonder how far recorded video gets. Then you have mentoring juniors - much easier to do synchronously. What’s the appropriate mix?

[skwee357]

I agree with you. I consider writing as one of the MOST important skills in life.

However, being an engineer, and writing in my engineering blog, I targeted mainly engineers.

But yeah, everyone will benefit from good writing skills.

[jaylittle]

It's a shame that more here don't realize that. Being able to communicate is paramount.

[oscillonoscope]

In my experience, writing skill rarely matters as much as people think. A large portion of my coworkers won't bother to read what anyone wrote or put effort into comprehending it. I try to make good documentation but I know it's pretty much just for my future self.

[IneffablePigeon]

This is _exactly_ why it is important.

Most of what you write will be skimmed or not read at all. The only way to increase your odds is to make your writing engaging (to improve chances of it being read) and clear and concise (to improve chances of comprehension).

Another oft overlooked skill is to know when to repeat your message in multiple places, and how to do so without it being irritating or noisy or irrelevant (see also: when not to write anything at all). Again, this increases the chance your message gets across.

[oscillonoscope]

There is no amount of writing skill that allows people to read complex technical documentation without any effort put into reading comprehension. All you're going to do is put your own career on hold as people see you putting large amounts of effort into nothing productive. Dave gets his documentation done in a sprint, why can't you?

[bruce511]

Obviously your context will vary. My experience is not your experience.

Early in my career I took something that was technically complex for me, and wrote it up as a book, using the path that lead me to understanding it.

Assuming that some of my peers might benefit from what I learned, I "self published" (aka printed copies on demand on my newly bought double-sided printer) and sold it for $50. I sold about 1000 copies over the next few years.

The money wasn't earth-shattering, but the effect on my career was immense. I was the one who literally "wrote the book". As far as resumes go, it's pretty up there.

Part of the success (I think) was that it was specifically designed to be an easy read. The goal was to get to the end and "know" a bunch of stuff, without it ever being anything but obvious.

I think it was helped by understanding where my own mental blocks were, and by unpicking those blocks, allowed others to easily disassemble and pass them.

In my experience the biggest block to learning is in understanding that something we absolutely positively know to be true, is actually false. Without letting it go first your brain refuses to accept the new (however simple) because it clashes with what is "true". But that's a digression for another thread.

[urthor]

I agree with this, immensely.

Your goal is to get your message across when your writing is skimmed.

That takes immense skill as a writer. Immense skill.

Paris Review is a great book to get an overview of mastering this skill.

[arvinsim]

As someone struggling to write, doing an engineering blog seems to be a fantastic way to start improving.