Engineering Words: Communicating clearly in the workplace

by Sharon Burton, Bonni Graham Gonzalez

Overview

Over the course of a career, every engineer needs to communicate, in both written and oral form, with other engineers and non-engineers. Yet, too many engineers never develop this basic skill. Engineering Words draws on the authors' extensive experience as technical communicators and teachers of a popular class in technical communication for engineers at the University of California, Riverside, to present a comprehensive introduction to communicating in the business world. This book covers everything from the basics of clear writing to résumés to cover letters to requirements documents to presentations and much more.

Engineering Words can be used as a textbook for classes that train engineers to be effective communicators. It can also serve as a self-study text that even experienced engineers will find useful for improving their communication skills.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781937434311
Publisher:	XML Press
Publication date:	02/27/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Sales rank:	105,365
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Sharon Burton works remotely for a cybersecurity company as a principal content strategist and teaches part time at the University of California, Riverside, in the Bourns College of Engineering. Leveraging her graduate cultural anthropology education, her career has been built around making content and content development easier for both the business and the consumers of the content. In that time, she's also taught upwards of 8,000 people in corporate and university-level courses.In her spare time, she knits, sews, cooks, grows food, bakes bread, and rides her bike, can be found on the back of a motorcycle, and, pandemic allowing, goes to the gym. Two or three nights a week, Sharon teaches baby engineers to communicate at the University of California, Riverside, as part of the engineering program.
Bonni Graham Gonzalez works for How to Manage a Small Law Firm, a coaching organization that teaches business skills to solo and small-law-firm owners. She also teaches part time at the University of California, Riverside, in the Bourns College of Engineering. Bonni's career has focused around storytelling, including designing and writing manuals that actually explain how to use products and creating award-winning marketing materials that both educate and sell. When not marketing or thinking about marketing, Bonni crochets, beads, cooks, plays with her dog, and goes on road trips with her husband.

Table of Contents

• Communication Guidelines: offers clear guidelines on the basics of writing for a business audience.
• Business Context: presents an overview of business finance and how writing for business peers and decision makers differs from writing in an academic context.
• Résumés and Cover Letters: shows you how to create cover letters and résumés that work.
• Flow of a Project: describes the phases of a project and the documentation required in each phase.
• Effective Presentations: shows you how to create effective presentation slides and deliver a powerful presentation.
• Human Cognition: describes how to use our understanding of how people think to communication more effectively.
• Construction Explanations: describes how to explain complex information using visual design and user-focused structure.
• Personas and Scenarios: describes how to create and use personas and scenarios effectively.
• Writing Specifications: describes the different types of specifications (technical, functional, test, etc.) and, through examples, shows how to write each type.