Transform Your Tomorrow… Today at Curtiss-Wright
At Curtiss-Wright, you have the opportunity to transform the way our customers do business, as well as transform your career. Our entrepreneurial environment provides our employees with excellent experiences that enable them to develop their skills through stretch assignments and the opportunity to work with the best talent in the industry. At Curtiss-Wright, you will have the opportunity to contribute from day one. And…that’s just the beginning of how we help you transform your tomorrow.

The Opportunity | Technical Publications Team Lead

The Technical Publications team is responsible for all forms of user documentation for Curtiss-Wright products.   This includes documentation for hardware, software and system-level products, distributed via the Continuum Support Center web site, or on software Board Support Package CD-ROMs.  The group also develops interactive tools (for example backplane pinout configurators) that demonstrate our product's special features and capabilities, and enable end users to understand and use our products with a minimum amount of effort.

A key objective of the Technical Publications Team Lead is to ensure all user documentation projects are delivered with maximum accuracy and in sync with engineering product development schedules.  The ability to research and introduce innovative solutions to documentation challenges is a strong asset in this position, as is the ability to learn and use a wide variety of desktop publishing tools.

This team lead will primarily contribute (hands-on) to technical writing/editing at the senior level, and will also provide leadership for the Technical Publications group, providing strategic direction, maintaining awareness of trends in the technical writing profession, and keeping abreast of developments in tools and technology that affect the technical communication process. Mentors staff members, to ensure the highest principles of technical communication are adopted and followed by the group and that individual skills continually develop and improve.

Your Challenge

• Provide strategic direction for the Technical Publications group, ensuring the documents and services we provide meet or exceed our customer’s requirements, and that processes employed by the group are reliable and efficient.
• Provide day-to-day supervision of the Technical Publications group, facilitating open communication, instilling the team concept, working with team members to solve problems, etc.
• Ensure departmental output is of consistently high quality, contributing editorial guidance to the publications produced by the group.
• Ensure Technical Publications processes provide a good cross-functional fit with processes of other departments (e.g. Configuration Management, H/W and S/W Engineering) to contribute to the overall efficiency of the product development process.
• Develop documentation estimates, plans and schedules in harmony with related engineering product development plans and schedules.
• Research project plans and engineering specifications to develop draft documentation.
• Interview subject matter experts to obtain additional product information during draft creation phase.
• Develop documentation on schedule and within budget.
• Report on progress, schedules and requirements as required.
• Manage the documentation review process to ensure reviews take place in a timely manner and provide needed input.
• Maintain technical publication procedures.
• Ensure released documents are maintained and updated in response to CR’s.
• Work closely with other team members in technical publications and engineering, marketing, and customer support.
• Stay current with product development schedules, communicates priorities to team members.
• Work with team members on the development of their individual Performance Planning Process documents, conducts semi-annual one on one meetings with team members, helps establish training and development plans.

Your Expertise

• Technical Writing Diploma, or B.A. in English, B.Sc Engineering or Computer Science (with demonstrated writing skills) and/or equivalent experience.
• Minimum of 10 years technical writing experience; previous supervisory/management experience an asset.
• Strong leadership abilities and communication skills.
• Ability to write clear and concise documentation using correct grammar and spelling.
• Some technical knowledge related to embedded computers, digital signal processors, graphics/imaging, networking products to facilitate dialogue with subject matter experts in engineering and marketing.
• Familiar with the how to's of designing documentation for maximum usability.
• Innovative thinker - stays on top of technical writing trends and tools and actively seeks ways to improve our documentation and the related processes for documentation development.
• Excellent organizational abilities, including the ability to manage time when working on more than one project concurrently, as well as the ability to skillfully organize and structure large amounts of technical information.
• Team player - contributes ideas freely to the group, shares information and experiences.
• Sound working knowledge of Adobe FrameMaker and Adobe Acrobat required.   Some ability with additional desktop publishing tools such as Microsoft Visio, Microsoft Office, HTML editors, etc. are an asset in this position.   Nice to have:  programming experience with Javascript or Visual Basic.

This position may require exposure to information which is subject to US export control regulations such as the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). All applicants must meet eligibility requirements of the ITAR and of the Controlled Goods Directorate (CGD).