Earlier this week, I was chatting to a hiring manager from a well known Silicon Valley company about how to hire UX Writers. The conversation went back and forth on the usual topics: how it was difficult to find mid-level writers, how it was hard to find writers that could write for a B2B audience, how long it takes to hire etc.
At the end of the conversation, I asked if their company was open to hiring remote UX Writers, even on a freelance basis, as a way to bridge the gap between identifying the right candidate and operating as usual in the interim.
Their response was very telling, and is a good piece of insight for anyone looking for a remote UX Writing role.
“UX is a contact sport,” they said. “You need to be in constant contact to get the job done.”
Just like you can’t play cricket (or baseball) over the internet, so companies find it hard to hire UX Writers in remote roles.
There’s a common misconception that the role is 100% writing. It isn’t. It’s barely 10% of the role. You can be a remote content writer but until we have good enough V.R. software then you won’t be able to replicate the in-person features of the role. This isn’t about the future of working, it’s the reality of work today.
And given my Zoom calls bug out so often, I don’t see that happening any time soon. The robots are coming, albeit very, very slowly.
Speaking of jobs, I posted
this on Twitter earlier this week. A number of people have asked if they can submit jobs to the newsletter for review. The answer is “always yes”. Will I post all of them? Unlikely, but I read every one. If you are hiring for a UX Writer you can use this
handy submission form [it’s free].
I’ve started to look around the job market in a very light oh-not-yet-maybe-in-a-few-months-let’s-have-coffee type way. One resource I’ve been using to get back in the swing of things is Ryan Farrell’s
Daily UX Writing Challenge.
I’ll do more of a thorough write-up when I’ve completed it (I must admit, I have struggled to complete the challenge every day), but if you are job-hunting there isn’t a better resource out there for getting tangible practice at the sort of hiring tasks you’ll be set when you interview.