I knew long before I graduated from college that I wanted to find a job as a writer, but I had no idea that this job would help me eventually start my own writing business.
Right after graduation, I started working as a technical writer for a consulting firm that handled documentation for big financial companies. Basically we sat down with different departments in the company, documented their various procedures, and turned them into manuals they could use for recordkeeping and training.
The company had a pretty big system where they did most of their work. This system handled virtually every part of the process of setting up and managing retirement funds. Even plan documents were all accessible online, as they were scanned into the system using high volume scanners, with the purpose of making them more easily accessible and streamlining the process for the many people who worked on each plan along the way.
This professional experience eventually helped me to become a freelance writer. I started freelancing part-time on the side, using my “day job” as a technical writer to help me get my foot in the door, and eventually quit my job to freelance full-time. I’ve never regretted that decision — nor the decision to work as a technical writer, because although the job was a miserable experience for me, it also gave me what I needed to start a successful business!