Technical Writer Manager

About Aerospike

At Aerospike, we dream big. Our focus is helping companies tackle seemingly insurmountable problems and doing what’s never been done before. That is why we developed the world's leading real-time data platform that powers mission-critical applications at the world's most innovative, category disrupting companies. Our customers have deployed extreme scale real-time applications to fight fraud, dramatically increase shopping cart size, enable global digital payments, and deliver hyper-personalized user experiences to tens of millions of customers. Customers like Airtel, Experian, Nielsen, PayPal, Snap, Verizon Media, Wayfair, and many others rely on Aerospike as the data foundation for the future to help them act in the microsecond moments that matter. Aerospike is headquartered in Mountain View, California and has a global presence with offices in London, Bangalore and Tel Aviv.

Job Description

Technical writers communicate complex information clearly, concisely and accurately, and well-structured from an end-user perspective. As a technical writer, your role involves tasks such as writing conceptual overviews and procedures, reading and writing example code, or updating help center queries and FAQs. Technical writers at Aerospike are a key link between engineers, product management, developer advocates, and all the external users and developers, tying together many vital but disparate parts of the Aerospike ecosystem.

We are looking for a Technical Writer Manager who is experienced, confident, and excited about working with cutting-edge technology. You will manage a team of writers (4-6 Technical Writers), set direction, give feedback, collaborate internally and lend specific content expertise. Using your extensive technical and leadership experience, you will interact with engineering and other internal and external groups to define team deliverables, priorities and processes. You will also contribute to the writing and editing of the documentation and be a member of the process improvement teams.

Responsibilities

• Work with Product Management, Engineering, Developer Relations, and other partner teams to plan content strategies and deliverables for Aerospike products and features.
• Work with functional leads to manage team workload and priorities.
• Execute on strategies for improving document quality and customer experience with docs.
• Coordinate staffing needs.
• Coach writers in their work and assist them in developing their careers.
• Create easy-to-understand and in-depth technical content – documentation, code samples, tutorials, or multimedia content, which demonstrate the best and easiest way to use Aerospike products.
• Take raw information and advice about product features and behaviors and try out the features as a user would, and use your experiences to develop content.
• Proactively identify documentation needs and gaps, establish feedback loops to gather customer feedback, and then work closely with key stakeholders to prioritize and plan documentation updates.
• Ensure documentation is end-user focused and enables the customer to understand and use the product.

Minimum Qualifications

• 5 years of experience managing or leading technical writers
• Experience in team management.
• Comprehensive, intensive, practical knowledge to include grammar, punctuation, spelling and usage of the English language, writing techniques and editing procedures.
• Proficient with Git and GitHub.
• Fluent in technical and common office software such as Jira, Confluence and Google docs.
• Ability to quickly grasp technical concepts.
• Keen eye for detail and for the depth and breadth of information to provide users with exactly what they need.
• Experience driving documentation for key product features.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Understanding of Database concepts (either SQL or NoSQL) and the Database ecosystem.
• Knowledge of modular documentation practices. Experience writing in a lightweight mark-up language such as Markdown.
• Illustration or diagramming experience; ability to turn information into an easy-to-understand illustration.
• Experience leading and writing excellent documentation for developers (e.g, APIs, SDKs).
• Experience documenting cloud-based infrastructure (e.g., virtual machines, networking, containers)
• Experience managing teams with multiple stakeholders across a variety of product areas.
• Experience managing and leading technical writing teams in a fast-paced, dynamic environment.

Aerospike is an Equal Opportunity Employer. We are committed to providing an environment free from discrimination on the basis of race, religion, color, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, non-disqualifying physical or mental disability, national origin, veteran status, or any other basis covered by appropriate law.

Salary Range: $150,000 - $180,000