Tim’s Communication Services

Professional Profile

• Systems vision of communication strategies within business needs
• Creative & detail-oriented communications professional
• Equally comfortable in marketing, technical writing/editing, and journalism
• Writer, editor, project manager of easy-to-use marketing & technical communications
• Many years of marketing writing & editing, technical writing & editing, and journalism
• Technical and communication experience also includes audio & video production, satellite TV installation
• Quick learner, adaptable to new environments
• Team player & self-starter – able to set schedule and work on my own
• Dedicated to technical excellence, quality workmanship and satisfying customer needs
• Freelance writer, journalist & video production assistant
• Wrote news articles, product reviews, music reviews, bios, blogs

Summary of communications services

• Consultative sales & customer service (contact me directly for details on experience)
• Marketing support
• Content creation/design/editing for online help systems
• Technical writing and editing
• Marketing writing and editing
• Training writing
• Journalism
• Web copy
• Copyediting
• Developmental editing
• Proofreading
• Evaluation of online help systems
• Evaluation of business communication programs

Communications Career Highlights

• Pioneered, designed, wrote, edited and built easy-to-use online training & reference help system for NuStep sales staff based on single sourcing – saves employees time searching for information
• Recommended need analysis for an overall communications strategy at NuStep and UAW-Chrysler National Training Center
• Wrote & edited marketing collateral and website copy at NuStep
• Established, organized and created comprehensive style guide for contributors to Nustep’s online help system
• Wrote, edited technical documentation for Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Michigan & Creative Solutions
• Publication manager, editor, writer at UAW-Chrysler National Training Center
• Coordinated designer’s, writers’ and photographers’ work
• Wrote, edited, researched many news articles, profiles & music reviews
• Wrote, edited computer user maintenance documents
• Set up wiki for local Cub Scout pack

Contact me

I’m available for projects & contract work. I’m now seeking a full-time position.

Email: (to reduce spam, this email is spelled out) tim – dot- mantyla- at – gmail – dot – com.

Visit my technical communications blog at www.techwr-l.com/blog/1983

Writing/Editing samples

See my work samples at my LinkedIn page.

Organizations face communications challenges

Organizations face many communication challenges. There’s marketing, public relations, training and technical documentation just for starters. I can help you solve the following business problems with better communications:

• Save money
• Streamline communications
• Boost sales
• Improve your image
• Improve productivity
• Increase employee and customer satisfaction
• Implement innovations that streamline operations

Typical organization communication problems

Information is a huge resource for any organization. The faster and larger an organization grows, the larger a resource it is–and the greater a challenge it poses to manage. Specific challenges include:

1. Buzzwords and noise – Information that customers need to understand your products and services is tangled in buzzwords and jargon. The same is true for employees and suppliers.
2. Information sinks into silos – Many organizations grow so fast that they don’t coordinate all the information resources available. Unfortunately, because it’s difficult to coordinate this resource as a company grows, information often stays in “silos,” unused or underutilized. This means that information resources needed by some areas of the company stay within other areas until identified–often by accident. The result: the left hand doesn’t know what the right is doing–and never mind the left foot!
3. Lack of information – Sometimes employees who need key information can’t get it, don’t get it, or don’t get it in time to be effective at their jobs.
4. Duplication – Sometimes many departments churn through the same information in multiple formats when it could be done once.  Single sourcing can eliminate this problem.
5. Knowledge loss – Employees carry valuable knowledge and experience worth billions of dollars annually that gets lost in transitions like job loss, retirement, promotions or leaves of absence. Example:According to an Infosys Technologies, Ltd. white paper, Countering the Threat of Lost Knowledge, the cost to send men to the moon in the 1960s was $24 billion. Now it would cost $100 billion. Why so much more? “Because of a massive knowledge loss as engineers who developed and maintained this crucial know-how have retired. Further, important blueprints were either catalogued incorrectly or not at all.”
6. Blocks to information access – Often departments don’t know about, or can’t access, key information that other departments have.
7. Lack of training and/or documentation – Finally, many companies rely on one-to-one, personal training that worked great when the company employed only 12 people. But that method now reduces productivity the more it’s repeated. Documentation saves time and resources.

In short, many businesses suffer from:

• Unclear messages
• Too much, too-complex information
• Too little information coordination
• Wasted time and effort searching for or duplicating information
• Undocumented knowledge that is lost when employees leave
• Too much time in one-to-one training
• Lack of appropriate documentation and/or training

All of these problems drain company time, money and human resources. My services can help you fix or prevent these problems.