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Comment by brooklyn_ashey | Hacker News Reader

Wait...does anybody care about writing skills anymore? ——outside—or even inside—journalism? I wish they did. Writing seems to be treated like a 20th century skill of the uber-affluent layabout these days. I jump for joy when I stumble upon some great writing on the internet.

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Yes. Try consulting. Information security consulting to be precise our work product is a written report. We have to communicate nuanced and complex topics to a variety of audiences. Writing well, even technical writing, is hard and it’s not as obvious as code when it is not quite right. We care deeply about it. Writing clean proposals, white papers, blog posts etc. It all matters to us. Sure your average coding job doesn’t require it, but plenty of work does. And I do believe having communication skills at a high level in a written form is a competitive advantage. It’s hard to see, but in the long run people who can eloquently write their ideas have an advantage on the less articulate.

The number of people in this thread breezily dismissing the value of effective writing is taking my breath away. I don't think these confident declarations we're getting in this thread paint a remotely accurate portrayal of skills that actually help career advancement. I think everyone's kind of playing a game where it's treated as a trick question and they're looking to emphasize the exceptions as much as possible.

Any sort of work, in say, nonprofits, or public relations, or marketing, or consulting, or any institution where you're at a level of management where your job is to present plans and preside over their progress while being accountable to oversight, and these are examples of the top of my head where I have at least some sort of familiarity, are places where strong writing is an asset. And I'm sure I'm just pointing to a small slice that I know from my own experience. These aren't special exceptions. These are the norm. The counterexamples make me wonder what, if any, actual career experience people are actually drawing from to claim otherwise, or whether they have the perspective to understand how representative those counter-examples actually are.

Throughout grad school, I worked as a writing tutor to support my humanities habit. Each new class of high school seniors was less skilled —and even less interested— in writing than the last. These were kids with 3.9 GPAs who went to Dalton, Horace Mann, Brearly, Choate and similar. I think great writing is a valuable life skill. I wish I could see more real-life evidence that employers care about it in the real world. (hiring and advancement)

My point is not so much that employers value it or not, but that it is a tool in your arsenal to advance yourself.

I literally just gave three or four entire industries where I feel it's almost certainly an important career skill based on my career contact with those fields.

The lack of responsiveness comments have to one other on the internet is disorienting to me, because I would have thought that this would merit acknowledgement. Your anecdote may as well have dropped out of the sky in response to basically any comment in this thread.

Shoot. I was trying to be supportive/positive. I have worked in many non-profits. I agree, writing virtuosity would be a tremendous asset in some of the jobs you mentioned. I have not yet encountered such skill in these realms. I’m all for bringing back literacy! Beautiful! But... unless one is employed at Harper’s or Granta, expect a less than orgasmic response to your stylish articulations. I’m still a fan of great writers.

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