Technical Authorship - Case Studies

Mark Godfrey

After 22 years in the RAF, Weapons Engineer Mark Godfrey left with an Open University honours degree; a great deal of general, technical and instructional training; and experience with technical manuals, aircraft engineering management and working with people.

A Career Transition Workshop helped to ‘concentrate the mind on transition to civilian life and preparing for the job market; and showed how our expertise can translate to the civil job market.’ He also took an aircraft engineering course for a civil licence with Air Service Training in Scotland.

An Internet job search led Godfrey to a job as a technical trainer abroad. However, he is now a technical author with DCS based in Bristol. ‘I write technical documents which could be for an aircraft, a naval ship, a luxury yacht, a communication system or even a kettle.

‘I like working with a small team, investigating a product, seeing how it works, understanding how to maintain the product and conveying the information so that others can operate and maintain it. This is completely different to engineering with the RAF. I am now employed in a nine-to-five job, and I’m home with my family every night. I will be receiving a comparable wage to the one I earned in the RAF in the near future.’

Published June 07