This page presents a few of the many compliments I have received regarding my technical writing and managing work. You can also find recommendations on my LinkedIn profile, and when needed, I can provide several excellent references.
From Adam Rifkin, Co-founder and CEO at Renkoo; Waterboy at 106 Miles; Meta-Architect and Cat Herder at mod-pubsub; formerly Director and Founder of KnowNow, and so on; basically, a Renaissance Man
“In addition to being one of the most articulate people I’ve ever met—and I mean it, she weaves through the nuances of language as if it were threads with which to spin fantastic and elaborate fabrics—Marina is generous, thoughtful, and beautiful. I love it how everyone’s mood is so much better immediately after she visits.”
From Don Fournier, Director of Publications, Progress Software
”First, let me thank you immensely for your work with us... You are a terrific project leader and really helped lead us through a critical phase, Apptivity 3.0, of Apptivity documentation development. I could completely entrust the daily decision-making to you, and you did a great job. Second, I enjoyed your work style and your personal style a lot. You make it so easy to work with you. ... I thank you for the mentoring, both explicit and implicit, you gave [employee N, whom I was training to become a publications manager], especially through your example.”
From Clement Wang, Senior Director, Product Management at Zuora
”Thanks again for all your help and professionalism.” (June 2009)
From Yufeng Li, VP of Engineering, Annuncio Software
Numerous compliments, including
- “You are the best technical writer I have ever known.”
- “Thank you very much for your dedication and excellent work. I know you are the one I can count on for the timely delivery. Considering the work you have done, this [delivery] is amazing.”
- [At the end of the project] “It has been a great pleasure working with you .... Your dedication and responsibility impress me quite a bit. I know you are the one I can count on for deliverables and you did what you promised. Thanks.”
(Annuncio was later purchased by PeopleSoft, which in turn merged with Oracle.)
From Joan Miller, Editor, CoSine Communications
Directly to me regarding the 500-page highly technical book I indexed:
“I am in the habit of not looking at our indexes because I don’t find anything. I have to keep remembering with the CoSine IPNOS Command Line Interface Configuration Guide, I can now rely on the index. I find every single thing I was looking for. Prior to your indexing this book, my success rate was more like 10%.”
Sent directly to a potential employer:
“...If only everyone were as professional and technically as astute as Marina, our jobs would be much easier. ... She is not a procrastinator and worked fast, but thoroughly. ... She seems to be a technical wizard.... and impressed the writer, an expert in his field. At one point, I had to ask Marina to speak directly with the writer of the manual, because I didn’t have time to manage my own work and this index project. The writer was impressed and comfortable with Marina. He is not easy to work with, and she got what she needed without alienating him, which is quite a compliment! I’ve worked in the industry here for over 12 years. There are only four people in this valley I would recommend with the kudos I give Marina. She’s a find.”
Other Compliments
- “The new API documentation is a great improvement over what we started out with.” (From Venky Madireddi, KnowNow, November 2003.)
- During final production in 1998 while working for Progress Software, the Production Editor called me from Massachusetts and asked me to make a number of minor but time-consuming changes to the camera-ready copy for a 500-page book. (None of the changes were for errors.) Those of you who have worked with creating camera-ready copy understand that making such changes can be a tricky proposition, as any changes to the page numbering will “break” the index and probably cause formatting problems. So one goal was to make changes without forcing any of the content on the page over to the next page. I asked her to hold on a moment while I fired up FrameMaker, then in 30 minutes, with her on the phone, I implemented all the changes and had the revised files regenerated and on the way to her. All this, and I was successful at not disturbing the page breaks. Her response? “Wow! I had heard you were good, but I didn’t know you were so fast, too.
Any other writer would have taken three days to do this. It is such a pleasure working with you.” This Production Editor was highly experienced and knew what she was talking about. - “You’re a great editor.” (From a writer.)
- “Thanks very much for the help. I was on the verge of a panic attack.”(From a writer at Electron Economy.)
- “Marina is one sharp cookie. Plus she has been known to give Lindt truffles as gifts, which automatically qualifies her as divine (she’s over-qualified actually, being a genuinely kind, generous and friendly person....). Of course, she’s also articulate, well-educated and witty, but you knew that from her profile already...all in all, Marina is one person I’m glad I met.” (Posted to my Friendster profile by an engineer I worked with at KnowNow.)
- “You’re the Indexing Queen.” (From a manager at Borland.)
- “I am surprised and amazed at how much you have written in such a short time. And you only talked with me once!” (From a software developer at Electron Economy, who went on to say that he had no technical corrections to make. My writing was 100% accurate. It was a fast-turnaround job and the developers were under deadline pressure, so I used the software and my notes from the one interview with him to write the documentation.)