Tim Slavin Email & Phone Number

Sole proprietor of a technical writing and technology consultancy firm responsible for creating and updating technical writing and marketing materials in a variety of media, from print to online. Clients include ISE, Wolters Kluwer, DoubleClick, MongoDB, IPsoft, among others.Web production and development work Includes installing, adapting, and maintaining WordPress and other content management systems, as well as designing and coding a CMS from scratch to meet web production client needs. Used PHP, HTML, HTML5, CSS1/2/3, JSON. Skills include business development, product and project management, user experience, information architecture, interface design, programming, database design, marketing, and promotion.Note that I've been honored many of my clients have hired me repeatedly for projects over many years.Key technical writing and other consulting projects and recommendations are described below:IPsoftFinch ComputingTalentBrowserMongoDBISEDoubleClickLynda.comWolters KluwerAdditional part-time work includes:30 STEM Links/beanz magazine (Technical Writer and Founder)An award-winning online and print magazine published six times a year, and now an email newsletter, it's a relaxing way to expand tech writing skills by exploring interesting programming and computer science topics in 500-700 words. See full entry below for more details.

Hired to create then maintain a complete documentation set for their Amelia artificial intelligence (AI) and IPcenter/1Desk ITIL task management products. Work includes researching, writing, and editing user guides, API guides, installation guides, platform design guides, and other materials used by customers and internal developer and training staff. Learned then translated complex NLP and machine learning topics into materials non-experts can understand and use. Also monitor Slack, Confluence, and other channels to identify new content opportunities. Work with the training department to ensure documentation reinforces training. Use Word, Confluence, Jira, Bitbucket, CLI, JSON, Groovy, Photoshop, Snagit, and other tools and technologies.

Now published as a twice weekly email newsletter, as 30 STEM Links, beanz magazine has evolved from a print + online publication. The print magazine was published six times a year until April 2024. Writing the magazine and now email newsletter requires technical writing skills -- research, interview, write, edit/test. With the complication of writing so kids can understand often complex topics.The 30 STEM Links email newsletter expands the amount of STEM/STEAM content. In the usual fun quirky style of the print title. Emails arrive Wednesday afternoons and Sunday mornings. The Wednesday email is newsy with projects, profiles, history, resources, and lots more. The Sunday morning email is 7 often quirky links to STEM/STEAM articles. Stuff like babies teaching AI, fluffy planets, and a runaway donkey living their best life. The Sunday emails continue the popular Tidbitz section of the print title.The print magazine won a Parents' Choice Silver Honor award, as well as Tillywig and Academics' Choice awards.

Remote

Hired to create initial document set for their FinchDB NoSQL database, including Query, Operations, API, and User guides, with output to PDF and online help. Used Madcap Flare, Word, Jira, Confluence, Bitbucket, Slack, and other tools.

Business writing and layout design, as well as migrating their website to new WordPress template, recoding parts of the template with PHP and CSS, and moving to new server setup.

Helped publisher recover their website and migrate it to a more robust server, as well as programming work to debug WordPress templates.

Greater New York City Area

Documented MongoDB database technology with Textmate, Git, Github, Amazon Web Services, Sphinx, Markdown, Slack, Jira, and other tools. Validated existing documentation as new versions of the database were released. Helped write and refine onboarding documentation to set up new writer software workspaces.

Greater New York City Area

Wrote business, technical, and operational documents to support ISE's new option trading platform, Optimise (now called T7), through product launch and six incremental releases. Documents used by ISE staff and technical staff of financial firms trading on the Optimise platform. Work included expanding and maintaining API, market data feed, and FIX documentation, as well as documents used to organize the Optimise launch. Also created style guides and Word templates. Documented the release communication process, technical support operations, and the process to maintain members extranet site.Also created business requirements documents from functional specifications, as well as system functional specifications reading C# code and database schemas to document functional processes for a billing application. Wrote technical documentation, API guides, user guides, installation guides, business requirements documents, and operations guides for Longitude project.Contract extended five times.

Oversee selection of technology to meet chapter goals to acquire and retain members. Includes analysis, selection, implementation, and training of technology to publish the chapter website, deliver regular emails to members, and store key chapter documents. Redesigned chapter website.

Responsible for helping with a variety of roles and tasks for launch and ongoing maintenance of their online magazine, MRKStyle.com, their ecommerce site, and MonicaRichKosann.com. Includes converting page design to search optimized HTML and CSS, consulting on software tools, install WordPress and create/maintain WordPress themes, helping with search optimization, and creating then launching seasonal versions of their site. Also includes project definition and management for their iPhone and Facebook application projects, as well as the user interface design for these applications and working with a business partner to hire and manage the software development for these applications.

Helped redesign website, create and maintain WordPress templates, create and post miscellaneous ads, white papers, and webinar content.

Approached by Lynda.com to expand my article about how to code HTML email into two video courses. If you do not know, coding HTML email is an arcane art using web technologies circa 1995 to date. I wrote the article when a client asked me to code their HTML emails but I could not find a comprehensive vendor-neutral article online. The Lynda.com course generates positive feedback from their students.http://www.lynda.com/Business-Online-Marketing-SEO-tutorials/Effective-HTML-Email-and-Newsletters/76981-2.html

Responsible for helping create and update various technical documentation for their DART for Advertisers and DART for Publishers products. Included writing and editing of documents, as well as helping prepare documents for localization. Tools included Framemaker, MadCap Flare, RoboHelp, among others.

Responsible for creating and updating consumer user guides and quick start guides for the Cruzer thumb drive and early Sansa MP3 players. Also included creating a book design in Word for other SanDisk divisions to use.

Responsible for helping with writing projects, including two speeches for senior executives and a report for the North American CTO that documented the electronic form technologies and capabilities used in different divisions of the company.

Worked with health information client to optimize their web content management technology and editorial processes. Helped define the business case and initial database product for an internal startup. Also wrote requirements and test documents for exception workflow web site for CTO. Programmed prototype website in Classic ASP/SQL 2000.

Rebuilt the marketing team that supported use of their websites to communicate with customers and staff. The new internet site won a prestigious CIO.com 50/50 Best of the Web award, as well as health care industry awards. Managed writing of B2B and B2C marketing materials such as direct mail, ads, call scripts, articles, and news items. Managed development of a style guide for their web sites. Managed focus groups and usability testing for internet site. Included definition and management of numerous projects to achieve goals.

Managed documentation and later a small software development group that supported the Reuters Dealing Forex software product. I was tasked to use multimedia to meet the information needs of Reuters global staff who installed and managed their software and hardware. Also involved in early grass roots use of internet technologies within Reuters, for example, creating a prototype online community for their far flung technical writing groups and a demonstration html training class with a teacher in London, students in London, the US, and New Zealand, and 50 plus online observers spread worldwide. Included the definition and management of numerous projects without this technical documentation group.

Sole proprietor of a technical writing and technology consultancy firm. Wrote, illustrated, and designed technical and business documents for Qume, Colony Capital, and other companies. Designed non-fiction books for RGA.

Burbank, California

New York City

Managed production details for roughly 100+ promos produced monthly by ten staff and freelancers; each promo went through five or six steps (e.g., initial idea, initial script, video editing, audio editing) Wrote 300+ ten second next ons monthly for two years

Ba, English, Journalism, American Poetry

Studied primarily English and History but also took five graduate courses in the School of Journalism, including a one week seminar.

English, Journalism

Activities and Societies: Transferred to the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, to compete for the Jules and Avery Hopwood Award.

Education record

Activities and Societies: Studied to enter the Jesuit religious order, long enough to experience the 30 day silent retreat and realize.

High School