> from my experience, professional writers are just low paid freelancers
It tends to depend on the company...and what the writers are building, and of course, what the product is. Some products do not lend themselves well to a freelance approach, as the domain and product specific knowledge is quite high. Other products have very specific regulatory compliance obligations that also do not lend themselves readily to freelancing (unless you are talking about long term contractors with 2+ year commitments, etc....
They have local chapters in many geographies. Their annual conference is usually well attended and covers topics related to technical writing from Help Authoring to Content Strategy to Content Marketing to Agile.
MadCap Flare was an awesome product. It grew out of the old BlueSky "RoboHelp" suite (which was also awesome) and could be used to output to many different formats (online help, web help, print docs, confluence). It's been a while, but I think you could even use FrameMaker to author and still use Flare to transform output to all its supported formats.
It's been a long time since I immersed myself in this world, so apologies if my memory is less than perfect.
Def. give a look at DITA...Darwin Information Typing Architecture is not a tool so much as an approach/framework that other products can support. Many modern tooling supports some of the DITA concepts, even if they aren't officially DITA tools.
On the other end, much of documentation has moved into the Wiki space. For a long time, Confluence was making some serious inroads there.
Most professional tooling these days also emphasizes content reuse, and sometimes (if you are lucky) separating content from presentation.
Opinions come from experience: I spent many years in tech writing at both fortune 50's and startups, but have since moved on to other disciplines I enjoy more.
If this (or a similar policy) affects you and you suspect that it is an attempt by your employer to get you (and others) to quit in order to avoid having to pay severance, unemployment, etc... Understand what "constructive dismissal" is. It may help if you need to file unemployment claims.
It's something usually managed at the state level, so depends where they are in the US. In California constructive termination standing is very much a thing.
Most states have some form of regulation against constructive dismissal/termination/discharge (term of art varies), but I don't know of a list. Would be good to have!
Marketer here. Yes, they work very well...unless you're pumping out a crappy newsletter that nobody wants, doesn't provide value, etc.
Not all products are the same, and not all sales funnels are identical... but generally you want lower commitment asks that can help you build your audience of potential customers far out in advance of them being in a position to buy. In a B2B world, investing in high-value content that helps people do their jobs better regardless of whether or not they own YOUR software is a great way to build your audience so that your product is front and center when it is time to buy/consider.
For some products, the opportunity to replace an entrenched solution with your own may only come up once a decade. For others, it might be an annual or monthly ask. Content Marketing is the only thing worth a damn that builds trust and relationship so that you can better convert these opportunities when the time is right.
Check out your local chapter of STC. The Society for Technical Communication has a job bank, but I think you need to be a member to access. Local chapters often share jobs without membership.
Russia (Putin) is doing this now because Nato members are experiencing internal political discord, and the alliance itself is not presenting a unified front. The past US president threatened to stop aid to Ukraine unless they produced evidence to be used against his political opponent. Germany is tied to Russian gas. Internally, member state politics are reflecting and fomenting social division. Russia chairs the UN Security Council. The world is grappling with Covid.
This move by Russia is intentionally timed because countries themselves struggle to act with a unified voice, much less transnational alliances.
And because the US has a weak president, weakest in decades. Biden also started with a political gaffe, in his first week he lifted the Trump-era ban on the NS2 project for no apparent gain.
Trump might admire Putin as a leader, but he actually shored up the eastern flank of NATO and banned the NS2 pipeline, which Biden rushed to open back up.
It tends to depend on the company...and what the writers are building, and of course, what the product is. Some products do not lend themselves well to a freelance approach, as the domain and product specific knowledge is quite high. Other products have very specific regulatory compliance obligations that also do not lend themselves readily to freelancing (unless you are talking about long term contractors with 2+ year commitments, etc....