Writing, Technically.

Jack Selzer's essay "The Composing Processes of an Engineer" is one of the first extensive analyses concerning the process of Technical Writing in a professional field. As the Introduction to Selzer's composition notes, most research on the procedures of writing well are based on the work of school kids or authors. What Selzer does is highlight a lot of the important groundwork that goes into researching and organizing the appropriate information for professional proposals in a scholastic field. In order to do this effectively, Selzer focused on the work of one particular engineer, Kenneth E. Nelson. Selzer examined the entire procedure in which Nelson was engaged. Selzer analyzed the "jottings, notes, outlines, plans, drafts, and revisions" as well as interviewing Nelson on his process.
I know that Selzer's analysis of Nelson's writing is based on extensive, careful observation, due to the abundance of documented research that Selzer elaborates on in his essay. He breaks down the process of writing technically into the different steps required to bring a final proposal into fruition. I can tell he spent a fair amount of time with Mr. Nelson, based on the information he provides. He explains Nelson's process almost as if he were Nelson. He goes on to emphasize the importance that Nelson places on preparation of the ideas that go into documentation. In fact, by Selzer's recollection, preliminary organization of the final product is a large portion of Nelson's process. Nelson adheres to an outline prior to an actual draft and bases the information he will include on the audience he is writing for. That is one aspect that seems to create success for Nelson, writing for a target audience. Nelson tries to reuse parts of the proposal process again and again, to remain consistent and concise in his readership's eyes.
Since he reuses materials and outlines a great portion of his work, Nelson does not need to do much editing to his final draft, other than a few superficial mistakes. It seems to me that Selzer has shown with his essay not only how to write technically if you are an engineer, but also as a scholar studying technical writing. He seemed to compile a large amount of information regarding the writing procedures of an engineer and outlined that information in a sensible manner. I don't know if Selzer organizes his compositions in the same way as Nelson, but it seems as though he could have done it in a similar regard.