In the aftermath of STC closing, there’s just a lot going on. As the Board VP who is still involved in closing activities, I’ve seen a range of emotions from those who’ve claimed a connection with STC. Most are sad but understand that we had to do what we had to do, and showed appreciation for the organization over the years. Other have expressed things…differently. I have words for those people since they were not involved with the decision making, so I will save those for another day.
Instead, one of the biggest messages from this has been, “Without STC, where can I go for my professional development, networking, and community?” Well, if you do enough research, there are lots of different avenues you can take. Some focus broadly on tech comm topics, and others are more specialized. Either way, there’s something for everyone. Even in these early post-closing days, I’ve seen former members rally to form smaller groups (not affiliated with STC, mind you) to help a grassroots movement to fill in this gap.
Sara Feldman started a post on LinkedIn asking others about these alternatives, and with her permission, the list below is based on all the suggestions that she and others who contributed to her online conversation as potential alternatives to explore.
Please note that these are is listed in alphabetical order so as not to show any preferences or personal endorsements from me for any of these institutions. This is not all institutions, but rather many that either Sara’s LinkedIn post provided or some that I researched. Most descriptions are parsed or paraphrased from their websites. This is simply a partial list that you can use to start your exploration of tech comm professional options:
(Last updated: 5 May 2025)
| Organization/Resource | Tell me about this |
| ACES: The Society for Editing | ACES elevates editorial excellence and empower editors across industries through training, networking, and career opportunities. As an international alliance, they advocate for professionals in journalism, media, publishing, corporate communications, academia, and government. |
| American Institute of Graphic Arts/ AIGA, The Professional Association for Design | As the profession’s oldest and largest professional membership organization for design—with more than 70 chapters and more than 15,000 members—we advance design as a professional craft, strategic advantage, and vital cultural force. |
| American Translators Association (ATA) | ATA supports the issues affecting translators and interpreters and actively promotes the value of their services. |
| American Medical Writers Association (AMWA) | AMWA’s mission is to promote excellence in medical communication and to provide educational resources in support of that goal. |
| Association for Business Communication (ABC) | The Association for Business Communication (ABC) is an international, interdisciplinary organization committed to advancing business communication research, education, and practice. |
| Association of Independent Information Professionals (AIIP) | AIIP is a global network of independent business owners running information-centric businesses. Members offer expertise across a wide variety of industries, services and geographies. |
| Association of Proposal Management Professionals (APMP) | The Association of Proposal Management Professionals’ mission is to be the trusted leader that serves a global community of bid and proposal development life cycle professionals. |
| Association for Talent Development (ATD) | The Association for Talent Development (ATD) is a professional membership organization supporting those who develop the knowledge and skills of employees in organizations worldwide. |
| Association of Teachers of Technical Writing (ATTW) | Members of ATTW work in graduate and undergraduate programs in technical communication, media, engineering, rhetoric, writing studies, and English, among other complementary research programs. |
| Australian Society for Technical Communication (ASTC) | The Australian Society for Technical Communication (ASTC) promotes and supports people who design, write and edit technical and business information. |
| Button Conference | Presented by Kristina Halverson of Brain Traffic, Button content design events and community resources help independent contributors and leads grow in their careers. |
| Canadian Association of Instructional Designers | This organization supports professional Instructional Designers in Canada and abroad. |
| Center for Information-Development Management (CIDM) | CIDM is a member organization that facilitates the sharing of information about current trends, best practices, and development within the industry, providing networking opportunities, host conferences, lead roundtable discussions, and publish newsletters. Hosts of the ConVex conference. |
| Consortium for Service Innovation | The Consortium is a nonprofit think tank focused on customer engagement. Consortium Members created and continue to develop the widely-adopted Knowledge-Centered Support (KCS) and Intelligent Swarming methodologies. |
| Content Strategy Alliance | Organization for content strategists, UX writers, content designers and other content professionals. |
| The Content Wrangler (TCW) | TCW offers over 100 live free one-hour webinars for tech writers each year and maintains an archive of almost 800 recorded shows. |
| Council for Programs in Technical and Scientific Communication (CPTSC) | CPTSC brings together administrators, faculty, researchers, and students to advance the study and teaching of technical, professional, and scientific communication. |
| Editorial Freelancers Association | The Editorial Freelancers Association is the largest and oldest U.S.-based professional association of editorial freelancers. Their members include editors, book coaches, writers, indexers, proofreaders, researchers, fact-checkers, marketing experts, graphic designers, translators, and more. |
| Firehead | Europe’s market leader in finding, placing and training technical communicators. Strong US/ Canada ex-pat community. |
| Globalization and Localization Association (GALA) | GALA serves and supports the global language services and technologies industry which comprises translation, interpreting, localization, and the technologies that support such activities. |
| IEEE Professional Communications Society (IEEE ProComm) | IEEE ProComm supports professional, scientific, engineering, and technical communication, content development, information design, and usability, as well as their potential social impacts. |
| The Indexing Society of Canada | This is a global community of like-minded people who enjoy the challenge of providing clear, concise, time-saving guides for readers and researchers. |
| Information Architect Institute Conference | The IA conference exists to promote discourse and learning about the intentional design of information environments. It is a gathering of practitioners from around the globe, who practice and teach Information Architecture and other design-related disciplines. |
| Institute for Performance and Learning (I4PL) | Training, networking, and certification. |
| Institute of Scientific & Technical Communication (ISTC) | The Institute of Scientific and Technical Communicators (ISTC) is the largest UK body representing information development professionals. |
| International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) | The International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) enables a global network of communicators working in diverse industries and disciplines to identify, share, and apply the world’s best communication practices. |
| The International Design Association (IDA) | IDA is a professional organization dedicated to the design field. |
| International Society for Design and Development in Education (ISDDE) | The goals of the ISDDE are to improve the design and development process, build a design community, and increase their impact on educational practice. |
| Knowledge Management Global Network | Knowledge Management Global Network (KMGN) is a not-for profit network of international KM communities and associations that endeavours to connect KM professionals and facilitate co-creation and sharing of KM assets and resources. |
| The Kinetic Council | The Kinetic Council’s mission is to unite and empower content, data, and semantics professionals through an industry-wide authoritative association. Within this new association, members will create meaningful connections, advance careers through world-class education and certification, and shape the future of these fields together. |
| Knowledge Management Institute (KMI) | KMI provides knowledge management certification and training. |
| The LavaCon Content Strategy Conference | Very popular conference where content professionals share best practices and lessons learned, network with peers, and build professional relationships. |
| The Learning and Development Community (TLDC) | Networking and training member website. |
| Learning Guild | Focuses on elearning, but also instructional design, virtual training, emerging technology, and more. |
| National Communication Association (NCA) | NCA is committed to transforming lives through communication. |
| Plain Language Association International (PLAIN) | PLAIN is the international association for plain language professionals that promotes clear communication in any language. |
| Rhetoric Society of America (RSA) | The Rhetoric Society of America is committed to public facing research, teaching, programming, commentary, training, and engagement in rhetorical studies to confront urgent concerns. |
| Sunshine State Scriveners Discord Server | Florida-based tech comm group; made of of former STC members. (Not affiliated with STC.) |
| Support Driven | The community dedicated to Customer Support as a career. |
| Tech Comm Connections | Tech Comm community sessions on Feb 6 & 11 hosted by Comgenesis. |
| Tech Comm Group (Slack) | Slack Community started by former STC members for networking. |
| Technical English Association of Japan | TEAJ is a Japan-based organization dedicated to promoting clear and concise technical communication. We offer seminars and work opportunities for translators and technical writers who assist Japanese companies in creating effective technical documents in English. Contact us at y_nakayama@teaj.or.jp . |
| Tekom Europe | tekom Europe is the largest professional association for technical communication in Europe whose interest is to promote the professional and business interests of all persons involved in technical communication. |
| User Experience Professionals Association (UXPA) | User Experience Professionals Association (UXPA) International supports people who research, design, and evaluate the user experience (UX) of products and services. |
| Write the Docs | Write the Docs is a global community of people who care about documentation. We have a Slack community, conferences on 3 continents, and local meetups. |
| World Information Architecture Association | World Information Architecture Association is dedicated to growing awareness of the discipline of information architecture while promoting social responsibility among practitioners. |
While I think it might be a little while before I jump into a new “home” (I’m still dealing with closing up the old one), there are a lot of good suggestions here, and plenty more out there. Here’s wishing you good luck at wherever you land, and hopefully I will meet up with you through one or more of these in the future.
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