Hi Reader,

A friend of mine built a plugin for No Man's Sky, and he offered to let me try it. Before he sent it over, he asked how technical I was, because he needed to decide whether to package it as a .exe or let me handle the install myself.

I told him I'd probably just ask Claude Code to install it, because I don't consider myself as technical as an engineer.

He said, "Oh, if you can use Claude Code, you're better than most."

That surprised me. I don't think handing a task to an AI tool makes someone technical, and since he writes his own gaming plugins, I expected him to agree with me. Later I realized he had been comparing me to the people who download his plugins.

He was doing audience analysis

My friend asked the question so he could decide how to deliver his plugin. Many people who download game mods need an installer and step-by-step help, and compared to them, someone who can walk an AI coding tool through an install is in good shape.

Technical writers ask that same question before we start any doc: who is reading this, and what do they already know? I ask it about readers every day, and until that conversation I hadn't thought to ask it about myself.

It depends on who's standing next to you

I spend a lot of time with people who design MCP servers and build enterprise software, and compared to them, I'm not especially technical. My mom's experience with AI is talking to Siri, and compared to her, I'm a computer goddess. To the gamer who needs a .exe to run a plugin, I'm the kind of user my friend was hoping for.

Each of those comparisons is accurate. They describe three different audiences, and how technical I am shifts with whichever one I'm measured against.

Who are you comparing yourself to?

When technical writers tell me they aren't technical enough, I ask who they're comparing themselves to. The answer is almost always the most senior engineer they've worked with.

That's a strange benchmark for a writer. The people you need to measure yourself against are your readers, and the question is whether you understand the system well enough to get them where they need to go. For most of us, that means developers integrating an API or admins configuring a product. If you can learn what those readers need and close the gap between what the engineers built and what the readers can use, you're technical enough for the job. A new job brings new readers, and you learn what they need, too.

How to answer the question in an interview

Hiring managers ask "How technical are you?" all the time, and most writers answer with a self-rating like "Pretty technical" or "Not very, but I learn fast."

A self-rating gives the interviewer nothing to evaluate. A stronger answer names the audience first, the same way my friend did. For example:

That answer tells the interviewer you measure yourself against the reader, which is the core of the job they're hiring for.

If "How technical are you?" is the interview question that trips you up, let's work on your answer together.

Diana