Published, Certified and Experienced

Experienced, certified and published professional Technical Writer with over 20 years of engineering IT documentation and support experience, providing enduser support documentation, and books for IT certification.

• "Surviving the High Tech Interview" article for Microsoft Certified Professional Magazine.
• "Sun Certified System Administrator for Solaris 8 Study Guide" book published by McGraw-Hill
• "Hack-Proofing Solaris" book published by McGraw-Hill
• "RHCE Red Hat Certified Engineer Study Guide" book published by McGraw-Hill
• "Optimizing Networks with SnifferPro" book published by McGraw-Hill
• "How to be Anti-Social: Preventing Social Engineering Hack Attacks" Whitepaper published by Syngress Media
• "New Security Features in Solaris 9" Whitepaper published by Syngress Media
• "Sun Certified System Administrator for Solaris 9 Study Guide" book published by McGraw-Hill

• SCSA - Sun Microsystems Sun Certified System Administrator Passed Solaris System Administrator Exams Parts I and II.
• MCSE - Microsoft Certified System Engineer and Microsoft Certified Internet Information Specialist - Passed Microsoft Certification Exams on Windows Desktop, Windows Server/Active Directory, Networking Essentials, Internet Information Server, Index Server and TCP/IP. Experienced Exchange administrator.
• ServiceNow Associate Business Process Analyst – Completed required training for Story creation and Agile process for development projects. 

• Over 20 years of experience as a technical writer for wide range of customers from end users to third-tier support engineers using text-editing applications such as Sharepoint, Microsoft Office Suite, Google Suite, Madcap Flare, Confluence and Wiki. Experienced in Agile/SCRUM methodology. Experienced with variety of ERP software such as MS Dynamic, Rossum, SAP and Oracle NETsuite. Experienced in wide variety of markdown editors and HTML coding.
• Hands-on System Architect and IT Engineer on a wide variety of operating systems and hardware including UNIX, Linux and Windows Active Directory environments. 
• Producer and host of Technically News, a syndicated radio news program for information technology professionals.
• Served in the United States Marine Corps as a Scout/Sniper. Received 3 meritorious promotions, Good Conduct Medal and Special Commendation from Republic of South Korea. 

 June 2024 - current: Redwood Software - Technical Writer

•  Providing technical support documentation, redesigned support site and instituted link-checking and review process to improve accuracy. 

Oct 2022 – June 2024: Delta Consulting/Hyundai – Sr Technical Writer

• Provided support documentation for third-tier support staff, updated disaster recovery procedures and redesigned support library. Ensured all documents were compliant to SOX and ISO standards. 

June 2020 – Oct 2022: Dell/Boeing – Sr Technical Writer/Compliance Manager

• Provided support documentation for third-tier support staff, design, build-out and support of lab and production Windows/Linux environments using Agile methodology. Ensured all lab and data center servers are compliant to Boeing and federal data security requirements.

Sept 2017 to May 2020: US Geological Survey Dept.  – Technical Writer/System Engineer

• Responsible for writing system support documentation, ongoing support of SoCal Earthquake Early Warning System using Windows Active Directory, LDAP monitoring service, Linux servers and VMware virtual machines. Researched and wrote extensive documentation for Tier 1 to Tier 3 support engineers. Designed and installed backup/restoration capabilities and full disaster recovery for all servers. Built a test server farm used for training and testing. Wrote all training documentation and  conducted customized classes for managers, field engineers and technical support team. 

Oct 2011 to Sept 2017: TekSystems – Sr Windows/Linux Team Lead

• Providing documentation for production/test systems and management of network upgrade projects. Documented processes and provided technical support manuals for end users and helpdesk technicians. Trained Unix/Linux support teams, provided support documentation applications, AWS, Active Directory and backup procedures.

Oct 2007 to Oct 2011: PlanIT Technology Group - Sr Support Engineer

• Provided technical support, customized documentation and project management for UNIX/Linux and Windows systems for wide variety of customers. Designed and implemented Solaris LiveUpgrade project to patch and upgrade servers with minimal downtime. Provided technical support documentation for all levels of Helpdesk staff. 

                                              (Previous Work History Available On Request)

• randy@rcook.com