Technical Manual Writer/Designer — Scaffolding Products

We manufacture and sell scaffolding and construction equipment — everything from full multi-function scaffold systems down to simple commodity hardware like basic frames, rails, and braces. Our in-house designer produces the manuals for our flagship, more complex products, and his work sets the visual and structural standard for the whole product line. We need a second set of hands for the simpler side of the catalog: short instructional manuals for straightforward commodity products. These documents are shorter and need far less illustration than our flagship manuals, but they still have to look like they came from the exact same place. Brand consistency across our whole manual library matters more than anything else in this role. Our house style: black-and-white, line-drawing illustrations — no color, no photorealistic renders. Clean, simple, instructional. We'll share real reference manuals so you can see the exact treatment, but if your portfolio already leans toward this kind of clean technical line-art look, that's a good sign this role is a fit. This is not a replacement for our primary designer — he stays on the complex, illustration-heavy work. This role exists to take the simpler manuals off his plate so nothing sits waiting on his time. What you'll do: Produce short, clear instructional manuals for basic scaffolding hardware (frames, rails, braces, and similar commodity parts). Match an existing house style closely — layout, typography, iconography, safety-callout treatment, and overall page structure. We'll provide sample manuals from our current designer as your style reference before you start. Work from product specs, existing reference manuals, and (when needed) direct product photos/drawings we provide. Deliver print-ready files in Adobe InDesign (.indd), plus a final PDF. Most of our manuals are bilingual (English/Spanish); we'll confirm on a per-project basis whether a given manual needs both languages. What we're looking for: Strong Adobe InDesign skills — non-negotiable, deliverables are native InDesign files. Proven ability to work within an existing brand system rather than developing your own style. Show us examples where you matched someone else's design language closely and well. Experience with technical, instructional, or safety-related documentation is a strong plus — you don't need construction/industrial experience specifically, but you should be comfortable with precise, safety-conscious technical writing (clear step sequencing, correct terminology, no ambiguity). Reliable communication and turnaround — this is ongoing, lower-volume work, not a single project, and we need someone we can hand new manuals to as they come up. Please send a few portfolio samples, ideally anything showing you replicating an existing visual style rather than creating from scratch. Let us know your typical turnaround for a short (4–8 page) manual and your rate structure (per-project or hourly). We'll share real reference manuals from our current designer during the interview so you can see exactly what "matching the style" means in practice before committing.