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Marla Sowards

AI-fluent documentation engineer

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Summary​

AI-fluent documentation engineer who builds intelligent, AI-automated documentation ecosystems for complex, multi-platform SaaS products in healthcare and enterprise data management. Designs custom MCP servers and AI agent skills that automate the full content lifecycle: ingesting product knowledge from code repos, Jira, and support tools, then drafting LLM-optimized articles, enforcing accuracy and style standards, routing human-in-the-loop reviews, and publishing at scale. Architects AI-ready content foundations, including taxonomy-driven information architectures, structured XML, and metadata models that power AI search, chatbots, and ticket deflection. Applies AI-driven analytics to surface knowledge gaps and gives leadership dashboards with actionable insights.

Experience​

Verifiable | Austin, Texas (Remote)​

Lead Technical Writer | 2024 - 2026​

  • Built the company's customer-facing, multifaceted product ecosystem supporting a complex software product with multiple platforms, applications, and versions
  • Created ~500 help articles inside a taxonomy-informed information architecture and managed the complete content lifecycle
  • Built custom MCP servers and AI agent skills that automated the full documentation lifecycle: ingesting product knowledge from code repos, Jira, Zendesk, Confluence, Notion, transcripts, PRDs, and other sources of product information; drafting LLM-optimized help articles and release notes; checking accuracy and enforcing style and terminology standards; routing drafts through human-in-the-loop reviews; and deploying and maintaining published content
  • Managed content as XML in the Paligo CCMS, leveraging single sourcing and structured reuse to scale content across multiple products and releases
  • Built a custom-themed Zendesk help site with a metadata structure that optimized AI search results and ticket deflection through suggested articles
  • Architected a conversational AI chatbot that responded to prompts with answers scoped to the user's own platform and software version
  • Performed AI analysis on data joined from Google Analytics and native reporting in CSM tools, providing leadership dashboards and reports with metrics that identified knowledge gaps, ineffective searches, unhelpful content, and opportunities to improve the customer onboarding experience and ticket-deflection rates

Health Catalyst | Salt Lake City, Utah​

Senior Technical Writer | 2019 - 2023​

  • Built the organization's product help infrastructure for a complex suite of data platform, API, and cloud healthcare applications with multiple platforms and versions, including its information architecture and content lifecycle management processes and systems
  • Engineered and owned a docs-as-code toolchain by managing content as Markdown in Git repo branches; linting; submitting new content and changes to stakeholders in PRs; deploying to production via a static-site generator and automated, CI-driven deployment pipelines; and coaching contributors
  • Wrote and edited product enablement content aligned with a software release cadence, including user guides, install guides, administration guides, reference guides, help articles, release notes, and customer communications
  • Built a REST and .NET API documentation portal, including overviews, tutorials, and reference documentation
  • Validated documentation accuracy through hands-on testing across software products
  • Wrote technical marketing content for the public website
  • Developed and published analytics dashboards with views into customer usage patterns, providing actionable insights across customer journey touchpoints

Technical Writer | 2017 - 2019​

  • Managed the end-to-end content lifecycle by adding or retiring content to guides, conducting audits, tracking processes, and creating timelines
  • Tracked and met documentation needs by analyzing requirements, specifications, epics, user stories, and bugs
  • Designed, built and moderated enterprise online customer communities in Verint and Jive with help articles, release notes, videos, Q&A, blog posts, and feature requests
  • Built a one-stop destination for customer success team members to track product development through sprint demo summaries, roadmap presentations, and release planning session recordings; find enablement resources; and share input and feedback with PMs
  • Developed personas through user research and data in collaboration with UX designers, PMs, support, operations, and customer success

Technical Editor | 2014 - 2017​

  • Edited guides and customer communications for spelling, grammar, and accuracy
  • Created and applied style and usage guides, templates, and branding standards to enforce quality and consistency across all product enablement content
  • Designed, created, and maintained internal product knowledge bases in SharePoint and Jive CMS

Education​

  • Technical and Professional Writing, M.S., Utah State University
  • Print Journalism, B.A., Brigham Young University

Tools and skills​

  • AI assistants: Claude (Chat, Cowork, Code), ChatGPT, Gemini Gems, Zendesk AI Agent
  • AI development: Custom Claude MCP servers, AI agent skills, generative and agentic AI
  • Structured content: Paligo (XML-based CCMS), taxonomies, classification schemes, metadata models, controlled vocabularies
  • Docs-as-code: Git, GitHub, static-site generators, automated deployment pipelines, Docusaurus, DocFX, Jekyll
  • Languages and formats: XML, Markdown, MDX, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Mustache, Handlebars, JSON, YAML
  • API documentation: Postman, Swagger and OpenAPI specifications
  • Content platforms: Zendesk, Notion, Confluence, SharePoint, Verint, Jive
  • Analytics: Amazon QuickSight, Azure Application Insights and Workbooks, Google Analytics, Microsoft Power BI, built-in CMS reporting
  • Automation: Claude scheduled tasks, Google Cloud Functions, Google Apps Script, Azure Pipelines, Azure Functions, Azure Logic Apps, Microsoft Power Automate
  • Collaboration and project tracking: Jira, Azure DevOps, Slack
  • Ecosystems: Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 (Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft SharePoint, Microsoft Teams)