Thing 12 – Collaborative Tools

#thing12

The last collaborative project that I worked on was a report we were commissioned to write for an external organisation. Some of the work was face to face, as it was the responsibility of my department to produce the final report, but also some of it was virtually as other contributors came from other departments, some of which were in physically different offices.   It was a rather large and complex report, but as a large company we use iManage, which means files are saved in locations that everyone can access, there is version control on documents as well as the ability so see previously saved versions, there is access control based on user permissions, and along with the usual track lining facilities in Microsoft Word, it made the process a lot easier to manage.

However, there is  still a lot of “manual” control over a project this large – the report was broken down into chapters,  diagrams and graphs were doled out to marketing teams to create, and dropped in at the end, the bibliography and footnotes had to be carefully cultivated from all the disparate parts. In hindsight, and now having done the Rudai 23 online networking portion of the course, I think perhaps something like Trello might have kept a better handle on some elements of the process – and helped with the last minute checks that everything was in and in order before we reached the deadline!

On a more personal level I have used Google Docs for planning my sister’s hen weekend – a more formidable task that you might at first expect – but it was an excellent way of keeping tabs on all participants and which parts of the weekend they were included in, who needed accommodation etc.

Overall I would say that using a collaborative tool is most definitely a positive, especially if you might have any “rogue elements” in your team – e.g. the person who is just not good at communicating what needs to be done, what has been changed etc.  Or the person who is not good at consistently saving and backing up their work.  Or just for the simple task of not losing sight of a “Master Document”!

#thing10 #thing11 #Rudai23

Check out my twitter account and personal branding bio @LindaGorIre

#Thing9 - Reflecting on online exhibitions and infographics.......



The first thing I would have to say about creating an online exhibition is that, as I am finding with a lot of these visual communicator "things", is that it is time consuming. If you want your exhibition to look well and make sense, you need to put in the time. Forward planning is essential!

Going at it in a haphazard manner is not the way (as I've learned!), and in future I would definitely map out how I want it to look and feel, and what information I want where, before going at it. Otherwise you spend a lot of time re-doing the same stuff and for a project like this, when there can be so many parts, right down to the smallest image or the curating of a piece of text or whatever, that is not something you want to be doing.

For my "exhibition" I decided to use Wordpress, as I have been using Blogger for this blog, and wanted to try out a different platform. I took the "Budget Summary" leaflet from this year's budget and turned the information into an online exhibition of the main points. Be careful when you are picking the web address of your exhibition! I realised I had put the wrong year in mine at the end..not helpful when it comes to search results.
In general though I found the Wordpress platform quite straightforward to use once I got the hang of it.

I enjoyed playing around with the Infographics - Piktochart is very easy to use. I was using the free version but I would imagine it is a powerful tool if you have the paid version and all the options. Easy to whip up one of these for anything that you might want to draw people's attention to, or explain in an easy way - and very handy for throwing up on social media platforms like facebook, twitter etc. A great way I think of keeping the content on those pages looking fresh and up to date.

Overall, the whole "Visual Communicator" module was an eye opener for me - I discovered a lot of tools that I didn't know existed, and which I feel could all be easily mastered to good effect over time. I look forward to that process!

#Thing8 - trying out infographics with piktochart!

#Thing7 - Take a look at my online exhibition here:

https://budget2017thing7expo.wordpress.com/

I took the Budget 2018 summary leaflet from the Department of Finance and turned it into an exhibit of the most important details from the budget.

#Thing6 - Reflecting on communicating visually...................


Hi!

This post is simply here to reflect on what's been going on with this blog thus far.....particularly the last few "things" related to communicating visually.
As part of that process, I used some images from sources that contain copyright free images, such as Google Images and Pixabay, and that I could, therefore, use on my blog quite freely.
I also played around with Photofunia, which allows you to edit images for re-use, and finally I created a slide presentation on Powtoon.

They say a picture paints a thousand words, but having completed these tasks I would have to say that my biggest feeling at the end of the process was just how much better visual material can make a blog (or whatever medium one is using) look. It might seem like quite a shallow thing, but in an age when bloggers are competing with so much else online, marketing your wares and grabbing people's attention has fast become just as important as ensuring the quality of the written content you want to share. When your customer base is quite often made up of people who might describe themselves as  "browsers" or  "clickers" - moving from one screen/blog/webpage to the next and only stopping when something really grabs their attention - that moment is key. The thing that "grabs" their attention and reels them in. I really felt that with a little bit of effort and thought, it's possible to increase the chances of that "grab" by using some very convenient visual communicator tools.

During Thing 3, I was really bowled over by the amount of images that are available under the Creative Commons Licence. There is a literally an image available for every scenario you might find yourself in and I think they are quite useful for giving a nice visual cue to readers as to what content they might expect to find underneath, or even as something vague and thought provoking that might arouse enough curiosity in them to want to look deeper - I tried to play with that idea by using the image of the open road and getting people to guess the title of the book - just the idea of using a visual aid that might give people pause, so that they don't just click past your content. I found the image sources very easy and straight-forward to use and they integrate well with blog platforms.

Using Photofunia was a little different - it's something that probably requires a little bit more time to get maximum benefit from. If you look at the two images I used, the text "Halloween is coming" looks far better in one image than the other, so experimenting is definitely key. Being able to edit to your own personal message is great though - it really allows you to create a look and feel to your blog that is all your own, whilst maximising the visual cues to the message you are trying to portray.

The last resources I used was Powtoon. I found it a little trickier to use, not as intuitive as the image resources and so it is definitely something that I would need to play around with a bit more before feeling comfortable. I ignored Rudai23's advice to watch the intro tutorial video - perhaps that was my first mistake but it has got me thinking....what was their (Powtoon's" mistake that I didn't feel that "grab" when it came to looking at their video.......anyway!
I also think that this resource would benefit from a more collaborative team effort - if you are going to create something that could be quite lengthy for people to watch, ie demands an attentions span of longer than a few seconds! , it would be important that it is edited well. Stick to your message, don't stray off point, follow a direct line or storyboard and make sure all your key ideas or points are covered.

If I was to do this task again, I think I would spend more time on each of the resources until I was comfortable with them, and then I would be in a better place to evaluate which one is the best one to use for any particular post or task that I am working on. Without being completely au fait with each one, I was basically shooting in the dark in terms of wondering how it was going to turn out on the blog. I was happy to run with that, as part of the learning curve, but in a working environment when one has quick turn around requirements, it would really help to be able to dive right in to the best option, rather than playing around and hoping for the best. I enjoyed discovering these resources over the last few weeks anyway, and look forward to getting to know them better!

#Thing5