Social media strategy seminar roundup

Photo by @bredadoherty

The seminar yesterday in Edinburgh went pretty well, I think. We had a great turnout – about 30 people – which was surprising as we were only expecting 25, and meant we had to find some extra room. Luckily the staff at COSLA were very accommodating!

Thanks also to Mike and the team at the Improvement Service for their help in laying on the seminar.

The session was run on the lines of going through the stages of a social media strategy, with me doing some introductory words, then groups discussing the issues, and then filling in the relevant section of their workbook, and some feedback. Rinse and repeat for each section…

Here are the slides I used. The most useful bits are probably the questions to consider when completing that bit of the strategy.

If you can’t see the embed above, then here’s a PDF copy to download.

Here’s the workbook.

Here’s a Word version if you’d like one you can edit and play around with.

Would anyone else be interested in attending a session like this? Let me know!

Nothing’s really new…

A quick post as I am preparing my slides for the knowledge management talk I’m delivering on Thursday.

In the slides, one of the key points is that the internet from the very beginning was designed as a tool for recording and sharing knowledge. I get to cover some of my favourite ground, talking about amazing people like Vannevar Bush, Doug Englebart, Ted Nelson and of course Tim Berners-Lee.

One thing I haven’t been able to squeeze in, but a story I love, is that of the Community Memory project.

I may as well just steal the text from Wikipedia:

Community Memory was the first public computerized bulletin board system. Established in 1973 in Berkeley, California, it used an SDS 940 timesharing system in San Francisco connected via a 110 baud link to a teletype at a record store in Berkeley to let users enter and retrieve messages.

While initially conceived as an information and resource sharing network linking a variety of counter-cultural economic, educational, and social organizations with each other and the public, Community Memory was soon generalized to be an information flea market. Once the system became available, the users demonstrated that it was a general communications medium that could be used for art, literature, journalism, commerce, and social chatter.

It other words, it used a terminal in a record shop, attached to a big mainframe miles away. It brought computing power to people who would never normally go near it. It was leapt upon by people, who used it to share information, buy and sell stuff, talk to other people.

Sounds a bit hyperlocal to me.

More travels, more talking

After this week’s exciting trip to Scotland, I’m venturing slightly less far north a couple of weeks afterwards, to Lancaster.

It’s for the ‘Digital networking and community safety partnerships conference’, taking place at the town hall in Lancaster on 16th February. It’s a joint LGID and NPIA event, and features really interesting discussions about how digital engagement can be used to make partnership working more effective, and to actually help change behaviour.

I’ll do a quick introduction to the subject at the beginning of the day, and will hang around to answer questions and help out where I can.

Here’s the blurb from the site:

Bringing together the worlds of community safety and digital networking, this free one-day event organised by LG Improvement and Development, the National Policing Improvement Agency and Lancaster City Council aims to provide an overview of social networking, social media and digital networking, their use generally and how they are being used within community safety and policing.

The event will include sessions on:

  • the policy landscape for digital engagement in community safety
  • what digital engagement is and how to use it
  • community use of digital engagement.

If you are interested in attending this free event, just email Rachel Duke by 9th Feb.

Incidentally, I’m probably going to be driving up to Lancaster on the 15th. If you’re on my route, let me know and maybe we can arrange a meet up at a motorway service station, or perhaps something less seedy.

A brief tour of Scotland…

I’m looking forward to my quick tour of Scotland this week, visiting Edinburgh tomorrow, to deliver a seminar on social media strategy for public services; and then Aberdeen to talk to the Scottish Knowledge Management Network about how technology makes sharing and storing knowledge a wonderful thing.

Both these events are in partnership with the Improvement Service.

Social media strategy

The seminar tomorrow is going to be quite interesting, as it is the first of its kind that I have delivered, and so it might be worth covering in a bit more detail.

As Joanne Jacobs expressed very eloquently in this post, strategy is vital for an organisation wanting to get digital engagement right. I’ve tried to design this seminar around the process of writing a strategy.

So, the agenda looks a bit like this:

  1. Background
  2. Objectives
  3. Implementation
  4. Evaluation
  5. Risk management
  6. Operational guidance

Each section will feature a short presentation from me, introducing the topic, and then a discussion on tables. Then all the delegates fill in the relevant section of the workbook we have created for them, with a page for each section, where notes can be jotted down.

Then after the event all delegates will be sent an electronic version of the workbook so they can type it all up, make any changes to the format they want to and that kind of thing, so that – wahey! – they have a draft strategy ready to go.

I’ll share the slides and workbook on this blog – assuming the seminar works! – next week.

I’m interested in making this seminar available to others as well, which could take the form of running more face to face sessions, for which a charge may well be necessary; or online as a webinar, which is likely to be free.

I’d appreciate any feedback on which of these people might prefer!

Introducing My Learning Pool – e-learning for everyone

Today we are delighted to launch our newest product – My Learning Pool – which is one of the most exciting things we have ever done!

My Learning Pool is a suite of online learning resources which can be bought and used by anybody.

Here’s a slidedeck that explains things a bit more – if you can’t see it, here’s a PDF version (opens in new window).

Whether you are some who is about to have a change in career, or a volunteer with a local community group, or the person in charge of an organisation – My Learning Pool provides all the training you need, when you need it, where you need it.

What’s more, all this lovely learning is available at a price that is jaw-droppingly good value – exactly what the civic sector, for example, needs right now.

No more giving up a whole day to travel to attend a training session, or spending hundreds of pounds getting the basic knowledge you need to be able to contribute to your full potential.

There are over 20 courses available in My Learning Pool at launch, and we will be adding to them all the time. They cover vital topics for individuals, such as:

  • using social media
  • finding a new job
  • presentation skills
  • personal health and safety

For those looking for a cost effective solution to providing training for your organisation, My Learning Pool also fits the bill, with modules on subjects like:

  • procurement
  • customer service
  • technology and change
  • managing stress

    • data protection

So if your organisation needs to get all its volunteers trained in say customer service, or heath and safety, My Learning Pool can ensure you do so in a cost effective manner.

So, how much does My Learning Pool cost? For a year’s access to all the courses, the price is a mere £25 per person.

Yup. Twenty-five quid.

As we add more courses through the year, you get those as part of your subscription, too.

You can buy it for yourself right now, by visiting the web site and signing up with your credit card.

If you want to bulk buy for your organisation, there are discounts available – check them out.

For anyone looking to brush up some of their skills, or for organisations that need the peace of mind that their people are getting the vital training they need, My Learning Pool fits the bill.

For more information, email hello@mylearningpool.com or follow us on Twitter @mylearningpool.

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