Friday, October 31, 2014

Highlights from the HighEdWeb 2014 Conference - Daphne's Perspective

Oh, Oregon...do I miss thee. Your gigantic trees, your rolling hills and towering mountains, your soft never-ending rain. Oh - and the 700+ congregation of higher ed web professionals!

Morgan and I had the opportunity to attend this year's HighEdWeb conference in Portland, Oregon which was just last week. This is one of the best conferences in the country for those in our profession. Savvy speakers, seven different tracks, networking and collaboration sessions/events, workshops, and a WHOLE lot of enthusiasm.

HighEdWeb session with standing-room only
Popular session at #heweb14 (#mpd3) with Morgan and Daphne sitting on the floor! Courtesy +Lougan Bishop
Morgan and I split up for many of the sessions and I attended quite a few management and professional development ones in addition to some in marketing, accessibility/usability, and development/architecture. I have to say, some of the most interesting sessions were in the management/professional development track.

The best of conference winner is Dave Cameron's HUMAN at work presentation about how to deal with "all the things" at work, including tasks, people, stress, and information overload.

Give yourself the gift of fewer decisions. Free up the cognitive space to encourage creativity & productivity. - Danielle Stapleon
His five goals for being a productive human being are so simple yet brilliant.
  1. Be honest - with yourself and others, subjectively and objectively. Pay attention to your internalized priorities, be real with yourself when interpreting your own performance levels, and don't live in denial. But also measure and capture data, develop reports and analyze your progress - facts speak volumes. Admit to your mistakes with others and give the feedback you would want to hear yourself.

  2. Be unafraid - mistakes are just a part of life. Have confidence, and don't be intimidated by those rock stars! Let go of those irrational fears like change and gossip. And don't be overwhelmed by complexity - take it one step at a time.

  3. Be mindful and focused. Tools to help your workday are AWESOME but don't let them rule your life. We can easily get overwhelmed by email, tasks, calendars and meetings. Use email just for communicating to groups, documenting info, and sending files - don't let it be the boss of you. Turn your email push notifications off and commit to checking your email just twice a day. Review your outstanding tasks daily and prioritize, place them in a project management system like Asana (that is what Web Services uses!) Use your calendar to schedule work tasks and breaks, and consider things like "no-meeting Mondays." Speaking of meetings, don't sit on your phone during them and be sure to take notes and report/share with your team.

  4. Be active - walk and get up periodically. Build a work-out routine. Staying active helps your focus and energy throughout the day. Start your day with a "focus" activity such as a card game, puzzle, or drawing to get your brain going. Keep your workspace clean and organized and consider a more ergonomic desk set-up such as a standing desk. Listen to music with headphones while you are trying to concentrate.

  5. Be nice to your fellow humans! Be a proud member of your team. Support your co-workers, be social, take ownership of your role, and give them a heads-up when you can. Show up to work with a positive attitude - if you are having a bad day, just put on a smile and bear it. Treat others the way you want to be treated.
 Love the idea of No-Meeting Mondas & Fix-It Fridays. I need to be better w/developing dedicated work blocks in my schedule. -Nicole Lentine
    So in summary we have:
    Honest, Unafraid, Mindful, Active, Nice
    Graphic extracted from Dave Cameron's slide deck.

    Isn't that a nifty acronym?

    To view the whole slide deck, check out Dave Cameron's Tumblr. To view related tweets, look up #heweb14 and #mpd9 on Twitter.

    -Daphne

    Tuesday, October 14, 2014

    "Meet the Staff" Series - Daphne Hunt, Director

    Web Services would like to share with the community a bit about our team such as what we do, "a day in the life", and other interesting things about the make-up of our team members. Each Web Services member contributes something very important (and very different) to the overall team. To start off with, here is a little bit about myself! -Daphne

    Full name: Daphne Jo Hunt
    Daphne Hunt
    Title: Director of Web Services
    Length of time in Web Services at Tarleton: 8 years
    Top three areas of expertise: Web strategy, web team/project management, graphic design
    Topic Interests: Same as expertise, with additional interests in video production, photography, and web analytics
    Favorite thing about my job: Working with such a talented group of staff members each and every day!
    Favorite hobby: Making crafts! I have a craft room at home and have recently made hair bows, a fall wreath, and a "fairy garden" for my bird bath.

    A "Day in the Life":
    1. Check homepage for any out-of-date information and make sure important information gets posted. (Tarleton's homepage is my "baby" that I must keep nurtured.)
    2. Check and respond to emails throughout the day (which as you know can take a while here at Tarleton!)
    3. As the day rolls along, check in with all the members of my team to see how they are doing. Since we are all in the same office area, it doesn't take too long to figure out what's going on!
    4. Go to meetings. We love to collaborate and share information with other departments, so I do spend a lot of my time in meetings. Anywhere from 2-4 hours a day on average. I meet with Marketing & Communications, Information Technology Services, and many other teams on campus. I get to meet a lot of people in my position!
    5. Monitor my team's projects & tasks on Asana. We enter all of our projects and tasks to this system in order to keep track of and prioritize all of our outstanding projects and tasks. At any given time, my team can have over 100 pending tasks in the queue as a whole! We each get several tasks done each day so we are constantly making headway.
    6. Develop strategies for improving our web presence and for improving how we communicate changes to campus. Making policies and guidelines for the web is one thing, but communicating those things to campus is just as important. I also give guidance to my staff about how to communicate to our colleagues, because I believe strongly in transparency, respectfulness, timeliness, and reinforcement.
    7. Give feedback and advice on projects and tasks. I help to ensure we are still moving in the right direction and at an appropriate speed to get things done.
    8. Team meetings: We usually have an official team meeting one or two times a week to discuss major projects and other topics that have come up during the week. We also have several "unofficial" team meetings during the week as needed - if nothing else, to just be able to share a joke and keep everyone in high spirits on a stressful day!
    9. Design graphics such as homepage highlights and advertising banners. I love graphic design so I section off a sliver of my day to work on these types of tasks.