Ben and I are on the same team, so for those of you who've read his blog, I'd like to reiterate that it was an extremely iterative process which, I think, has yielded a good result. We all had done some of our own prep work individually, so when we met to work on the project we immediately jumped in with our ideas. We took pieces of everyone's ideas in the end. The collaboration definitely boosted my level of creativity!
It is ironic that we met face-to-face to work out our online presentation, and we all felt that it was the fastest and most effective way to figure out what we wanted to do. Perhaps this is just because we are still neophyte online learners/practitioners. At least that's true for myself.
It's a bit of a learning curve for me at the moment. Besides this class, I'm working on a short term consulting project where my consulting colleagues are in Germany and the UK. The client is in California and Switzerland. Everything we do is via email, skype and Huddle. The final project is face-to-face, but all the prep work is virtual. One of the solutions we want to offer to the team is how to work better virtually. At least we're practicing that first hand.
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Laura, I think that what you found, which is literally some form of blended learning support, is very valuable. In the same way that online learning can be synchronous or asynchronous, knowing that we have options and then exploring the best way to work them to meet our needs is valuable.
ReplyDeleteIs your consulting project at all related to our course, or are the meeting and working skills that are necessary for it the same ones that we are exploring in class?
What is Huddle?
Also, when you refer to other tools and blogs, consider giving links to them as well, as that will make it easier for the readers to follow your thoughts.
Jeffrey
Dear Laura,
ReplyDeleteI share your appreciation towards a face-to-face meeting - how it could be the most effective way to get the work done. I also work with colleagues in different time zones, and the more synchronous contact we have, either via teleconference or videoconference (the second best to a face-to-face meeting), I find that the team 'feels like a team' and possibly more productive.
In terms of teams working better virtually, I think that the old time values like having clear common goals, building trust, respect for diversity, professionalism, all remain important in the virtual world. Although I am not sure how best to foster these online... Something I will keep an eye out in the coming weeks.
Thank you and cheers,
Akiko
Hi - for those who don't know...Huddle is an online project management software. I'm using it for a consulting project at the moment where my teammates are in the UK and Germany. We store docs up there so we can all reference it. The link is: http://www.huddle.net
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