Un-Collaborative Tendencies... And a New Toy!!!

Just threw a new camera on the ol' laptop, and couldn't resist creating my first video weblog. It raises the important question of using technology when technology is not really necessary. You'll see that the medium isn't leveraged to add any specific value. The same is true for all collaborative technologies. Some are pretty sexy, so a decision is made to include them before desired outcomes are defined. We nerds sometimes can't help ourselves.

Anyhow, the video was recorded immediately after a team meeting with respected colleagues who have become trusted friends. Like any closely knit team, some of our collaborative practices were slipping or non existent. We met to readdress the way we interact.

Tendencies. A big thing I got out of this was tendencies. We all have them, positive and negative. How do we provide feedback that isn't attacking people or shaming them for tendencies? How do we receive feedback so that we progress towards all positive tendencies?

Podcasting: Collaborative Media?

I will be doing some podcasts with Interactive Communications Specialist Mike Young from the CIMIT Convening Program next week. CIMIT is doing some cool research in the field of convening and meeting design, and is definitely pushing the envelope with collaborative technology in healthcare. They're getting surgeons and other people that have such limited time to experiment with blogs, podcasts, and most recently Adobe Connect. It's an impressive feat to change cultures of this stature and get this caliber of group to adapt.


Myself and others in my organization work closely and share many thoughts with the CIMIT people; Mike and Lynn Osborn, most regularly. Mike will be in Canada next week and I'm very excited to take advantage of his expertise in film and media. We'll work on a few podcasts, and I'll be sure to post them here. In addition to his mastery of film, Mike can offer a lot of ideas and feedback on the content and subject matter, being that he's fully engaged in the world of convening.


Where does the podcast fit in to the collaborative picture? As with blogs, they're often considered a one-to-many monolithic medium. Fair enough. They usually are. But whether or not they are collaborative in their design, they can definitely support the collaborative process. It's almost an expectation these days that a great conference will have a forum rich in podcasts for attendees to check in on in advance, and a place to revisit presentations afterwards. And they can have a collaborative structure or ecosystem. Like a YouTube, some meeting pages or wikis allow any member post videos of their own.


Is the podcast collaborative? Is it a benefit to the meeting process, or is it one person gaming the audience?