Posts from — June 2010

This question is for internal corporate communicators:

Do you have paper based communications you create and share digitally, or do you have electronic communication products people can consume any way they want including print?

“Take a memo!”  That is SOoo  1960.  This is 2010!  We don’t have typewriters.  Of course, we all have computers.  But, do you or your staff, craft a memo on a computer and then distribute it as an attachment to an email?  Do you post a PDF of the memo on your intranet?  Congratulations!  You are using the tools.  That’s good.  Unfortunately, you are limiting the capability of the tools by not having the right mindset.  You are still thinking “Memo!”

Flip it around!  Don’t think “I have to write a memo.”  Think, “I have some important information to share.  What will be my primary tool to communicate this?  What will be my backup channels?  How can these channels support each other?  Where will this information reside for the long term?” [Read more →]

Academy: 10 ways to say it with prezi on Prezi

When I work on a project, I usually whiteboard it, then work in outline mode of Microsoft Word.  I will sometimes use a mind map program like MindMeister to capture my thoughts.  The benefits of the Word outline mode  and the electronic mind map is that I can move whole sections around and show scale at the same time.

Prezi does all of this AND allows me to draw a path through it so I can show others.  What a fantastic tool.  It is THE  “mind map” and presentation tool.  I hope you agree.

April’s roll out of the Apple iPad overshadowed another special bit of computing history.  H. Edward Roberts, the designer of one of the very first personal computers died this month.  His Altair 8800 inspired Bill Gates and Paul Allen to develop Microsoft Basic which would become the world’s largest software company.  That’s 1975 to 2010.  Thirty-five years.  That’s all.  From a computer with no display screen to a beautiful display screen with a computer, times have certainly changed.

There is  a running debate whether the iPad is an appliance or a computer.  I say it doesn’t really matter.   The iPad opens the internet, email, and social networks to a whole new group of users.  They don’t need to be computer savvy; they just need to be iPad savvy.

Bringing more people to the internet, email and social networking is a good thing.  I’ll see you there.