i enjoy video editing, which i guess doens’t surprise me. i’ve been putting together the holiday videos for rctc the past three years, as well as some additional videos (including a fun halloween one this pas october).
here’s this year’s holiday video. i edited it and took the closeup video cuts.
this is going to be a blog post about blogging. how meta.
i went to the minnesota blogger conference today and learned stuff about blogging. here are the top takeaways i got from the conference.
1. your blog post needs to be at least 300 words for google to index it. not 280. not 299. 300. THAT is the biggest thing i learned, and i believe the most useful for work, where i just started a news blog. the more we can get out on google, the better.
2. another useful thing i learned that i will apply to work: it can take at least 9 months for a blog to really take off. i’ve gotten more than one comment about how no one’s reading the blog (they are) and it’s useless (can’t say that yet!) so why are we bothering? if we are still getting the numbers we are getting now, which are not horrible (the most read post is 500 views), then i will put a kibosh on it.
3. i found out a useful wordpress plugin that gives a calendar view of posts versus a listing.
4. a personal thought process from novice to expert: “this is neat. -> i might be good at this. -> i’m a _______.”
5. find 6 characteristics you value and use them as a filter for everyone and everything you work with. does content serve your audience? does your content fit your values? don’t dilute your message with extraneous crap. be the guardian leader of your blog. *
6. be the best answer. what can i be the best answer for? what is it i’m best at? what do i want to be known for?
* what are my 6 values?
1. eat well, but remember to eat socially as well.
2. pay attention – beauty is in places you least expect.
3. be cynically optimistic. or optimistically cynical.
4. it’s ok to be excited about weird stuff.
5. be an environmentalist. we only have one earth.
6. still working on this one!
the next week is going to be busy busy. i’m not looking forward to it! i’m actually planning on staying late tomorrow for sure and maybe thursday just so i can make sure i get everything done that needs to be done for the beginning of the school year.
we’ll see if i get around to writing anything of substance in the next few days!
i am a big introvert. it’s not so bad that i can’t function in public, because i CAN function in public, and i function quite well if i know you well. if i know you well, it’s less of a chore for me to be around you (chore as in it takes a lot of energy). if i know you really well, i can easily be around you with no energy drain.
while cursed with this lovely introvertiveness, i am also cursed with the ability to be a somewhat presentable and effective presenter. it’s kind of like math – i am GOOD at it, and i can DO it, but i sure as heck don’t enjoy it. (ok, well, i don’t hate getting up in front of people as much as math, but you get the idea).
when the opportunity arose to say something at a MnSCU social media roundtable, i knew this was a good opportunity, and i wouldn’t mind sharing what i know. plus it would be a great thing to put on anyone’s resume! (NOT that i’m using it lately, but you never know what might happen!) so i volunteered to say something.
today was the big day, and while i wasn’t as nervous as i was in front of rctc’s administrators or the audience of 100+ on staff development day, it was still something that made my nerves wrack and my senses heighten to levels unacceptable to the little person inside of me who just wants to curl up on my couch with a book.
so now i’m wiped out, and after lying on the couch for an hour and a half, i am going to live-tweet the basketball game tonight (in lieu of “arrow” – waaahhhhhh), so i’ll be good to just pass out after that’s over.
you lucky people who get your energy from being around people don’t know how good you’ve got it.
i’m going to try to keep this vague as to not call anyone out at my place of employment.*
my job is to help get people more interested in many aspects of rctc and reach out through social media, but i can’t do my job if others don’t want to have anything to do with it.
i had a perfect opportunity to create a conversation with another mnscu school – and isn’t that what social media is about? reaching across the interwebs and creating conversation?
but when it came down to it, the counterpart on rctc’s end doesn’t think this is a good way to spend time – or resources is my guess. if it were up to this person, my guess is i wouldn’t be working there and all our social accounts would be abolished.
unfortunately, after the other school reached out, i couldn’t reach back and grab halfway. instead, i left the other half hanging, waiting for that high five.
*sigh* i kind of want to go all tom cruise and say HELP ME HELP YOU!!! and also a short reminder that fun is a core value. 🙁
*…and as in keeping with the social media policy that I WROTE, i will say that the opinion of this piece is my own and is not of rctc’s.**
**who knows – i may just delete this post after a little bit.
i’m creating my first “real” marketing plan -ish thing. it’s a social media strategy and forecast for the college, but it’s the first time i’ve done something like this in real life versus in class. my classes are finally paying off?
i don’t mind it so far! it’s like a research paper, but with a lot of unknowns. that’s all! thought i’d share!
today we had a meeting at work, and they are doing all they can to prevent future layoffs. this means whittling down everyone’s vacation to 20 hours by jan 31 (and i mean EVERYONE company-wide – thousands of people) and quitting the 401K match until at least june. the vacation thing doesn’t bug me because i don’t have 200 hours like some people. i have 12, and we are required to take off xmas eve and day after xmas as well as the day before and after new year’s. i feel bad for my one coworker who’s been saving her vacation for maternity leave. baby’s due in february and she’ll have to use her vacation time before that. that would SUCK.
ugh! i’m glad to have a job and all, but this is just depressing. the thing is, is that we’re busy in my dept. we’ve been busy for a while. add to that no raises this year, no 401k match, rising health insurance costs, what a pain in the behind.
they changed the vacation thing, again. now everyone has to take 80 hours from t-day to jan. 31, no matter how much vacation you have in your accrual bank. i took two days for t-day, which leaves me with 8. xmas and new year’s takes up 4, then we are closed MLK day w/out pay. so i had to pick three days in january to take off. i’m taking a five-day weekend over MLK day. what a crock. when all’s said and done, i’ll have -24 hours of vacation feb. 1. given the fact that i only accrue 40 hours a year, this is really annoying me. why couldn’t they have pro-rated it according to how much you accrue? the people who earn 4 weeks a year could take twice as much as those who earn 2 weeks. so much for a summer vacation. good thing i didn’t have one planned.
it’s been a long long time since i’ve written something negative about work. and it’s nothing really negative about my job in particular; it’s about the company in general.
we have this intranet at work where you can check your paychecks and vacation balance, and they also post messages from head honchos. well, the head cheese wrote a message pertaining to how the meat and potatoes of our business, realtors, is not doing the greatest due to the downturn in the housing market. he actually used the word lousy when referring to the previous year’s numbers.
needless to say, there are layoffs on the horizon, and granted the last time there was a layoff i talked to my supervisor and he basically told me that my job was secure, and promise never to leave, it’s still shaky ground. my department in particular hasn’t heard anything one way or the other (unlike other departments), but still…
if i get laid off again, i will not be happy. i might start looking for jobs again. i hate the job search, but i’d rather be safe than sorry.
i’ve been at my job for four days.
and it’s kinda meh.
first, i was not informed that everybody works every third weekend when there’s a lot of jobs backed up. that was “inadvertently” left out of my interviews, i guess. so that’s not really that cool.
second, the job is not exactly what i expected it to be. i guess i thought i would be getting instructions on how to put something together, design it, and then it would go back to proofing or whatever, then make corrections, etc. etc. no. basically, it is looking at an already completely finished piece, making sure the pictures are all there, the fonts are ok, and it’s ready to go to print. no designing really on any part at all. i guess i thought there would be a little designing.
plus, the people are interesting. there’s a woman who’s worked there for 17 years, and she’s kind of…abrasive, i guess you could say. really out there, in your face. there’s an older woman who works there who’s pretty cool; we talked about our cats on friday. there’s also a girl there who has a second job at hooters, and a girl who’s on maternity leave, but will be back soon. red-haired, six feet tall, and apparently she’s not afraid to be aggressive. then two guys who don’t talk much. oh, three i guess.
so, i get there in the morning, i log in to the various places i need to be logged in to, i grab a job, i work on it, it goes back to the cust. service person, and i work on the next job. something can take 15 mnutes, and another could take 2 hours. it’s busy work, in short, and i do maybe 9-10 jobs a day.
another thing that’s annoying is you have to keep track of your time – obsessively. you write it down on the sheets in each job folder AND there’s an activity sheet you fill out every day with how much time you spend on everything. it’s kind of dumb.
so, it’s definitely not my dream job, and i wouldn’t feel so bad about leaving sometime in the very near future. i’m waiting to hear back from SCSU to see if i have an interview, and then if i don’t get that one, i’m searching full force.
but, it’s much better than target, and it pays much better too. 🙂