fluffing your lines – project management at its best

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Recently I was reminded of the performers principle of carrying on regardless even if you fluff your lines. This being based on the knowledge that no-one apart from a few knew what was supposed to happen in the first place and so, in most cases, the majority will assume the reality of what happened was planned.

I think it’s useful to bear this in mind when a project isn’t quite going to plan. There are so many times when the only option held as acceptable is the ideal. But true project management principles recognise what the lowest possible acceptable state is, as well as the highest.

Now don’t get me wrong, as a client to an agency, I always shoot for the moon. I see it as my personal responsibility that the charity gets the best for every pound we spend. I owe it to every tin shaker who has volunteered (and all the other supporters too), as well as every beneficiary who needs the charity.

However the principle of ‘fluffing your lines’ and still getting a round of applause is very helpful to keep to mind when times are looking gloomy. The other positive is that phasing new features in gives you something else to talk about after the initial big bang!

pondering.. what makes a charity compelling enough to reccommend?

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Over Christmas I found myself thinking about whether there is a pattern to what makes someone recommend a charity. I think it must be different to commercial organisations but I can’t really be sure. I posted my ponderings on twitter and it started a conversation I thought I’d repeat here.

So here you go – a mini crowd sourced checklist and the seed that started my resolution to blog!

 

spirals Laila Takeh
Today I am pondering.. Is there a pattern to what makes a charity compelling enough for someone to recc’d it
rachelbeer Rachel Beer
@spirals there are probably some common factors, which would be fairly easy to guess at, but a pattern… I’m not so sure
spirals Laila Takeh
@rachelbeer thx- I agree. Been thinking.. exc. supporter’s personal experience of the issue – personable, honesty, good storytelling..
rachelbeer Rachel Beer
@spirals and showing impact/positive outcomes as well as the need, sharing useful inform, perceived to be an authority on the issue/cause…
spirals Laila Takeh
@rachelbeer Think another important one is collaborating with others where there is shared issue/s. Not being megolomaniac
rachelbeer Rachel Beer
@spirals … and perceived to be good value for money/effective. I think showing appreciation for supporters is a big one in the mix, too
spirals Laila Takeh
@rachelbeer there must be some sort of checklist somewhere already. Hmmm
rachelbeer Rachel Beer
@spirals good one
rachelbeer Rachel Beer
@spirals I’m not sure there is. I was thinking about blogging it – do you have a blog?
spirals Laila Takeh
@rachelbeer toyed with blogging but not stuck it out yet. Perhaps that should be my 2011 resolution 🙂

tips on working with digital agencies – choosing the right agency

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I often get asked about how I work with digital agencies to get the best from them or to cope with any issues that may have arisen. I don’t think there is a single model you can use as it really depends on the agency and the people (both yours and theirs). It obviously all starts at the point of appointing the agency.

I’m sure there are articles out there that suggest a specific criteria or questions you can use when making your agency choice (unfortunately links to any have escaped me today so please drop a link in my comments!). Yet it really starts at a slightly higher level – at the point just before you decide which agency/s to approach. So here are my thoughts…

You can typically categorise digital agencies along a spectrum, some agencies are very transparent about their focus but others will advertise themselves simply as full service. If you can identify where an agency sits along the spectrum it really helps you know if they’d be a good fit for your project. It also helps guide you on how best to manage them later on.

The ends of the spectrum

Creative (Form / aesthetic) driven

  • Great at beautiful and innovative ideas and design
  • Low/loose project management
  • Flexible and adaptable
  • Less likely to hit a deadline comfortably

Technical (Function) driven

  • Great at dealing with complex functionality or infrastructure
  • High/structured project management
  • Process driven and less adaptable
  • More likely to hit a deadline on time

Key questions I ask myself when deciding who to approach: does success focus on function or form? and how flexible is the deadline?

Does this spectrum idea work for you? Have you got an idea of where your agency/s sit?

will charities make money from social networking?

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This is another blog post I drafted a while ago…

“With the social networking space being pandemic I know a number of charities in the UK are trying to work out ways they can capitalise on the phenomenon. It’s obvious that tapping into existing social networks and being available as a ‘friend’ that can be added to your MySpace/Bebo/Facebook, allowing users to wear their hearts on the web, meets many charities awareness raising aims. But how justifiable is it to spend the amount of time necessary to boost the profile sufficiently enough for it to take on it’s own viral life?

Someone said to me recently that the way to capitalise on the social web phenomenon is to get users to do something for you without them realising. But of course the condition of this is that it has to be something quite addictive, useful to the individual or integral to the way they live. Ok, so if that’s our criteria I can see a few charities will be able to come up with the ideas. But what about the others?”

Reflecting back on this I think the criteria (addictive, useful, integral) can be broken down more explicitly when it comes to charities. So here’s my attempt at a question list to help when thinking about if a concept is worth investing in.

  1. EMOTIVE: does it evoke an emotion? or ‘capitalise’ on an existing emotional state?
    Charities are by their very nature emotive. It’s where every charity starts – a belief that there is something that needs social change or support.  But today’s culture is soaked through with ‘asks’ and so you have to really evaluate if your idea will stand out and create awe/shock/fun/sympathy/pride.
  2. REWARDING: does it make someone feel empowered?
    For health and development charities this is a big one as many people feel dis-empowered by health problems or the state of the world. The social gaming industry has this factor nailed – i think there’s lots to learn from this area.
  3. CONVENIENCE: does it help you do something more easily? OR does it help you do something you couldn’t have done previously?
  4. EXCLUSIVENESS: does it make you feel one of a special few? is there a limited edition nature to it?
    This one is pretty hard with digital media as it’s expected, and needs to be, very open in order to be perceived as shareable – I’d suggest there needs to be some complementary activity offline.
  5. COMPETITIVE: is someone already doing it? is it popular? could you do it better?
    At BHF we created a recipe finder app even though there were quite a few out there already. However what this meant is we knew there was a market for the app and all it took was to spot our unique selling point – our expert heart health nutrition advice.

And of course you then need to weigh this up against the effort and costs.

facing the cold

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This is a stub of a post I wrote a while back. I’m currently reading the Networked Nonprofit and this pondering is particularly relevant in that context.

“Charities often publicise the democratic governance they abide by, rightly so. But many are struggling to make space for the very open platform of consumer involvement that is the web.

Too scared to try. Perhaps they don’t have enough confidence in themselves? but why would that be? What makes them doubt?

The loudest people are generally the highly opinionated with extreme singular views. Hence it’s the bad comments that get heard. The quiet majority are really the ones we want to hear from – its our job to give them the space to be heard.”

Hello world!

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It’s my 2011 resolution to try to write a regular blog. I’ve tried before with no success because I’ve always been uncertain about the value I’m adding. I know there’s already some excellent charity digital peeps out there blogging – I’m subscribed to a number of them. So what exactly can I add?

But I’ve realised I’m still getting asked some of the same questions about digital from charity folks that I was asked a few years ago. So here goes my experiment to try to add value by answering some of these questions. I’m probably going to repeat topics you’ve seen elsewhere but hopefully I’ll be giving you something extra from my real world experiences.

Here’s my current potential topics list. Let me know if you have any additions / amends / order of pref.

  • where to start when redesigning your charity website
  • organising / motivating your content contributors
  • working with your IT / Technical team (and avoiding tension)
  • personal tips on working with digital agencies
  • ‘but digital is so easy’ managing expectations