This document discusses various online tools that can be used for networking, meetings, and collaboration to help reduce barriers like travel costs and time. It provides an overview of tools for planning meetings (Doodle, Google Calendar), online networking (Yammer, Ning), collaboration and file sharing (Dropbox, Google Drive), and video conferencing (Skype, Google Hangouts). Tips are provided for sustaining online networks like appointing champions, demonstrating value from contributions, and maintaining engagement through interesting topics. The document concludes with asking for a discussion on which tools may be easy to try and which require more effort, as well as suggestions for tools to experiment with.

1. Tools
For
Networks and Meetings
Paul Webster (Twitter : @watfordgap)
20th March 2013

2. Topics
• Background - What do you do now?
• What do you want to be able to do?
• Ways the tools can help – internal & external networks
• Websites to try* – not to bombard … some clearly stand out
• Tips
• Discussion
• What's next?
(*Disclaimer – Some are very new, I've not tried them all out!)

3. The 'problem' both physical and barriers
Travel – is it the best way .. digital methods better
Time – capacity to attend
Cost – fuel and staff
Knowledge
Confidence / Fear
Capacity / Resources
Any more?

4. Don't forget to plan
• Know your objectives and what you want to say
• Run an on line partnership meeting
• Research where your audience are – do you know?
• Survey and find out, work in spaces where your target audience are
• Plan how to use the tools – have a strategy
• One off consultation, Regular event, How do you want to achieve itd
• Choose tool to match audience and implement
• Look at what other organisations have done, what works elsewhere?
• Sustain the conversation and say thank you
• Encourage people to return, keep it new, links from websites
• Engage with people on line, be receptive, respond, react

5. Ways that on line tools can help
• On-line Networking
– Planning, Collaborating
• Meetings
– Less time, travels and costs
• Development Surgeries
– New ways to reach clients and members
• Team Reporting and Building shared knowledge bank
– Collaborative tools and acceptance of media
• Banish Paper!
– Tablet computers for discussion documents & note taking

6. (Internal & External) On line networks work well ..
• Focus on building communities of interested people around
issues they care about.
• Small highly engaged networks & teams (Task & Finish Groups),
better than loose uncontrolled mass of people (NAVCAboodle?)
• Reach people in a style & media where they are – even e-mail!
• Be provocative in posts and leave open questions … but have
time and answers to complete the conversations.
• Don't make it a chore – an ever decreasing spiral
– to find .. log in to .. disappointing content .. drops off radar ..
• Make it a place feel at home and want to return to.
• Highly visible outcomes and noticeable changes

7. Finding the right tool for the task
From Flickr – Claire Sutton and justinbaeder

8. Websites to try - Planning
• Doodle
– Everyone loves Doodle! Everyone know what Doodle is?
• Google Calendar Sharing for availability
• Yammer
– All information for a dispersed team in one place
– Put up a 'critical' document (mileage claim) or make an
announcement
• Ning is similar – but developed to be more public facing
– Your own social network
– Control all access and features

9. Dispersed Collaboration
Yammer
Private discussion network
What it is
- a closed internal network for teams
- community for dispersed workers
- chat, send open and direct messages
- store & share documents
- follow groups, people and files
- discussion thread notifications online,
by email, phone app or text

10. Dispersed Collaboration
Yammer
Private discussion network
Free Version
- Unlimited size secure, free network for an organisation or team
- Discussions, Polls, Groups, Teams, File sharing,
- Desktop tool and Smart phone app
- Fully customisable notifications by device and frequency
- Full control over network and group membership
Paid for Version – From £2.00 per user per month
- Custom branding
- Tools for bulk user management
- Enterprise control over keyword blocking and stats downloads
- Enhanced support via telephone and email
Other ones to look at
- Ning, Facebook Groups, Google+ Communities

11. Websites to try – Collaborate & Share
• Dropbox
– Great for sharing documents between team members
• Google Drive
– Banish paper from meetings!
– Collaborate in real time
– Not Microsoft, so some compatibility checks needed
• Facebook Groups – It's where many people are already
• Huddle
– Very secure team management & project planning site
• Instant public collaboration (Most free = public, paid = private)
– listhings.com, linolit.com - very easy 'corkboards'
– piratepad.net, scribblar.com instant 'wiki' - history playback

12. Collaboration
Google Tools (Drive)
www.google.co.uk
(was Google Docs)
You need a (free)
Google account
What it is
- Google Drive (My Drive offline)
- Collaborative document sharing
- Online version of Office Software
- Documents, Spreadsheets, Forms
- Also Presentations & Drawings
- Need a (free) Google account
- File level control for access / update
- Have to be connected to Internet
Maybe consider Yammer or Dropbox

13. Collaboration
Google Tools (Drive)
What it does
- Similar editing features to Desktop based Office software
- Upload files and share, gather information by Forms
- Revisions & rollback changes – view list of revisions
- Simultaneous live updating & chat while working together
- Secure 'cloud' backup
- Doesn't have all features of Office Software
- Download .doc / .pdf to Format, Share, Print

14. Social Networking
Google+
Integrate – With other Google
services & Search services
Circles – A natural way to mimic
relationships and group friends
Hangouts – Video chat-room, share
docs, live stream to YouTube
Mobile App – Very intuitive
http://www.socialv2.com/google-howto/the-google-shortcuts-and-cheatsheet/

15. Collaboration
Google Tools
Not Just Document Sharing (Google Drive)
- Browser (Chrome)
- Mail (Very popular and versatile on-line e-mail system)
- Reader (Keep up to date with RSS newsfeeds you subscribe to)
- Maps and Streetview (Find an organisation and see the building)
- Places (Enhanced search result listing & map integration)
- Alerts (Instant e-mail notifications when search term mentioned)
- Custom Search (Embeddable search for your site or selected range)
- Wallet (Secure money transactions)
- Adwords (Advertising and keyword promotion)
- Sites (Build simple webpages)
- Play (Google App store for Android phones)
- Plus (Social network, share content in 'Circles' & video 'Hangouts')
Even
- Hardware (Chromebook)
- Augmented Reality (Glass)

16. Websites to try - Meetings
• Skype
– Free for one to one sessions, premium version for groups
• Google+ Hangouts (10 people)
– Easy to use, can live stream and save to You Tube
– Share whiteboards and files
• Go to Meeting (Robust scalable conferencing)
– Available for charities through CTXchange
• Yammer
– Not as easy to follow along, but key points can be posted
• Other free systems
– WebEx (3 people), ooVoo (12 people)

17. Group Communications
Skype – www.skype.com
What it is
- voice & video calls over internet
- text chat
- desktop sharing
- distance meetings
- reduces travel
- one to one only on free version
- owned by Microsoft

18. Group
Communications
Skype
Free Version
- Your Skyple Account and software updates
- One to one video and voice calls to anyone else on Skype
- Instant messaging and file sharing
Paid for Version – £2.99 introductory fee, normally £5.99 per month
- Calls to mobiles and landlines
- SMS text messages
- Group video chat for up to 10 people
- Group screen sharing
Other similar sites to look at
- ooVoo, Google+ Hangouts, WebEx

19. Involving Wider Groups and Communities
• Surgeries using Skype or Google+
– @cllrharrington – bookable, topic related each week
• Community / Partnership Story Telling
– Share good news & project successes – Com-Phone (Android App)
• Other ways to convey your message – Jing, ScreenR, even Vine
– Short video tutorials
• Live stream (video or audio) events in a community page
– Get an on-line debate started whilst the event is happening
• Have a '#tamesidehour' – Tameside 4 Good open tweetchat
– Public (on Twitter) ways to canvass community views
– Award winning #yorkshirehour
• Traditional forums can work (Sheffield Forum) or can become echo
chambers or full of ranting trolls. Need careful management.

20. Following online chat or an topic #hashtag
Events often expensive & time consuming to attend, but great for
learning & sharing. Participate online or catch-up on tweets, speaker
talks, video interviews and event pictures. Mange in :Hootsuite & Tweetdeck
Conversations #chat2lrn
in :
4pm Thur
Twitterfall
#nptalk
Tweetchat
8pm Wed
#yorkshirehour
8pm Wed
#vcssupportnw
#bigtif etc.

21. Partner feedback to build knowledge bank
• Recording feedback from sessions
– Video (Bambuser) & Audio (Audioboo) as comfortable
– Better than case studies – volunteer management
• Collaborative documents
– Build shared documents and policies – do live in meetings
• Shared 'social bookmarking' – Digg, Del.ico.us – private or public
• Capturing intelligence and building shared learning
environment. Formal system, Google Drive or a Wiki
– LMSs are building this in, snippets Person A has, if recorded
and classified correctly can help Person B... or Person C in 12
months time
– Wiki (pbWiki, WikiSpaces) or a Google Doc (less searchable)

22. On-line learning
• Ticks all the boxes
– Saves time, lower cost, reduces travel
– Instant updates can be rolled out to all learners / volunteers
• Build on line learning programme for new starters & track this
• Direct groups to on demand e-learning as need identified (now),
not when next course is being run (6 months)
• Allows network partners to collaborate and build courses
• Systems available from
– Learning Pool – Interactive with Learner Management
– KnowHow NonProfit – Video tutorial based

23. Various Other Tools
• Batchgeo – Instant Google Maps pinpoints from spreadsheets
• Doo.net – Advanced 'tagged' cloud file sharing
• Evernote – Fantastically easy way to share files across devices
• Join.me – Screen sharing, chat by text & voice (10 people free)
• Mind Meister – On line collaborative mind mapping
• Speak Pipe – Let your website visitors leave audio feedback
• Text Local – Send SMS messages to team (need to buy credits)
• Trello – Project Mgmt – Team idea sharing & progress tracking
• The App Builder – Build free smartphone apps
• Volunteer Spot – Volunteer scheduling & management software

24. Tips for Sustaining the Network
A Driver
Dedication from the people who want to share
Independent & Transparent
More willing to open up & share if parameters are clear
Jigsaw in it's place
Contributing to other networks & feeding from resources
Topics
Interesting, relevant, presented well for the local sector
Energy to keep going
Hard work when everyone else has gone back to their day jobs
Time
Assign someone & give them responsibility to manage and feed it
Community
People lead full & busy lives, need clear value
Change
Responsive and can shift if the landscape or direction changes
Fun & Human Interest
Light hearted, birthdays etc. Not always just dry meeting notes!

25. On line Networks - Summary
• Have a clearly defined purpose and aims for the community
• Give people a reason to visit (share file, announcements, chat)
• Get all participants happily on board with chosen tools
• Make sure the technology works & bandwidth (upload) is good
• Appoint 'champions' – develop step-by-step guide sheets
• Demonstrate the value of contributions by using them
• Treat on line meeting with same importance as one face to face
– Dedicate time & headspace, Privacy, Facilitate, Record notes
• See the strategy through – Sustain, Listen & Revise if needed

26. Summary - Discussion
Will they work? Yes / No / Why / Why not?
Which are easy to 'give it a go'?
Which will 'take more effort'?
Which one things will you try out this week?
Links
http://www.feverbee.com
http://nptechuk.wordpress.com/
https://socialsourcecommons.org/toolbox/show/1006
http://agilecomplexificationinverter.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/collaboration-tools
-list.html
http://www.communityhowto.com

27. Thank You – My Email & Twitter contacts
Paul Webster
paul @ watfordgapservices.org.uk
@watfordgap