This past week members discussed collaboration tools, trainer staffing and more. Explore curated sources on these topics including some from ILTA’s treasure chest.
Collaboration Tools – A Real Solution or Just Another Tool to Manage?
Over the past month various ILTA members have discussed collaboration tools. Are tools like Slack, Asana, Yammer, etc. truly an efficient way to collaborate or are they another distraction? Which tool is the best for my organization or team? What are the best practices for working with teams in collaboration tools? To narrow your list of possible collaboration tools, use PC Magazine’s “Best Online Collaboration Software of 2017” comparison chart and article. Captureapps wrote the “Pros and Cons of Slack” but most pros and cons could apply to any collaboration tool. As a bonus, the article adds best practices notes on etiquette, setting policies for groups and setting personal rules for time management. For guidance from your peers at ILTA, listen to the ILTACON 2016 recording of “The Social Collaboration Tools Making a Meal Out of Email” and the SharePoint Symposium recording “Modernizing the Collaboration Toolkit.”
Attorneys to Trainer Ratios, Defining Training at Your Firm and Skill Up Program Takeaways
After one ILTAn posed a question about staffing ratios for trainers, another wisely answered, “It depends.” She noted specifically it depends on the types of training that fall into a trainer’s purview, the type of law practiced and the trainer’s administrative department (IT or HR). For statistics on trainers, see pages 25, 26 and 32 of ILTA’s 2015 IT Staffing Survey. To do more with your training department, develop a skill up program. For ideas and steps to follow review the Key Takeaways from the Peer Insight on Skill Up Training (requires login credentials and membership in the User Support Community) from the recent skill up virtual roundtable and register for the next virtual roundtable on skill up training on March 15.
SOMETHING EXTRA – Blockchain and More on Training
Spring may not be in the air yet but training is. ILTA volunteers recently shared two blog posts on developing an LTC4 program, “How to Launch and LTC4 Certification Program” and “Another Way to Skill Up and Launch an LTC4 Certification Program.”
Thanks to Deborah Dobson’s 2016 blog series on blockchain, we have a better understanding of the capabilities and potential of this ledger tool. I recently heard a story on NPR’s Morning Edition about one of the early (and convicted) adopters who saw value in blockchain technology through bitcoin. Read the transcript of “Using the Blockchain to Change Prisons” for a little history and a unique perspective.
As ILTA’s content curator, I’m always monitoring the discussion forums to discover what topics are top-of-mind among the members. Each week, I focus on a few areas that spark your interest, and I provide some curated resources to assist your own information-gathering on the topics. If there are specific topics you would like assistance exploring, please contact me at
joanne@iltanet.org