Life is pretty good right now, especially if you happen to be me. Radical Planet 2012 Unconference in TO has come and gone. Great non-speakers and non-educators raised a lot of non-expectations and provided and incredible opportunity of non-learning to all the participants. Special Thanks go out to our American and Irish Contingent who made both the journey, and provided some really key opinions to get the whole (non) show buzzing about all things Social, HR, Sourcing, and what the state of the union will be in 2050. Yes, Life is pretty good for the former Radical Crew.
However, with the end of one (un)conference, comes the advent of more. Breaking News, according to Geoff Webb and Jeff Waldman (at some point guys…we should just identify you as Ebb and Aldman-> you know, so we can tell your sterling hot selves apart J hmmm….maybe I should say Agent Ebb and Agent Aldman of the SHR-> Leave it with me guys! Something cool will come of this thread-> I just don’t see it yet. Any ideas from the Socialytes on how SocialHR will deal with its G(J)eff conundrum) We are looking at a staggering total of 12 Unconferences in 2013; covering quite a bit of territory in the known world and boldly going where few sourcing icons fear to go. That, folks is what they call a ‘teaser’…more information will be coming in the months ahead, so, as they say on television, Stay Tuned.
Moving on to the second week of June 2012- First up is not so much a new program, but a variation on an existing theme. In the world of Microsoft, they have decided that ‘The Cloud’ is truly the future and kept that firmly in mind with the new Office suite, called appropriately enough “Office 365”. At this time it is available for all Office Users; meaning the Cloud will envelop desktop versions of Office 2007, Office 2008 for Mac, Office 2010, and Office 2011 for Mac on a subscription basis. Depending on the plan you choose personally or for your business your documents and powerpoint presentations, Outlook Mail and Word Documents will be both secure and available on both desktop and portable devices such as your Windows Phone. Subscription rates start as low as $6.00/month per user for up to 50 members of your staff, up to $20.00/month per user for large enterprises of over 50,000 people.
I think the main reason this makes my Tech-List this week, is simply for the accessibility and ease of use by the entire team on a single document, or project and you don’t have to waste valuable resources on a number of computing devices/tablets/phones/organizers just to keep the projects organized. Load them to the cloud, set up access for your team and away you go. Wrike is good as a tool to create the work-list this program picks up those reins and drives the team initiative forward full throttle. Have a look at the plans and the various features here: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/compare-plans.aspx#fbid=nUhPt-Ib5dU . As an aside, like anyone else, I enjoy the underused term ‘Free’, but for the bells and whistles this package provides, I may just have to get this underwritten somehow to increase our team productivity. Hmmmm….Anyone need a Virtual-Carwash for (my)charity? Just thinking….
In keeping up with the times, The Sourcers’ Apprentice got a new phone. According to Darwin, one must get with the times to stay with the ‘cool kids’. Not wishing to be left behind, I turned (again) to the world of Windows and a Nokia Lumia 710. Apparently this is a second-generation idea, as Nokia has already released (and saw success with) the Lumia 900. My reason for looking at a Windows phone instead of an I-Phone as so many of my peers have, is that I don’t use a lot of data presently, and my messaging is currently limited to Foursquare (the Dark Knight edition), Twitter, Facebook…The usual offenders; and of course to track my latest e-mail assignment from Agents E and A. I lead such an exciting life (yes, sarcasm..) and I already use a pimped-out I-Pad 2, so why duplicate on a great tool. The phone comes with a number of cool options (basically you carry a Mango-Version of Windows in your hands) and it comes with a descent 6 gb memory. Couple that with the aforementioned Office 365 and you have a powerful productivity pair for accomplishing all your tasks on the road. The only hold-backs I’ve noticed is that the battery is a power-pig and you may be recharging the battery more than you are used to, and the tap-screen keyboard has a bit of a learning curve. Skype works great, so does the voice recognition, I can take meetings without chewing up minutes. You may say that by moving further into the new Socially Acceptable Age, The more accessible I become. Feel free to link up with me on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn by clicking the appropriate link. Currently I am also accepting Klout love from all givers.
So this week Windows rule the roost. Next week I have a special surprise for all the Socialytes in the crowd. So, Stay tuned for something truly exciting. You have never seen a column quite like the next one!!
MIH…each and every time
