Hello, As a first time attendee of the MCN Conference, I have to say that I was very fascinated by the conversation going on about the relationship between IT Professionals and their Directors. I am fortunate because a little over a year ago the director of the San Jose Museum of Art made a decision to embrace technology and created the position which I currently fill.
Piggybacking of some of the discussion about communication, I wanted to offer a little info about a situation that arose recently. Around the one year anniversary of my position I was approached by our Marketing Director who mentioned to me that I need to be a little more outspoken about what it is that I do at the Museum. This really caught me off guard. I felt that with every opportunity that presented itself I tried to speak about technology and what it was that I was doing. I went through a lot of denial about this, but finally came to the conclusion that I would draft an email that would recap the previous year's accomplishments; this email would then be sent to certain staff members who I felt were stakeholders. The email took me two days to write and ended up being a four page memo. In it, I tried to put it in layman's terms what was accomplished; this many people downloaded our podcast, this many people watched our YouTube Videos, this many people listened to our cell phone tours, I went to these conferences, we are mentioned on this blog, etc., etc. I also included links, which most people are pretty comfortable with clicking on. Basically, I became a self promoter. Not something that I expected to have to do, but embraced after I reflected on all the accomplishments. The email, with attached memo, was very well received and became "Jerry McGuire"ish from people saying, "Have you read the memo?" or "Hey, I enjoyed the memo! Didn't realize you did all that stuff!" It was even printed out and distributed by the Director of the Museum to all the Board Members at one of their meetings. It was also forwarded to our Development staff for use in grants and corporate funding initiatives. And, it also acts as a personal record that can be referred to on numerous occasions when shameless self promotion opportunities arise. I realize that I might be in a unique situation, but I encourage some of you to take up the reins of self promotion. It might help to clear the air about any staff questions and might give you a better picture of where you stand in your organization. Thanks for a great session Nik! I was the last one who received one of the books you were handing out at the end! Best regards, Chris Alexander Manager of Interactive Technology San Jose Museum of Art
