My interest in Ning continues unabated, especially after seeing that over 100,000 networks have been developed so far. Marc Andreesen's post on the accomplishment indicates that one of the reasons for their incredible growth is that Ning developers are focusing on making it ridiculously easy to set up your own network. I'm here to tell you that they're succeeding with that plan. You can definitely set up a network in... Read more →

Last week Rosetta Thurman and I invited interested women to join us for a career retreat in the D.C. area. Since then, we've been thrilled to hear from a number of women who are excited about the idea of working together to create their career plans and move their professional development forward. Now it's time for next steps. The Beyond the Glass Ceiling Community We're starting with a new community... Read more →

A few months ago I wrote that the best blogging strategy for nonprofits may be a group blog, where a number of writers are all contributing to creating posts, rather than relying on a single writer. Now I want to share a few tools that can make a group blog--or any group writing project--even easier. Writing Posts with Google Docs Google Docs lets you create and share documents online, which... Read more →

A lot of email in my inbox is of the "Check out this link!" variety. This morning, Harold Jarche reminds us, in a post entitled "Free Your Bookmarks," how social bookmarking through sites like del.icio.us can cut email clutter. Instead of emailing links to everyone you know (we're begging you to stop!), set up tags in del.icio.us or any other social bookmarking site. You can create categories for friends, family,... Read more →

As part of answering Reader Questions this week, I'm going back to something that Glenn Ross asked me awhile ago: If I'm responsible for L&D in my organization, how can I help my employees identify their PLEs (personal learning environments) and what resources do I need to provide for them? Apparently Glenn likes to ask the tough questions. But I'm feeling brave, so I'm going to try for an answer... Read more →

Have you ever tried to explain social bookmarking to a non-techie? A little frustrating, to say the least. Well, the crew at Common Craft once again brings technology to the rest of us with their latest 3.5 minute video on social bookmarking--more specifically, on del.icio.us. Lee LeFever and his wife Sashi continue to entertain and edify with their white-board style of clarifying Web 2.0, although this version is missing the... Read more →

Yesterday's plea for rethinking face-to-face meetings apparently struck a nerve, as a lively discussion broke out in comments and Jane of Wandering Eyre weighed in on her blog. As you'll recall, I was complaining that a group I'm working with wouldn't use online tools to gather information, preferring to meet face-to-face and I suggested a few reasons why I thought that might be true. I was initially going to keep... Read more →

Looks like interest in Facebook is continuing: It's Facebook Week! Over at Read/WriteWeb, it's Day One of Facebook Week. You can join the Facebook group for Read/WriteWeb readers and learn a little about the platform. During the rest of the week the plan is to look more closely at some specific applications--like in this post Top Ten Facebook Apps for Work. If you're interested in following the posts, you may... Read more →

In the past few days, I've found a number of new portals online. I'm starting to wonder if we can't learn a thing or two from what's happening. First, via Eisenblog, came Open Learn University's portal, created by Stuart Brown in Netvibes to support OU students and instructors. Then I find Crimson Connect, the student-run Harvard University portal, developed in the wake of student dissatisfaction with Harvard's "Official" website. (Take... Read more →

Have you ever tried to schedule a meeting with several participants? It can be a nightmare of emails and back and forth phone calls as you try to find the perfect date and time. Lately my meeting planning has been much easier as I've started to use Doodle to set things up. Here's what I do (more instructions here): Click on Create a Poll. Name my poll and identify myself... Read more →