The self-playing guitar

During a random search for "ITT Tech" on the Internet, I spotted some unedited test footage that someone had uploaded to their own personal YouTube account with the label "ITT Tech capstone project" but no other details. It looked interesting, so I left a note in the comment field asking them to contact me on our social@itt-tech.edu email account. Sure enough, within a day that person responded and let me know who they were and what ITT Tech location they attended, in the Denver, CO suburb of Aurora.
I then requested that the campus director of the school interview the students on camera, since I could attend in person. I provided them with guidance as to how the interviews should be conducted and the questions to ask. They then sent the footage to me via Federal Express and I processed the clips and used Adobe Premiere Pro to edit and upload the following story to the ITT Tech YouTube page.
Over 3,000 page views for this one story, one of the more popular videos that people have watched on that social media channel. There is also a Part 2 (video interview with the course instructor) and a Part 3 (extra, bonus footage.)
The video: Self-playing Guitar

Here was a YouTube playlist that I created which features four capstone projects (including the self-playing guitar) that I produced and edited. Here is a playlist on YouTube that features the Student Professional Experience videos that I produced and edited.

"Local Celebrity" not a moniker I ever expected

I have always thought myself as a humble person when it came to communications - the result of having been the "thoughtful journalist" who stayed out of the picture, promoting the glory of someone else's story. Then, on this day, that changed, and I appeared in my former newspaper's photo gallery: This is the link to the 14-page photo gallery: They said what?! We found the best tweets from local celebs

I decided to have a little fun with this, as I didn't get a phone call in advance of the reporter's story. So I turned the tables on the reporter with my own Storify of the reaction that resulted from her piece. My Storify on being named a local celebrity. It was quite an enjoyable, if unexpected, day.

Employer video testimonials

More than 14,000 businesses and organizations hired ITT Technical Institute graduates in 2011-12, disproving the notion that we were just a "diploma mill" leaving students with more debt than results. With no initial budget, our team at headquarters devised a strategy to have each of ITT Tech's 140 campuses across the U.S. identify the local businesses in their cities that employed ITT Tech grads and would be willing to answer a series of prepared questions. We knew we were dealing with amateur, supplied footage, and that was OK. We ended up with more than 450 raw video files, which we produced for each campus to use in their open house recruiting endeavors. Some of those clips were placed on the ITT Tech YouTube page, giving outsiders a great impression when they landed on our site. We invited employers across the United States -- from Boeing to Universal Studios -- to talk about the relationship they have with ITT Technical Institute, and to share observations about the ITT Tech graduates they have hired.

ITT Tech video testimonials

Thanks, boss

I publicly shouted a thank you to a former boss, and here's how she publicly thanked me!

Being social

I had another great opportunity to do journalism-like reporting of a couple of events involving groups that I am involved with - Indianapolis Social Media, and the #Social46 Super Bowl Klout-recommended group that helped spread the word about Indy during the Super Bowl. The two items couldn't be more different in style. I used Storify to chronicle Live-tweeting an organ transplant. Indianapolis-based IU Health's communications staff provided a play-by-play of commentary from the operating room on June 13, live tweeting a kidney transplant. Kristofer Karol and Gene Ford explained how they prepared for such an event at the IndySM breakfast, hosted by Indiana Blood Center.
I also used Storify for BrewhouseFoodie makeover menu in Indy. The marketing geniuses at @brewhouse want to create a buzz about all the changes coming to the menu and thus hosted a tasting for some social media folks in Indy. No expectations other than to use the hashtag #brewhousefoodie when we posted.

Jim Brown's MBO, 2012

No matter how far along you've brought your company through its journey with social media - either as its strategist or advocate, you should always be ready to go back to the beginning. What is the fundamental purpose of the tool. That's not just reciting your mission statement or a providing a snapshot of your metrics or spouting off the number of posts, the number of daily likers, your follower count. Those are all important - they justify the expense. Headcount isn't cheap. It can be - and should be - even simpler. Anyone familiar with an airport's TSA screening area has concluded their cattle-chute experience by using the "recovery area" – the group of benches and metal tables where you repack your laptop and retie your shoelaces. This area has always felt refreshing after a traveler has endured the disheveling experience. Yet it's also an oddity - a traveler has endured a gauntlet on their journey, one that puts you on track to your gate. Despite all that you are still just unfettered steps from being back in the main terminal. This aviation experience offers a good lesson for businesses that communicate to external audiences via social media. No matter how far along in your journey with social, you should be able to explain to newcomers within your company what the fundamental purpose of the tool is. I need refreshers which is why I like being a member of a social media club, or supporting those that do it, such as Jim Brown. Whch brings me back to my first point. I decided to attend the session just as much to see what's being said by speakers, but also because of the knowledge that you gain from attendees about the very topic of this blog post. Do they take the same approach when it comes to explaining social within the context of the company? I’ll give you an example, retaining the aviation theme. I attended a ginormous helicopter convention in Orlando, FL in 2011 and was pleased to borrow a coworker’s first-generation iPad, hook into the civic center’s wifi and tweet out news for my company. It felt so productive. But on the shuttle back to the hotel, I found myself having to explain what Twitter was to about a half-dozen marketing and sales department heads. As Jay Baer describes it, digital illiteracy in the boardroom regarding social media is still a huge issue for company social media specialists. When I worked at my old newspaper job, I was not just tweeting news, but helping to legitimize my company as an authority in social media, which is a small piece of the pie when it comes to credibility. We use social, so we get technology, so therefore we must be competent, we can be trusted. We’re with it. I’ve carried that same mentality into two successive jobs. But speaking social is like speaking Spanish. You’ve got to be fluent with outsiders, then be willing to translate your words to the English-speaking executive, or your mission will fail terribly. I don’t tend to social media conferences because I don’t see their value, beyond learning the characteristics of a particular campaign, which is extremely helpful. I’m defining my own approach. Oh yes, I keep tabs on what everyone else is doing. Experts at a conference like MBO are able to step away from the conveyer belt, take a look at the products being created, and assess not just the total numbers and efficiency but ask: is it worth it? I can then absorb those lessons, add them to my own mental equation and give an even better answer when I am asked what the fundamental purpose of the tool is.

INTF-1 at southern Indiana tornadoes

The Indiana Department of Homeland Security activated the FEMA asset just hours after tornadoes struck in southern Indiana. This isn't necessarily a big deal for media, but since I was in the process of gathering research for a book about the Urban Search and Rescue program, it was a good idea to again use Storify to identify material that could be of use later down the road. Here was my Storify: Indiana Task Force 1 at historic, deadly 3-2-2012 tornado