Ski Club Committee Meets Online
Mount
Olympus
is a club ski field near Christchurch in New Zealand. The
field has paid staff during
the season but the management, planning and most maintanance
and construction is done
by volunteer club members and the committee.
The club committee meet regularly during the year but, in the lead-up to
and during the season, most members work hard to make decisions and organise
events. Until recently, this work involved a lot of email flying around.
Much of the email had file attachments but no-one knew where the latest
or the athoritative version of a file was. Thomas Stephens from the
Olympus committee used OnlineGroups.Net to set up the
Mt
Olympus Online Groups site.
In March 2006, the club opened the
WWSC Committee
online group. The group is private. Non-members can see that the
group exists
and see the members list and the Charter, but can't read the posts.
Thomas worked with OnlineGroups.Net
to develop an appropriate membership criterion. The membership criterion
can be objectively applied and ensures that everyone in the group
knows who might join the group in future and read the post they make today.
It also ensures that institutional knowledge can be passed from current
committee members to their future successors.
The culture around Mount Olympus is pretty social. It has a large diaspora
of people who feel involved with the club. To provide a place where
these people can hang out and plan or reminisce about ski and
snowboarding trips,
Thomas started the
My
Olympus mega group.
The mega group is open so anyone can
read the messages
or join and take part in the conversations.
Why was this site not around years ago?
Thomas Stephens, Site Administrator of
Mount
Olympus Online Groups writes…
Why was this site not around years ago? The benefit of being
able to search any committee discussion, latest phone list,
latest price list, from any location, with a secure library
is now the way of the future.
The ease of the email interface and online interface is great.
The people who don't like change don't realize that they have
changed and are now working in a more efficient way. People who
take to the online interface so they can focus on club issues
rather than sorting though their emails, just whiz though the
discussions with thoughtful answers and questions.
On the fun side, having an open group eg Mount Olympus
Mega Group, means all friends, members and even newbies can
get a feel of the club sprit, keep up to date with on going
hot topics and keep in contact when they are a world away.
Thank you, OnlineGroups.Net.
Professional Association Builds Online Community
The NZ
Association of Psychotherapists
is an organisation with about 400 members who are distributed from
one end on New Zealand to the other. The group is responsible for the
professional standards and ethics of psychotherapists and for the
induction of new people into the profession. We organise a conference
somewhere in NZ once per year and produce newsletters locally and
nationally and an annual professional Journal.
This takes a lot of discussion. NZAP uses the online groups mainly for
its committees. There are currently about eight groups with overlapping
membership. They have ongoing discussions are able to share files. By
working in the one system rather than with a fragmented email only
approach the organisation is developing a sense of place online, the
beginnings of a virtual community for a real live community.
"This is a company that gets it."
Walter Logeman, Site Administrator of
NZAP Online Groups writes…
I am happy to write a testimonial as I want OnlineGroups.Net
to succeed beyond their dreams!
I am on the Council of NZAP, the New Zealand Association
of Psychotherapists and responsible
for the online communication in our organisation. We began
using OnlineGroups.Net in October 2004.
We now have a site with eight Groups and an announcement group.
I am pleased we chose this path, here is why.
-
Clarity
-
We can see exactly who is on each committee, and who is
responsible for deciding that.
That was not so easy in the messy days of "Reply to all" emails.
-
File sharing
-
Using the Files area we can distribute files knowing they
will remain available to those who need them. They are safe
on the server even when people change computers etc.
-
Security
-
Confidential email & files can be deleted off individual
computers and still the
conversations go on using the web interface, behind the passwords.
-
Helpful Support
-
Simon and others have always been there when needed.
-
Simple
-
This is a company that "gets it". Conversations
are possible via web AND OR email,
it would seem a simple thing, but only OnlineGroups.Net can
do that effectively,
and they do it cheaply and simply. Our most non-tech savvy
people can use it.
Participants manage their form of access.
-
Philosophy
-
OnlineGroups.Net understand groups, not just technology.
Each group has a charter & a coach and built in options
for protocol and relationships. Belonging to the "Coachus"
group helps to discuss group process & effective participation.
-
Advanced
-
I can see if there are new files or posts via RSS. That saves
headaches when I monitor groups as their "participation coach".
I can use tags & RSS and I like the look of the proposed features.
Horse Trek Guides Coordinate Activities Online
Kate Tapley of
Kate
Tapley Horse Treks Online Groups.
We have a team of some 10 on call staff running the horse treks I
manage.
"The online group can get information out to others easily and efficiently."
Kate Tapley writes…
The online group we use enables us to pick up each others ideas,
and deal with tasks and plans on the spot. No phone call, no
waiting until we see each other. It also means we can have
discussions, share enlightenments and thoughts with each other.
Our minutes of staff meetings go on there, and we have fun with
each other.
We often have occasion to plan for rides without a lot of notice
and we find the online group can get information out to others
easily and efficiently without having to actually have direct
contact with each person on the list.
Since our online group has been running our information
dissemination has been boosted, our connections with each other
has increased, and we have an over view of what is happening from
day to day.