Collaborative working
9 November 2015
Working together on a creative project should be a good laugh so today we’re talking collaborative working and getting the most out of your team meetings. When it comes to working as a team, you may find you have loads of ideas that don’t necessarily all work well together but always jot down your page ideas so you can refer to them later. You’ll notice there is space for notes and ideas in your info books so be sure to take this along to your meetings so you have everything together!
Sometimes an idea on paper isn’t quite the same, so don’t discount any ideas before exploring the online system to see how you can translate your theme into a workable set of templates and designs 
Some ideas may call for fiddly details so think about the time you have set aside for your project and how this fits in around your school work and other commitments 
Also make a note of school holidays and exam periods etc that will affect the time you have to work on the book so you can plan your workload in advance.
When you first start your book online, the first person to create the book itself will be listed as our main chief editor. We strongly advise you add other editors to your project with separate accounts so you can see who’s doing what. It also makes it easier for us to know who we’re chatting to and stops that baffled expression we get when we explain something for the 3rd time, not realising we’re talking to different people! So getting back to your group, it’s best to assign roles to each team member so you know everything is covered. If you’ve got someone who’s super creative, why not set them the task of designing your cover. Another team member can track the profiles and make chase anybody who’s not logged in and another could oversee payments etc. Splitting the workload will help you progress your project with confidence and make the process super enjoyable for all.
When it comes to launching your project to the year, you’ll have a few options available to you:
Option 1: Cool, Calm and Collaborative
If you want to go for a full collaborative experience, choose to invite your year group online so they can be completing their own profiles, voting in awards and uploading photos to the book. This will make your life easier as an editing team as people are all doing their own bit and filling up the majority of the book with profiles
Option 2: The DIY or ‘design it yourself’ option
Your second option is to add members manually to your book and having your editors complete these on behalf of the student group. Perhaps you found it easier to collect your data offline? This would be the option for you as you can easily fill up those profiles and drop photos into place without getting everybody active online.
If you are of the superhero variety, you may want to take on the whole project on your own which is also fine. You’d do this in the same DIY way! What’s more, our support and design team can assist you regardless of which option you choose and are available by phone, email and instant chat too!! If you’ve not started your book online quite yet, click the button below to explore our wonderful system
