The field of instructional design is a collaborative one. Even if I am the subject matter expert for a project, good design requires good teamwork. One of the first steps in a successful project is identifying potential partners and ensuring all team members are on the same page. I use many of Peter Block’s and Betty Vandenbosch’s consulting guidelines for this. If there are no other official project team members, it is still a good idea to request feedback on one’s design throughout the process from a trusted colleague. Even prior to entering the instructional design field, being able to recruit the appropriate partners and subject matter experts – as well as ensuring all stakeholders are properly identified – could determine the success or failure of a project.
TOOLS
Working in teams on collaborative projects can be difficult if one needs to exchange more than a couple of email messages through MS Outlook. Although the tools in GoogleSuite are effective, and I do use some of them including GoogleDocs, I tend to favor MS Teams as all organizations with whom I have worked use the MS Office suite and MS Outlook, and the tools within MS Teams allow for real-time changes in the respective documents and tasks, as well as the platform doubling as file sharing and video-conferencing applications. Other video-conferencing platforms I have used for collaboration are Zoom and WebEx, and Box and DropBox as other file sharing systems. I have also built MS SharePoint and Elentra Communities spaces for collaborative groups, as well as used Monday.com and Trello for collaborative project management.
Teamwork & Collaboration in Action
IMAGE: This was the process for an internal policy and standard operating procedure to help our department become both compliant with fiscal controls and stewardship policies when requesting, issuing, and activating pre-paid debit cards used as participant payments for research studies. This would not have been successful without the participation of my colleagues, all stakeholders, and campus partners.
