Laura’s Winning Ideas

I would normally wait until I have several cool tools to mention, but this one is too hot to wait.

How about YouTube behind your firewall? Google Apps is offering a free video service, allowing you to upload videos for internal use with the same ease as 13 year-olds are uploading stupid dog tricks to YouTube.

• Announce a major contract win corporate-wide, interviewing the Project Manager live, for everyone to see when they get to their desk in the morning. . .no matter what time zone they work in!
• On-line proposal training can include video.
• Oral Presentation rehearsals can have the Red Team Review on-line.
• Teams can video-tape field work so the proposal writers can see how that gizmo is used in Bangkok to describe for the World Bank proposal.
• Proposal software tricks can be demonstrated so your remote coordinators learn the latest tips and tricks without waiting for a training session.
• Make your next plea for that resume update Up Close and Personal.
• Include your partners around the globe in your celebration of a proposal shipped.
• etc. etc. etc.

And the price is my favorite price to try out new technology: FREE for the next 30 days, and $50/year after that. (just launched September 2,2008)

Your IT department doesn’t have to host the video, and you aren’t shipping video files around (Yikes! Can you say mail server crash?!?).

Be a hero and pass this tip along to someone at your organization who has a need, or try it out by video taping your next team meeting and posting for your group to play with the technology.

This Google service pairs beautifully with the flip video camera reviewed here:

The flip video cameras are available for just over $100.

Here’s an even better idea!

1. Get one flip camera, video tape a cool proposal tip and post.
2. Mail the flip camera to a proposal person in another office for them to do the same, and
3. continue shipping the camera around until everyone has a chance to be the star of their own video.

Lots of fun seeing each other in action when you don’t usually get to meet each other. Everyone has some special nugget the others don’t know about, and it’s a great way to share the wealth and have some fun along the way.

(Tip of my hat to Agile Mind, the Virtual Government Blogger who first posted about Google Video.)