Increasing the Visibility of Your Qualifications
The eyes of the world have been watching as athletes gathered in PyeongChang, South Korea. Each competitor in the Winter Olympic sports brought their unique story to the games. Simply being there for the competition was an indicator of a person's or team's perseverance and skill.
Winning Bronze, Silver or Gold are coveted achievements. To reach the podium required split-second adjustments as they demonstrated their strengths and adapted to the moment.
|
|
Most of us will only experience the thrills of Olympic competition vicariously. However, each of us can discover what it means to "measure up" when it comes to our skills and the careers we pursue.
In today's post we're encouraging you to apply the process of separating out your content in more visible segments--as discrete chunks! Prepare your learning activities, experiences and achievements as stand-out elements so your performance collection is visible, easy to navigate and adapts transparently to changing scenarios.
Let's begin with a working definition of the concept:
Content chunking is a method of presenting information in smaller portions (“chunks”) to improve viewing and increase understanding. The goal is to make both faster and easier. Chunking is especially useful for material presented on the Web as viewers more often scan content for specific information.
Content chunking typically involves:
| ORGANIZING:
|
Chunking, as a technique, helps you organize information into pages, screens, or slides to improve readability and enhance visual appeal.
|
| SPACING:
|
White space can help to buffer areas between text, photos, or graphics.
|
| GROUPING:
|
Limit the amount of information posted to a page by carefully organizing or grouping it.
|
| FORMATTING:
|
Present content that is similar in nature (i.e., skills, experience, education) by revealing details in a consistent format.
|
| LINKING:
|
Content hyperlinks are often preferable to lengthy pages of text or multiple graphics and images.
|
| SEQUENCING:
|
If you find it necessary to include "process steps as text," make those more manageable to read by creating bullet points. At the same time, avoid bullet overuse.
|
| PRIORITIZING:
|
Always place your most important information at or near the top of the eFolio Web page.
|
| FINAL DESIGN TIP:
|
Plan your eFolio Web page so it scrolls no more than a screen and a half of text and avoid content orphans. The impact of your content (text, images, or links) can often be lost if no indicators cause the viewer to scroll down farther on the page.
|
In upcoming blog postings we will link "content chunking" to skills presentation, site planning techniques and eFolio interview benefits as we apply this concept to help you promote your soft and hard skills in tandem with the requirements for a specific employment position.
To Be Prepared... work through the following list of tasks:
- Identify and define a single competency or skill (i.e., leadership or teamwork) that you want to showcase in your myeFolio content.
- Select a capstone course project or work experience that demonstrates your mastery of the competency.
- Describe what you selected in Part 2 by drafting a brief paragraph for each of the writing prompts listed below:
- Provide some background to capture the context
- Describe the specifics of what was required (typically you should include "when, where, & who" factors)
- Discuss "what you did" (abilities, knowledge used, attitudes, behaviors, characteristics or discoveries)
- Summarize the outcome by applying a "what happened" approach
- Write a sentence or two that explains how this experience relates to your current goals
- If possible, prepare a visual (slide, image, scan or graphic) that shows your finished or "in process" project.
Checkpoint: Focusing on "creativity" as a competency, the chart below aligns an example of the preparation process directly to the 4-part content chunking tasks listed above.
Competency / Skill
|
(1) Creativity
(2) Project selected |
Project Context
|
(3a) Capstone project in college course was to create an image using the graphics program called Photoshop Elements.
|
Requirements
|
(3b) We were asked to create our own artwork, experimenting with the variety of colors and tools available in the software. The final image was to be useful in a potentially real business scenario. We could define the purpose of our project.
|
My Process
|
(3c) I learned to use several tools in Elements. Different brush and pencil tool sizes, the blur/smudge tools and transparency settings were helpful. The purpose of my image, a splash screen, might align with an ad campaign for a product. I wanted to communicate social media connections and make it useful for both video and Webinar applications.
|
Outcome
|
(3d) I was able to master Photoshop Elements with little difficulty and completed the project as assigned. At the outset my images looked like mere cut-and-paste. As I discovered other tools, a more cohesive appearance took shape. It was relatively easy to go back or change elements within the image until I was happy with it so I found myself experimenting more with various effects.
|
Relevance
|
(3e) Surprisingly, I enjoyed learning how to create the artwork I wanted. It is sometimes hard to find the clip art or stock images you need (especially at no cost). I am not an artist so to integrate the graphic program for a real business need might not be something I would even want to do everyday! Knowing how it works and that it is possible should help me ask for more realistic support from other staff in a marketing team. The process proved to me that digital art can be used to express intent or relate to a specific target audience. (I certainly see things I would change before using the image I created but I now know how to make those changes on my own.)
|
Project Visual
|
(4) "in-process" project...
|
Final Thoughts
If this post has helped you gain a better understanding of the basic process used to chunk content for specific projects, we have accomplished our goal.
Now that you can follow the process, you're ready to become more nimble in your eFolio presentation.
Next time you'll observe how to transition your draft text to the posting phase. In a fresh approach, you'll learn to expand the usefulness of your content as you adapt it for various audiences.
If you do not yet have your own myeFolio account, you can sign up online at http://myefolio.com/signup and get started today!
