This is the first of what will be a regular series two or three times a month on techie tools useful for your church (and/or yourself!). Being the “techie nerd” for the Presbytery at the moment, a disclaimer is in order to start this series off right:
I do not believe technology will save the Church!
{{ Phew… wow, do I feel better now! }}
Having said that, I am all about the tools. For some guys it’s power sanders, lathes, and chainsaws. For me it’s tech. Hardware and software both. Anything that can help me remember stuff and make me more productive. I’m a believer in investing time into this stuff to know how to use it better and get that time back 5 or 10 fold. And yes, I believe it has direct relevance to the advancement of the gospel in this time and place.
“What was that?” …. “No, I’m not idealistic AT ALL…”
I say that tongue firmly in cheek, of course. I can be quite the INFJ idealist in many ways, but I also have a real streak of INTJ strategic practical realism. I LOVE stuff that “just works.” Especially if it helps productivity and collaboration. And this is where DropBox comes in.
I chose to do my first post on DropBox because it is a tool that is fairly simple to “roll out,” requires no church-managed account if you don’t want one, costs nothing, and yet can make committee and Session work SO much better. It is low cost and high value. At this very moment, our own PSF Nominating Committee is taking the plunge, and many others at the presbytery and in our churches are also utilizing it. I use it all the time.
So WHAT, exactly, is DropBox?
DropBox is a special folder in which you save files, just like any other folder, except those files also appear on a site in “the Cloud” (online, accessible from any computer anywhere anytime), and ALSO appear on any number of other devices or computers you want them to. Some examples:
1) You use a work computer, a home computer, and a tablet. You start a project at work, save it in DropBox, and it’s waiting for you at home, where you continue working on it long past your bedtime (not that any of us would actually do this… just hypothetical…). You make changes, save, and the most current version is waiting for you at work.
Oh—and it’s also on your tablet too so you can present or preach it, and on your phone so you can talk it up over coffee with a key stakeholder.
2) You serve as chair of the HR committee at your church and there are lots of changes happening. You work on several job description proposals drafted in MS Word or Excel, save them in a folder called “HR Committee” in your DropBox, and share that folder with each committee member.
Now, not only do you have the proposals on all your devices, so do each of your committee members. They each can open these files on their own computer (i.e., a “real” file, not from a web page), make notes or changes, save, and everyone that you have shared the folder with automatically gets the updates. Everyone always has the latest version of each file, and there’s also revision history online.
What does DropBox mean to you and your committees?
1) No more email trails, figuring out which copy is the latest, etc.
2) No more emailing yourself files so you can work in multiple locations.
3) Seamless collaboration, with revision history if needed
4) The ability to share files as “read only” if need be.
5) Control over with whom and how anything you own is shared, anytime, anywhere.
Really, it is (like all good tech solutions) a) so simple it’s genius and b) near-magical. Your files: anywhere, anytime, and only what, when and where you want.
You want now, Yes??
Download it here! They’ll walk you through the install. And if you need help ramping up, they have their own video tutorial and a genuinely helpful FAQ. I also have produced my own help guide with screen shots for your enjoyment.
More DropBox tips and tricks to come in future posts!
For the Gospel,
~Doug Abel, PSF Social & Electronic Media Consultant
Good stuff social media dude!!!!!