Orgsync Blog

During the month of February, OrgSync started working with many new campuses from coast to coast.  We are extremely excited to welcome the University of Alabama – Birmingham, Arizona State University, Florida International University, Pace University @ Pleasantville-Briarcliff, University of the Incarnate Word, Adelphi University, Denison University, California State University @ Dominguez Hills, The City College of New York, Saint John’s University, and the University of Colorado @ Denver.  Together these schools account for approximately 150,000 students in over 1,900 organizations.

At Arizona State University, OrgSync will become the primary management tool for over 700 student organizations. “As one of the largest universities in the country, we have an extensive network of clubs and organizations that will benefit greatly from the organizational tools OrgSync offers” states ASU Assistant Director for Student Development, Jennifer Stultz; “OrgSync will not only help our individual clubs and organizations grow, but will also help them better integrate with one another and into the larger ASU community.”

To emphasize the importance of getting members involved on campus, OrgSync offers an unlimited number of online training webinars to students and faculty members.  OrgSync also includes an onsite training session with every initial purchase of the OrgSync platform.  The onsite trainings are very effective at helping organizations transition to a newer, more efficient method of communication. So far this spring, we’ve conducted onsite trainings with hundreds of leaders from The University of Alabama, St. John’s University, Bowling Green University, and Sacramento State University in conjunction with their respective spring leadership conferences.

As members of the OrgSync community, users from these schools will have the opportunity to provide feedback about the platform and drive future developments.  We look forward to working closely with each of these schools to provide them with a cost-saving, state-of-the-art management platform they can be proud of.

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Integration Enables OrgSync to Release a Premier Treasury Solution for Higher Education

OrgSync is excited to announce that it has integrated PayPal into its co-curricular management platform.  With PayPal, student leaders and campus administrators can electronically issue invoices and collect payments online.  The integration brings convenience and security to collegiate treasury management while decreasing administrative burdens and saving campuses time and money!

“We are pleased that OrgSync has chosen PayPal to provide student organizations and campus administrations with a safer and more convenient way to send and receive money online,“ said Glenn P. Lim, General Manager of Alliances and Vertical Markets at PayPal.  “We look forward to working with OrgSync to make the security and convenience of PayPal available to college campuses everywhere.”

OrgSync continues to evolve, offering campuses a partnership to build the ultimate campus management solution together!  “PayPal’s payment service is a great match for the needs of OrgSync’s technology platform,” said Eric Fortenberry, CEO of OrgSync.  “OrgSync has developed an unparalleled company culture, forming unique relationships with each one of our campuses.  We share a vision with our clients to build a solution that will benefit the Higher Education community as a whole and accelerate student involvement and success.  OrgSync has found the same zeal and values in PayPal and is excited to provide additional treasury benefits to its clients.”

You can view the press release here.

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April 22, a Day to Think Green
Today is the world’s 39th annual Earth Day.  This is a time to reflect on your daily routine and ask yourself whether or not you can make [at least] a few minor adjustments to help minimize our negative impact to our planet earth.

2009 marks the beginning of The Green Generation Campaign.

It’s core principals are:
1. A carbon-free future that is based on renewable energy that will end dependency of fossil fuels, including coal
2. Increasing individual’s commitment to responsible consumption
3. Creation of a new green economy that lifts people out of poverty by
a. Creating millions of quality green jobs
b. Turning our global education system into a green one

Join OrgSync & Our Commitment to Saving the Earth, One Campus at a Time!
“Our users save thousands of sheets of paper annually.”-Clifton King, OrgSync Software Developer

By using OrgSync’s online forms to manage promotional and financial activity organizations are saving paper, and are not only saving money, but limiting the destruction of forests, and eliminating unnecessary waste.  Essentially, our users are saving the Earth.

Currently OrgSync users have saved over 33,000 sheets of paper through online form submissions!  This number does not include the paper our users save using OrgSyc’s online tools, such as our event and meeting attendance tool and our online invoice and receipt system.  Way to go OrgSync Users!

OrgSync Goes Green
OrgSync takes pride in implementing Green Initiatives into its company culture with simple eco-friendly habits that accumulate over time and work toward reducing toxic greenhouse gas emissions and conserving energy.  In a conscious effort to conserve gas, OrgSync encourages carpooling and does not send our booth materials separately to conference venues prior to our arrival.  Furthermore, we limit our paper use by telecommunicating with our employees and clients.  Also, energy saving light bulbs are used throughout our office and all monitors are turned off during non-office hours to limit unnecessary electricity usage.

Below are a few pointers on how to help further your campus’ Green Initiative:
1. Recycle paper, plastic, aluminum, electric waste such as cell phones and computer parts, printer cartridges
2. Generate a Compost
3. Educate others on the importance of your Green Initiative and how to get involved!
• The most important thing is to educate students on how their daily activities affect the earth and its inhabitants
• Your goal should be to develop    environmentally responsible individuals to help create a long term positive effect on the earth
• Provide your students with frequent opportunities to get involved in your efforts
• For instance, providing recycling bins around campus is a constant reminder for students of the importance of recycling
4. Buy Recycled Products
5. Address Concerns & Set Specific Goals for your campus
• Create a plan to increase your campus’ Green efforts
•Plan of action that you can realistically implement within one year

• What are the possible obstacles to your Green plan
• List sources/support
• List of possible rewards for participants
• Delegate tasks/director positions to specific committee members
• Ask yourself “How will we involve students?”

You can find more information on Earth Day & Green Initiatives at:
http://earthday.net/ednoncampusorganizersguide

www.gogreeninitiative.org

Happy Earth Day!

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Cindy Royal is an assistant professor in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Texas State University in San Marcos.  Cindy and I met on Twitter, when I volunteered to be interviewed by one of her student bloggers during SXSW Interactive.  You can view the OrgSync SXSW interview here.  We were excited to see social media being taught in the classroom and were even more excited to help students get hands on experience using social media!

As another SXSW Interactive comes to a close, I am pleased to be asked by OrgSync to provide some of my observations from this year’s event. I have attended the festival for many years, and this was the second year that I invited a team of student bloggers to cover the event. Our coverage, including photos, videos and archives of live stream interviews can be found at www.sxtxstate.com. SXSWi is such a fantastic opportunity for students to engage with concepts we discuss in the new media concentration in which I teach at TX State University in San Marcos. It is the most important conference that I attend each year, introducing me to new ideas that will be affecting media in the future.

This year’s programming was outstanding. From impressive keynote speakers like Chris Anderson, editor of Wired and author of two important books, The Long Tail and Free, and Tony Hsieh, the CEO of the online shoe retailer Zappos to outstanding panel discussions dealing with the future of social media, trends in journalism, Web design concepts and the direction of overall online experience, SXSW once again proved that Austin is the place to be in March. Additional highlights for me included discussions by Gary Vaynerchuk of Wine Library TV and Kathy Sierra. Their enthusiasm for online endeavors is infectious and inspiring.

Overall, I think two broad themes emerged from this year’s festivities.

The first is the focus on the user experience (UX). Where five years ago content was considered king, now it’s about what your users get to do on your site. The interaction must be two-way, and it must be relevant to the communities you support. The second theme has to do with the ubiquity of social networks. In her talk entitled “The Future of Social Networks: Social Networks Will Be Like Air, ” Charlene Li explained that we are moving to a universal identity and single social graph in our usage of these networks, and that we will eventually no longer use fragmented platforms and identities. This goes beyond a mere aggregation of existing platforms and requires a few major players to emerge as focal points of this interaction.

In regard to the activity of my students at the festival, I am very proud of the work they did on the blog. I was energized by their enthusiasm coming out of panels and discussing topics, asking questions and interacting with attendees. They worked extremely hard to not only gain knowledge for themselves, but to share that knowledge in the various ways that they have learned in our program, through blogs, video, photos and social media; lots of simultaneous learning and practice. The weeks prior to SXSW included the design and development of our site, promotion via various social media platforms including Twitter (@sxtxstate) and Facebook and the creation of content in the form of previews and tech news updates relevant to SXSW topics. While this activity was supervised by me, the students were completely in charge of the direction and execution. For this, they have a lasting archive of their experiences and something they can reference in the future.

We even tested live stream capabilities by doing a live interview from the convention center each day. You can find the archive of these interviews under the Live Stream tab on the site. We met Jeff and Eric of OrgSync on Sunday, and they were kind enough to spend some time with us talking about their collaborative online campus offerings. In addition, we interviewed panelists from The New York Times and Chicago Tribune, as well as business owners who were in attendance to gain new insight into technology trends.

The SXSWi team, of which several of my former and current students are a part, put on an amazing event each year, and continue to improve with each successive year. I don’t know how they’ll top 2009, but I’m already looking forward to March 2010. If you deal with technology and media in any manner, I highly recommend attending SXSW. And, if you can stick around for the second part of the week, the music’s not too shabby either. See some of the pictures and videos I shot during some of the music showcases at www.onthatnote.com. Hope to see you in Austin next year.

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The OrgSync Conference Team just returned from 2009 ACUI Conference in Anaheim, CA.  I have attended many conferences in my 11 years in higher education, but this was the first time I was able to attend ACUI.   It is always excitNow people know the name OrgSync and we have a large amount of clients stopping by the booth to say hi and get a little in-person consulting and training.

OrgSync Booth at ACUI

We could quickly see how close the ACUI community is and thoroughly enjoyed the conversations we had with attendees from around the world and gave me a great chance to connect with colleagues I had not seen in a while.

We were also excited about the live twittering and blogging that was happing throughout the conference.  They had 5 blogs from all levels of experience (Sr. Management, Mid-Level Management, New Professional, Graduate Student [from my friend Liz], and a Undergraduate Student).  There were also several members Tweeting about the conference including the official ACUI twitter feed. We are excited ACUI are using technologies we use and support.

We had a great time in Cali, and look forward to seeing you in NYC next year.

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This weekend I had the pleasure of visiting our neighbor to the northwest, Lubbock, TX and one of our largest campuses, Texas Tech University. Tech, a client since May of 2008 boasts nearly 400 student organizations and has been a joy to work with over the past year. Mike Gunn, Assistant Director of Student Organizations, oversees all of the student organizations on campus and did a wonderful job of organizing their annual “Student Organization Academy”. The program held on Saturday, April 4th, offered 12 sessions covering various topics including leadership development, risk management, practical solutions to student organization issues, school spirit, transferring experiences as student leaders into the “real world”, community service, re-energizing your organization, and, of course, ORGSYNC!!

I was pleased to share OrgSync with a captive audience of over 200 student leaders. Students and Staff Advisors were excited to learn about how OrgSync will help them accomplish their missions and goals as organizations, and as always, I was asked many questions that will likely guide future development of our software.

After realizing that our founders and many of OrgSync’s staff are alumni of the University of Texas (which Texas Tech football stole a win from last season), the students there could not resist taking the picture above. Thanks Tech Students and Staff for being such great hosts and for your interest in serving the Tech community through your involvement in student organizations there!! I will look forward to visiting Lubbock again soon.

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Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos at SXSW

This past March, the SXSWi opening keynote speech, presented by Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, highlighted the importance of developing a strong company culture and explained his company’s revolutionary vision of customer service.

As I listened to Tony’s presentation, I found myself inspired by the fact that Zappos’ adherence to company culture and core values helped land them on Forbes list of Top 100 Best Companies to Work For in 2009.

Zappos’ philosophy of success is similar to that of OrgSync’s in many ways. Above all, we believe strongly in adhering to company culture and core values. At OrgSync, our success is driven by three core values: 1) Giving the customer the largest stake in the future of the OrgSync platform, 2) Empowering organizational leaders through technology, and 3) Making positive contributions to our communities.

First, as a hosted solution, we believe that development of a premiere product is best accomplished by giving our clients the largest stake. Every month, we encourage our clients to meet with our in-house development team to discuss new product ideas and trends. Through this method of communication, our development team is able to quickly design and implement new features for the entire client base to use. Moreover, OrgSync recently released an Application Programming Interface (API) that will provide campus IT departments the flexibility to create automated processes based on the needs and requirements determined by the school or organization. OrgSync also has a 24/7 customer support line that clients are encouraged to call whenever they need a question answered.

Eric and Jeff at NCLC

Second, OrgSync seeks to empower organizational leaders through technology. The OrgSync team has a strong background in higher education, and involvement in campus organizations. In fact, the very idea to create the OrgSync solution was generated from our co-founders’ experiences in running multiple student organizations at The University of Texas at Austin. Members of the OrgSync team are also regular attendees of the International Leadership Association Global Conference, the National Collegiate Leadership Conference, which is hosted on OrgSync, and the Lone Star Ruby Conference. OrgSync’s involvement in these conferences expresses commitment to innovation and leadership that will best serve OrgSync’s client base.

Lastly, OrgSync aspires to make positive contributions to the Austin tech community, and the communities of its clients. In February, OrgSync sponsored the Austin Twestival hosted by media maven Michelle Greer. Also, earlier this year, our company organized a daylong social media campaign on Twitter to raise over $1500 for Clean Water, whose objective is to provide sanitary water to natives of Africa.

OrgSync’s Cayce Stone uses the phrase “Everybody wins!” to summarize the OrgSync philosophy. By adhering strongly to these core values, OrgSync to provides a solution that makes management of your organization more efficient.

That following Monday morning, I received an email from Tony detailing where I could find more information about Zappos culture. He informed me that a copy of the Zappos Culture book I had requested would be arriving at my doorstep soon, and also extended an offer to visit the Zappos headquarters next time I am in Las Vegas. Thanks again Tony for being an excellent role model!

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YouTube, the social media phenomenon that allows you to “broadcast yourself” has mainstreamed video sharing across the world! Currently we take video sharing for granted, but prior to YouTube streaming video was expensive, timely, and difficult to do. Now there are multiple platforms available to broadcast videos and create personal channels including YouTube, Viddler and Vimeo, to name a few. For purposes of this post I will stick with YouTube.

It was not until recently I realized the power behind the YouTube Phenomenon. For example, Soulja Boy was discovered in March 2007 from a rap video called “Crank That” which he made in his home studio and uploaded to YouTube . You can find 100’s of videos of people emulating the Souljah Boy dance including one of MIT professors and another of Prisoners in the Philippines. By May 2007 he had a record deal with his song reaching #4 on the Billboard charts and a Grammy Nomination. Another recent discovery on YouTube was Arnel Pineda, who had posted videos on YouTube oh himself singing Journey cover songs. Journeys talent agent came across Pinedas videos and quickly asked him to join the band as the new lead singer!

So what does this mean for Higher Education? Dr. Mike Wesch teaches a class at Kansas State University that requires students to interact with YouTube. His presentation at the Library of Congress is a must watch, and of course is broadcasted on YouTube.  It is an Anthropological look at  YouTube that explores the connectedness, culture, and power of this medium. If you have  spent limited time on YouTube you will quickly discover how everyone can have a voice and be heard by the world.

Many departments across campus could benefit from video technology such as YouTube. Admissions Offices can actively attract prospective students and provide a better snapshot of their campus experience by posting videos of student life, campus tours and student testimonials. Campus administrators can also use YouTube to broadcast weekly or monthly addresses to the campus. How many campuses feel there are communication problems from administration to staff, or staff to students? This is an easy (and free) method of increasing communication on campus.

Create a video year book and document sporting event, guest speakers, concerts, and other memories you want to capture and share for the year. Kudos to the Universities that have created their own YouTube Channel and started putting content on there, but this is just the beginning.

What are additional ways YouTube can be used in the classroom or on campus? How do you Use it now?

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