It hasn’t been long, but a lot has happened in the short time since the founding of techstructional (previously the IT Training Department). I’ve been building training for IT projects and systems since about 2007 or 8. But, I’ve worked inside organizations from school districts to healthcare companies, always in IT, helping train those who aren’t in IT.
I’ve often been told I was good at helping bridge the gap between overly techie IT and regular people. That’s why I decided to go into training and develop training content. Over the years, I found the ideal way to do this was through digital or one-on-one training.
One-on-one training isn’t exactly efficient, and it isn’t possible for most large-scale IT projects. That leaves digital training solutions as ideal for training staff on new IT systems or even using technology more efficiently.
That’s why I launched techstructional. Because IT sometimes has a bad rep and, if not, still occasionally needs some assistance to train employees who aren’t techie for new systems.
Even though techstructional is new, founded in November 2022, it has already come a long way. I launched it with a new website and a blog post on November 21st about the blog launch and goals of techstructional.
Continuous improvement is a way of life for every successful organization. Never stop improving or learning.
Even though it has barely been a month, much headway has been made in founding and establishing the company. No organization is ever complete, though. Continuous improvement is a way of life; every organization constantly develops and improves.
That’s why we’re summarizing our first major accomplishments and some of our plans for next year. 2023 will be our first full year, and it will be an adventurous year.
So, onward to our accomplishments in a short but productive 2022.
Accomplishments In a Short 2022
It’s been just over a month, and we have a good list of accomplishments. We have the background, skill, and passion and continue to build those as we work toward our first client. In the name of transparency, we’re still developing the business and how others see the value we can deliver to their organization.
That’s why we’re transparent about the fact that nothing magically happens overnight. We’re no different because earning our first client is a work in progress. It’s all a process of adding value, being seen by others as valuable, and turning that value into better technology and workplace training.
If we can accomplish this in just over a month, there’s no question that we can achieve even greater things for IT launches. So, take a gander through what we’ve put together in the last month and how we’re working our way into growth.
Launched The techstructional (previously IT Training Department) Website
Our first major accomplishment was to launch our website. That meant having a domain (and a company name), colors, logo, and all else that goes with establishing a company online.
I’m lucky to have come from a web design background well before I ever worked in training. That means I have a background in HTML, CSS, and design. Then again, no training can be well-built without a good amount of design skills and UX skills.
So, after all was said and done, this is what I created. While I’m not in love with the logo (since redone), it’s functional and works well enough for what we need.
While the overall design has stayed the same, there have been additions, changes, and more since the initial launch. The entire home page messaging and content was completely redone shortly after launch. That’s how launching a new business goes, though.
As soon as you launch a new business, messaging changes, information gets refined, and how that’s communicated to the world gets simplified and becomes more valuable. That’s exactly what we did, and I’m sure that won’t be the last time.
Create LinkedIn Presence
Given that our target audience is medium to large organization IT departments and the project and change managers working with them, LinkedIn is our social media platform. That means we needed to focus on creating a great LinkedIn page that cemented our messaging and helped make sense of what we do.
This one is still a work in progress since our messaging has changed slightly. Once we had a good LinkedIn page setup, the next most important part was establishing it and adding value.
Contribute Value to LinkedIn
We had our first post, second post, videos, and more. That even includes the announcement that our website was launched with a quick scroll-through video similar to the one above. That’s not much value, though.
So, we created a quick video explaining what we do to kick off our story and how we help organization IT departments launch their projects more successfully with quality training. That quick video and the post accompanying it remain pinned to our LinkedIn page as of the time of writing this post.
It won’t always remain there as we refine it since it doesn’t add much value beyond telling others about what we do. The real value comes from sharing others’ work and engaging with the LinkedIn community. That’s exactly what we’ve been doing nearly every day.
That means going out there, finding valuable content for Project Managers, Change Managers, and the training and development community, and sharing it with others through our page. It also means engaging by liking and commenting to add value where possible.
Another aspect of LinkedIn engagement is sharing interesting and useful content we’ve run across. In that mix, we also share some of the content we create on the techstructional Blog.
Create Other Social Media Presence
While we don’t put a lot (if any) of energy into any other social media presence besides LinkedIn, we did establish our business on other social networks. There’s the techstructional Facebook page and a techstructional Instagram profile, which we post to.
One network we created our profile for but only post to is the techstructional Twitter profile. We’re not a big fan of Twitter’s current direction, but that seems to have gotten too political. So, we created the profile and posted to it but didn’t monitor it.
Then there’s the techstructional YouTube channel. It’s a work in progress as we slowly post a few videos and work on content to post there. We’ll use the channel to post nearly all video content on LinkedIn and Facebook. They are both decent platforms for posting full-length video content.
That’s the extent of what we can handle for social media for now, but TikTok may be on the horizon; we’re not sure when or if we could even offer enough value there.
Creating Valuable Content
This has been a huge priority. Since we launched our LinkedIn page, the goal has been to create valuable content for it. We’ve created original posts with useful information and no other goals in mind. Our initial focus was to create content that helps people understand the importance of accessibility and how to create accessible content.
We’ve even begun developing text-based videos for posting that are an easy-to-watch version of our blog posts. Some of our content is more engaging than others, but that’s to be expected.
80-90% of engagement typically comes from 10-20% of your content.
We’ll continue to create content and add our insights while sharing other people’s valuable content. If we can add value, we’ll reshare and increase the value. That’s what social media is all about: sharing, growing, thinking, and engaging with others.
Refine Messaging on Our Website & Social Media
Shortly after launching our website and social media profiles, the idea came to refine our messaging. While I had the message in my head, it was not always clear to begin with. A bit of thought helped me clarify how techstructional helps IT projects and the IT department in organizations.
As an instructional designer in an IT department, I saw firsthand how digital training helps people and the organization perform better. That’s how I thought of the messaging that covers the four major topics of how digital training helps the organization and IT department.
- Cutting training in less than half. Yes, I’ve done this on many different occasions by taking in-person or virtual instructor-led training and streamlining it.
- More effective training comes from spaced learning and simplifying training content so people don’t suffer from cognitive overload. It’s easy to do, but good (and thoughtful) training makes it all possible.
- Designing effective training for IT projects can save an organization tons of money. That’s pretty important!
- Training helps every IT project go more smoothly while adding the right value to the organization.
With that new messaging, we completely redid our home page to explain important training facts for IT projects. Remastering our social media profiles also took some time, and they will continue to be a work in progress throughout the year.
Create Valuable Blog Content
As of writing this post, we have nine active blog posts available. I’ve written a post each week since the first one on November 21st, which means a new post on Monday and Thursday of each week. The only break in that schedule has been the day after Christmas (I’m not writing on Christmas), and there will be a break on Monday due to New Year’s Day observed.
There’s no guarantee that the schedule will stick as our content grows, but it might. Either way, we’re increasing the value of our blog while helping project managers and change managers understand how we can support their projects and how to work with us.
Our content also covers topics that help us connect with the L&D and eLearning community. That means creating content that helps others improve training. One of our first big focuses has been creating accessible training content, which includes making videos more accessible with subtitles.
Our list of ideas for creating good content for our blog is large, and we continue to add to it. That doesn’t mean we’re not open to suggestions, though. Let us know if you have a good idea for content you’d like to see us create!
Planning For 2023 And Beyond
While we don’t have an exact plan for the coming year, we have a long to-do list. One immediate task is to create a video summarizing our four big points that prove the value of our training for IT projects.
It’s proven because we’ve done it for years inside IT departments for large organizations. Now it’s just a matter of communicating that value to those who will decide to use our solutions to make their IT projects more successful.
Proper digital training and ongoing support add tremendous value to IT projects at launch.
We want to add value to IT and help transform how people see IT departments and innovations coming from them and being pushed to the rest of the organization. It will fail if people aren’t properly supported and trained in new technology.
Our goal for the next year is to refine our messaging and communicate that value. That means becoming a valuable part of the LinkedIn community for change managers, project managers, and L&D.
Wrap Up
We’re ready to change how IT projects are launched company wide. Effective training that helps people get up to speed faster in new technology has proven value. Employees who feel well-supported and know how to use IT systems will have higher job satisfaction and less turnover.
Even though we live in a technological age with incredible technology, people still need support for new systems and need to know how to use them right. The right way to use IT systems will ensure more success and employees using them more efficiently and effectively.
Proper training can have that effect immediately. We’d love to work with you on your next IT project to help employees adopt and use the systems better than without effective training. Schedule a free consultation today, and let’s start discussing your project.