It is easy for us baby boomers to assume the whole social media and technology thing is something best left to the younger generation. As time goes by though, I suspect you’ll be holding this assumption at your peril as you miss out on the great information and communication channels that are increasingly becoming a part of our life at work and away!
Once you get your head around the possibilities the online and connected world can bring to your work and lifestyle, all sorts of opportunities start to open up. I started engaging with social media initially as a way to understand what my girls were using to engage with their world. As I learnt more about its application to diabetes care and education from the younger whipper snappers coming up, I didn’t want to be left behind!
Once bitten by the social media and technology bug I was off and racing; integrating online resources, communication channels and a variety of apps and on-line programs into my work. I seem to find new ways to utilise the technology, literally at our finger tips, every week!
Last week, during a visit to review a man with an intellectual disability at his home, the manager of his service told me about CamScanner – a phone app that let’s me take photos of pages or other information which is then scanned to remove the shadows and turned into a pdf or jpeg file. Love it … and have it working for me double time now both when I am on the move and in the office as it lets me quickly email information or keep for later to attach to a client’s file. The free version lets you do the basics, which has been enough for me, so download from your App Store and give it a go!
As I am want to do, after I listened to some podcasts, I did a search on how to do a podcast and before I knew it I was asking my Power of 2 chatster Kirrily Chambers if she wanted to record a podcast show with me. Kirrily replied, “Why not?!” and so it was … listen to one, do one, teach one! A quick search on the Internet and before I knew it, the microphone was researched and purchased, Audacity downloaded and worked out, ready for the appointed time Kirrily and I set to record our first P2 Diabetes Chat podcast.
We’re set to record the sixth edition of the podcast this week. We are learning a lot as we explore different ways to share our weekly thirty minutes of diabetes chat with a broad cross section of health professionals. The lighter, chatty approach of recording a conversation between a Registered Nurse and Pharmacist Credentialled Diabetes Educator brings a whole new dimension to learning for health professionals. We get to add our voice, wisdom and sense of humour to the conversation, which isn’t possible in the more formal journal articles, guidelines and online webinars.
Podcasts offer multi-taskers like me, with something to listen to while exercising, going for a walk, doing the housework or tidying the office. The work commute, visit to the dog park and plane flights will give you time to listen to something to make you laugh, think or even cry.
This is a brave new world where technology brings new ways for us to listen to content that we want to hear … and if it isn’t available … we can create it ourselves and share! That’s really what Kirrily and I have done. We were missing the opportunities to have a good chat about the foundations of our work, especially as we are both self-employed. Each new podcast, we get to do just that AND share it with you and our colleagues across Australia and beyond. The feedback has been positive, and people have already sent in questions for us to get our chat-on to explore, making it feel like a community already.
No matter whether you are an old hand at finding podcasts or you are a newbie … never fear, Jayne is here! Click the link below to go to the iTunes podcast store where you can listen to the P2 Diabetes Chat podcast editions. Doesn’t matter if you listen to one or binge listen them all, just give it a go. If you click the subscribe link, the podcasts come to you each week.
So … … click … subscribe … listen … as Kirrily and I get you thinking differently about all things diabetes. That’s the power of 2!