I almost got to be a photographer today. ALMOST.

It has completely ruined my weekend that this failed to happen.

To summarize, our library has an awesome digital technologies section (essentially where the library and IT department join together), and my job there is to work in the digital archives. Which I’ve gotten fairly decent at – so naturally, I want to move onto struggling with something else. But as of today, I’ve gotten to join a new committee on social media which I certainly didn’t know that we had before. I’m really excited by this, as I hope to work in social media as a future career path down the line.

> It’s somewhere inbetween becoming a personal finance expert and going to grad school for Buddhism. Somewhere. I swear. <

In my opinion, working in tech is kind of a crapshoot – but I’m certainly not a natural, so keep that in mind. I think there are plenty of people who learning technologies is as quick as breathing, but that’s not me. Which is why I like learning new SM platforms, programming tools, and tricks in Excel, it challenges me in a way that I don’t quite get anywhere else.

But like anything else, I believe you need to really concentrate to succeed in tech. Really focus when you get the instructions the first time instead of zoning out, and then make sure that you can apply them in the way instructed before experimenting. And since I love experimenting with things/concepts/ideas, this was really the best way I learned how to focus and get better with learning tech and programming. Not an extremely fun activity I’ll admit, but it was definitely necessary for my success.

So next time you’re having trouble understanding a new form of technology, think about whether you really focused the first time around. Make a resolution to listen intently when you need it – it will definitely pay off in the future.

I almost didn’t get this post in! Mainly because I’ve been working all day.

As much as I love Wednesdays, they leave me almost no time to breathe, study, or seriously crank out any creative work. But I love them primarily because they remind me of what I enjoy best – learning new technologies.

Today, I finally got to put my knowledge in Qualtrics to good use after a ITS training session about a month ago. I learned how to use display logic when creating questions, different formatting ideas, and stylistic choices. Though I’m very much in the rough stages, hopefully I’ll be able to use that training in other respects.

I just finished up a WordPress section – the results you can clearly see here, and even though it’s not a program that you learn such as HTML/Python/etc., I enjoy finding out new things about the sites I use everyday.

At my other job, I get to work in the official IT/digital scholarship department, so I’m around books and computers all day (living the dream)! I’d be lying severely if I said that I was anywhere near any expert using Adobe Photoshop, Bridge, and ABBY FineReader, but I’ve definitely improved a lot over the school year.

A lot of technical learning for me at least is just watch, theorize, test, and apply – but I know that everyone has their own way of deciding things. For me, I really like to jump in it and make tons of mistakes. And while it was pretty soul-crushing having to go over some projects again – and again – and again – it was very educational to feel my way through things at my own pace. It also probably helps that I have a very patient boss, which probably comes with the territory when working in IT.

I’ll continue with some more points tomorrow on learning tech, but that’s all for now!