Since my last post about DAM career planning, a whole host of higher education courses popped up on my radar. The courses found, researched and listed are located in the US, UK and even China. There were plenty of higher education courses offered which mention DAM within their syllabus, but these courses listed below are focused on DAM.
Since 2007, Simmons College (Massachusetts, USA) offers a DAM course as an elective to a graduate program.
Since 2008, Zhejiang University (Zhejiang, China) offers an undergraduate course on DAM.
As of January 2010, Columbia University (New York, USA) offers a continuing education course all about DAM.
As of March 2010, Birmingham City University (Birmingham, UK) offers a module in Media Asset Management (MAM) as part of a certificate program.
As of September 2010, King’s College London (London, UK) offers the first Master’s degree program about DAM (MADAM).
There may be other higher education courses specifically about DAM offered elsewhere which I would love to hear about and I am sure the readers would too.
Special thanks to all the DAM professionals, professors and administrators who helped me compile this list.
Webinars are a form of web conferencing used to conduct live meetings, training, or presentations via the Internet. Every month, there are plenty of webinars offered in a variety of topics including Digital Asset Management (DAM).
Often, webinars are offered free of charge in order to inform people who join to watch. Typically, the webinars are open to questions via built-in text messaging during the session and the questions are addressed verbally at the end.
A free 4-part webinar series dedicated to optimizing Digital Asset Management processes and technologies is being offered. It is called Digital Asset Management Jumpstart (2010).
In the interest of full disclosure, webinars are often sponsored, but I volunteer my time as a speaker. I do not get paid to speak/present and I do not accept money from any vendors since I remain vendor agnostic, so I do not endorse any specific DAM vendor. I do list events I attend/present under my events tab on the right side of my blog.
Registering for webinars is quite common and the organizers often send you an online calendar invite to remind you of the webinar after your registration is complete. I listen, watch and/or present webinars weekly.
On the day of the webinar, you should:
Login a few minutes before the start time (check for your local start time based on your time zone)
Listen to speakers
Watch a series of slides to illustrate the speakers’ points
Ask questions during the session via built-in text messaging window provided. Questions are often addressed verbally at the end of the webinar.
To listen and watch a webinar, all you usually need is
Time (often 1 to 2 hours)
A fast, reliable internet connection
A computer with audio output (headphones or load speaker).
No travel required to attend any webinar regardless of your location nor the presenters’ location. Some webinars are recorded for future viewing in case you miss them or find them later on. Some DAM vendors as well as third party vendors offer webinars on a regular basis.
Yes, it is true. Another DAM blog is officially one year old with posts year round (just look at the archive). It all started with an idea about sharing experiences and knowledge about DAM. And DAM is all about sharing…assets.
I knew I was doing something right when after my second blog post I was asked to guest blog about DAM. I am very happy to report that the interest in my blog is still growing strong. I want to thank all the readers for your continued support. Please keep your comments and questions coming. And I will:
remain vendor agnostic
keep writing posts (yes, I write these all myself)
continue to blog about DAM in the user and administrator perspective
If you are awaiting the internship program, there are several major universities in the US who have contacted me since my post about career planning and mentioned they are already (or are about to start) offering DAM courses and interested in an internship program for their students. There is work being done toward spreading the word online as well as at several DAM conferences about these educational programs. Details coming soon.
There are not enough mentors today (in most fields for that matter), so I have made it one of my goals to start this DAM mentor program and remain vendor agnostic.
When will this start? Beginning in January 2010, I will begin offering a DAM mentoring program online on periodic basis (probably twice per month). There is no obligation to meet twice a month. You may choose to participate as often as the conversations are scheduled.
How and where will this mentor program start? Since geography and time zones are what really separates us today, this program will begin as a live voice conversation online (via VOIP) and any visuals can be shared (via screen sharing software). Mentoring can be done as a group or individually. In the future, we will explore in-person conversations, but those are likely to be even more limited in time and location.
What time and day would these online conversations happen? It all depends on your time zone and schedule. We are not bound by any geographic limitations nor travel necessary.
In what language? Individuals in the US and Europe have already contacted me about this and I welcome others globally as long as they speak fluent English.
Who can be a DAM mentee? Any individual working professionally toward the implementation of a DAM solution within an organization. This can also include individuals who already work with a DAM solution within an organization and who want to have a regular conversation about DAM. This is not about DAM for individual use, but about DAM for use within an organization (or even across an organization).
How much will this cost? Free. It will only cost you time for the conversation. I am donating my time and using free software (legally downloaded) to have these mentor/mentee conversations. Think of it as a DAM professional giving back to the DAM community to enrich the knowledge others. As long as the mentee is willing to learn and ask questions, I am willing to give guidance and/or suggestions. It is your responsibility what you do with the guidance or suggestions given. I assume no responsibility for (a) any hurt feelings (shoulder to cry on not included), (b) any action taken based on my guidance, (c) my suggestions and/or (d) any bruised egos. I will guide you as if I were in your shoes, based on the information you provide.
What about the mentee’s identity and affiliation to an organization? The mentee’s identity and affiliation is kept confidential unless they want to reveal it themselves. I will continue to blog about commonly encountered questions about DAM (which you can read about on this blog) in future posts without any organization(s) names nor the names of any individuals listed. Chances are you are not the first to ask those DAM questions.
Tell me where in the world you are located (in order to find a suitable time within your schedule and my schedule).
Note what topics you would like to discuss so I can possibly sync them with others wanting to discuss the same topic in a group discussion. If you need this to be an individual discussion, please specify.
I will send you details on when we can have a live periodic conversation and some free software tools to do so.
Before I mention DAM jobs descriptions themselves, many of these positions require experience, but what are the levels of experience in Digital Asset Management? How do you qualify the experience or even rank experience with DAM?
There are several levels of DAM experience from basic (1) to increasing in complexity (7). These levels include:
Simple DAM user (this is often the majority of DAM users)
Understanding the relationship of DAM system options, implications of the decisions made and configuring those system options to best suit business/workflow needs
Testing configurations to make sure they work the way they are intended to
Identify and understand what is missing from the system which your organization may need
Explaining what is missing from the system with written documentation
Explaining the value of adding the customization since it will cost extra (time and/or money)
Possibly draft a vision what the customization may look like and how it could work
Possibly even coding the solution
Thorough testing of solution
Ultimately, the best would be to have experience in all of these hands-on experience at one point or another. If this is not an option, try to experience the most number of levels available. This way, you have experienced what it is like to do this work, know what is involved and ultimately train others in future on how to do this work more efficiently and effectively. As a Digital Asset Manager, I have experienced all listed above at point or another over the years. This helps me when I need to write documentation for a specific role (audience) or when I give training so I know what is involved in whatthat user needs to do with DAM. I try to not over complicate any explanation to any particular person unless they really need more detail, so I try to keep information at a high enough level to minimize confusion.
Now, if you want to discern between individuals who have similar experience in many of these roles, then start by asking:
How many different DAM solutions have they worked on?
How many different organizations have they worked with using DAM solutions?
How long did they use the DAM and how often?
How many DAM solutions were successfully implemented and are still used today?
How many users did the DAM solution serve?
How many assets were managed?
How do they measure ROI using DAM?
You could use these questions in a DAM job interview too. What levels of experience do you have with DAM?
Most of us did not go to college nor university knowing we would be working on Digital Asset Management (DAM) today. Many might even say ‘DAM picked me. I did not pick to work on DAM.’ Those of us who are working on DAM come from diverse career backgrounds, which may include:
Archives and records management
Business Management
Design
Education
Engineering
Film
History
Journalism
Library Science
Marketing
Photography
Project Management
Sales
Video
And many other career paths
Is a career in DAM really planned at all? It may be fair to say that at the time of this blog post and according to a recent poll, most people did not plan on a career in DAM, but rather volunteered for it or were volunteered for it. Either way, that is okay. Allow me to explain why…
Growth in DAM means growth in careers which manage information (Has your organization stopped accumulating digital assets? This is not likely to happen anytime soon)
Part of running a DAM can lead to better record keeping and Rights Management which reduces liability within the organization (aka not getting sued for unauthorized use)
There are more and more DAMjobs waiting to be filled
There are not enough DAM professionals available with the needed experience, some even say there is a shortage of qualified individuals
More education about DAM is coming soon to help reduce this shortage and further the knowledge of people who find themselves newly involved in DAM
DAM internship and mentorship programs are being explored in order to share the knowledge and hands-on experience needed
It takes a certain type of individual to work on DAM and not everyone can do this type of work. You may be that person and not realize it. Do not expect overnight change, but rather baby steps of progress
Some organizations are still scratching their heads wondering why there is a low adoption of their systems, while their own people don’t understand how to use them and there is no one to help them internally. As soon as it dawns on them, they will begin seeing the value of a DAM professional who can assist them within their organization whether it is an internal resource who knows their processes (is that you?) and/or an external resource (such as a consultant) if you are not sure where to start or how to move forward in a phased approach. Yes, I will be blogging about the phases of DAM too.
There are courses available in DAM from:
CMSWatch (also offered by AIIM) offer an online certificate education course on the Fundamentals of Digital Asset Management Technologies
King’s College London to offer a Master of Arts in Digital Asset Management (MADAM) in late 2010. This is being offered not because we needed more acronyms in this field, but because we need more education about DAM.
Of course, DAM vendors offer documentation and support for their specific DAM systems, but it is not enough. Who will drive the adoption, implementation, operations, support and workflow of the DAM within your organization? Enter the DAM Professional.
Anyone can supplement their DAM education and experience with:
Books (take note of their publish dates though because technology changes rapidly)
During one of my presentations at a recent DAM conference, the audience made a request for a DAM internship or mentorship program. This poll is meant to find out how many people are interested in an internship program and/or mentorship program, specifically about Digital Asset Management. This program would be led by DAM professionals who use DAM and are willing to mentor. Please vote so we can publicly gauge the need for such a program. You may also email me directly if you are interested in this type of opportunity.
In order to have an easier URL to remember and share, you can now access this blog by simple using http://anotherdamblog.com
If you want to see a stream of all the latest blog posts as they become available, you may subscribe to the free RSS feed. They are also posted at the bottom right of my blog.
Based on the past polls posted earlier, I thought it would be interesting to find out how many people are dedicated to Digital Asset Management (DAM) operations within your organization? The DAM vendor should be able to support the DAM system based on your SLA and may suggest workflows on how to use the DAM, but who manages the daily operations within your organization? Who is doing your uploading and metatagging? Who trains all new DAM users as well as power users? Who helps establish and govern workflows and process with your DAM? Who is your go-to person inside your organization for your DAM? Does your organization have multiple people doing these tasks? Please answer this quick anonymous poll:
After gauging the level of interest in podcasts about Digital Asset Management (DAM) with a poll I posted earlier, I thought I would share the different series of active podcasts which I have been enjoying and participating in.
That DAM Show by Colin Birch and Dan McGraw. This is one of the most entertaining DAM podcasts I have ever heard since they started releasing these back in June 2009.
CMS Weekly by Andrew McCaskey. While focused mostly on Content Management, Andrew remains informative and consistent with his weekly show which mentions DAM from time to time. In the interest of full disclosure, Andrew did a unsolicited plug for Another DAM blog in episode 36 on September 28, 2009.
There were some vendor-specific podcasts earlier this year too, but they don’t seem to be very active any longer which is unfortunate. All the podcasts are packed with great information, you can tell there is a lot of effort put into creating them. I would encourage everyone to listen to their episodes. If you enjoy them as much as I do, subscribe (they are all free of charge) for future episodes. You don’t need even an iPod to listen to them, just a computer with internet access which you obviously have. If you do have an iPod, the first two podcasts listed are available on iTunes to download and listen on the move.
I wish all the producers of these podcasts all the best and look forward to every episode they come out with for the latest news and thoughts on DAM within the podcast medium.
Do you have a podcast about DAM or another favorite DAM related podcast? If so, please do share.
The latest podcast series to be released to date is
