Wk 3 Response to Bianca

Week 3 - Post 3 - Personal 20-Percent Time

Posted by Bianca at 7:40 PM 

Lifehacker did another posting on Google's 20-percent time. For those of you unfamiliar with the concept, at Google employees are given one day a week to work on whatever projects they feel like. It's basically structured experimentation time and it's worked exceptionally well for Google. Some of Google's best-loved offerings (including Gmail) came initially from the experimentation done in this 20-percent time. In the Lifehacker article today they discussed creating your own personal 20-percent time so as to increase creativity and innovation.

Now that we're coming closer to the end of our program I'm starting to think about what I'm going to use all my spare time for, and some 20-percent time style personal development sounds just about right. The last few years I've been in and out of classes both for my Canadian teaching certification (my original Florida certification didn't transfer over completely) and now for training for my new career in instructional design. I love learning, but I'm getting a bit tired of taking classes mostly for career growth. I'm also a bit sick of grades altogether. I'm thinking of following up Full Sail with some fun non-graded classes just for me. I'm also thinking of working on some fun projects on my own. 

Here's a short list of the things I'm planning to work on and learn in the year or so after graduation:

• I promised myself I could take a glassblowing workshop after I finished grad school. I've wanted to do this for years but it's not cheap so I kept putting it off. I deserve a treat after finishing grad school though.
• Nate mentioned a PowerPoint alternative called Prezi that is ridiculously pretty. I'm going to play around with it a lot I think. I also picked up a spiffy program called Timeline 3D in a Mac software bundle I bought up this week. I don't have a need to create timelines for anything right now... but the program is just so spectacular I think I'm just going to have to make things with it anyway just for fun.
• I've been working on a home decorating project as part of my New Year's resolution (shameless plug: here's my blog for it) . I've done a few small projects for it, but once school finishes it's time for the big projects like refinishing a cool (but banged up) vintage vanity, drafting and sewing a slip cover for my currently boring black office chair, and finally matting and framing all the great prints I've bought in the last few years (most of them are from Imaginism Studios, whose work I adore).
• I've gotten a lot more into graphic design since I started at Full Sail. Because of this I just need to bite the bullet and become friends with Adobe Illustrator already.
• Language class time. Which will it be: Spanish (which would make my Abuelita delighted and be useful on Caribbean vacations) or Japanese (which would make reading manga and watching anime easier and would be useful for when I FINALLY go to Japan... and likely blow my life savings in Akihabara)

What I suppose I'm hoping is that these side projects will function to keep me creatively invigorated, which will lead to more innovation both in my personal life as well as my professional work. I'm also hoping some of the side projects I do might have parts that will transfer to other areas of my life as well. It's surprising how this can work sometimes. For example, back in one of our early classes at Full Sail I made a video that was an introduction to Twitter and blogging. Just recently I showed it to my boss as an example of what we could do on our company website, and she pitched the idea to a client of ours who has now contracted us to create a similar video to promote a training program she's leading. Who would have guessed that what I thought was a one-off class assignment would have turned into the opportunity for me to create a promotional video? If I do even more personal creative exploration, who knows what opportunities I'll be able to take advantage of in the future.