As per Frans Kuipers email I am contacting Roy.I am new to website. I would like to volunteer in redesigning of website.
Thanks
Amruta
9423574027
India

Hello,
*Sitting at home, having no job, needing to think of something else then my personal issues, in need to use my time usefull i became i member of Nabuur.
* studied journalism, addicted to writing, i would like to meet people who need a writer. For a book, for a letter, an article. Anything where i can be helper or give ideas to improve what is there. And let people know that asking is better then stopping!

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Suzanne Smit
http://wakabun.blogspot.com

hello suzanne,
I can see that you are in to help and you would like to do that pretty soon. when i had just joined nabuur i knew nothing to do but all i can tell you listen to the guide no one calls you to help them but you look for the work from volunteer opportunities and also joining the villages it is in these villages that we find work to do for a community.
have a great time at nabuur bye
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Herbo

Suzanne,

Herbo is right. You will need to have a look under the tab at the top of the page that says "Volunteer Opportunities" as well as join communities and offer your help. Your skills in writing will be needed by many, especially for letter writing, proposals etc.

Please keep looking for areas where you can help. Sometimes it can take a little while before you find a community where your skills are required, but it is well worth the effort when you find yourself able to help a community to achieve their goal.

Welcome to Nabuur

Kind Regards,
Melissa

Thanks for the feedback here. The challenge of 'not knowing where to start' is definately a big one. It would be useful to hear more about how you all get around the site and what pages and links (bookmarks?, shortcuts?) Do you remember what the real stumbling blocks were?
Roy

Hi Roy,

I'm relatively new, having joined only a couple of weeks ago. My initial impression is that it was fairly straightforward to figure out what to do to get started.

Answers to your specific questions

1. Who would you like to meet? Why?
I am here to help sustainable development projects succeed, rather than to meet people. From my perspective, the key people are the facilitators and local reps, plus anyone I can collaborate with to progress tasks.

2. What would you like to do here? Can you find your way around? Any info you haven't been able to find?
I would like to contribute to the completion of concrete tasks which deliver outcomes.
The website is ok to navigate around from my perspective.
The information about facilitating is a bit buried at http://www.nabuur.com/en/vacancies which I found only by clicking through from "10 things" on the home page - which I rarely visit now that I'm involved in village tasks. It might be worthwhile making this info more accessible if you are looking at a site restructure.

3. What is the ONE THING you would change on the site to make it work better for you?
Not sure what guidance is given to facilitators and local reps, but certainly some villages would benefit greatly from a more structured planning approach. Is there a generic, simple project management toolkit to help local reps and facilitators to plan and manage their projects? If not I would suggest one could be developed and incorporated into the village set-up and review process. I think the current Project Room structure, with Steps and Tasks, is not bad but its potential is under-utilitsed in many cases. It would be greatly enhanced by some sort of representation of the project plan as a whole, ie a GANTT-type depiction of steps and tasks showing where they fit into the overall plan, percentage completion, and not just time needed but actual delivery dates, task owners etc. Perhaps these are already in use but if so they're not clear to me. I understand that you need to maintain simplicity and keep entry barriers low, but I think more emphasis on project planning and management could improve success.

Other thoughts & suggestions

Image-free version for slow connections
Can users with slow connections choose a low-image version of the site to help with speed issues (eg excluding profile pictures)? Is it possible for the site to detect connection speed and default to the appropriate version? Slow connections seem to be a big hindrance to local reps being able to keep up to speed with progress and respond in a timely manner.

Search
Improve search capabilities. For example, I would like to be able to search content within a particular village. Also I have not been able to find particular villages that I've been referred to using the search function - instead had to browse through country listings.

Key to symbols
Provide an easy-to-find key explaining the meaning of the task status symbols. They make sense after a while but weren't all immediately obvious to me.

My Nabuur page
Include links to users' own recent posts on the My Nabuur page.
Perhaps have a checkbox on the My Profile page where people can nominate whether they would be interested in doing a facilitation role.
Is it possible to enable users to add/remove/rearrange/resize the elements on their My Nabuur pages? If this is already a capability it hasn't jumped out at me.

Consolidate action items for local reps
I wonder if it would be possible to tag sections of text within an entry as a question for the local rep? This could then be pulled onto a consolidated page for the local rep where they can see all the questions they need to answer. Perhaps tagging text would only be allowed by a facilitator, and fields in the consolidated list could include date, who asked it, what the answer is (editable by local rep). The idea is to help local reps easily see where input is needed from them, and even provide a response, without having to navigate between multiple pages. Might be too high-end depending on the scope of your review?

Cross-project coordination
Outside the scope of a website update, but perhaps have a cross-project support role to scan/consolidate resources & solutions, and make suggestions to help facilitators connect with the existing body of knowledge and experience within Nabuur? I have no experience with the facilitation side of things so perhaps you already have something in place. However I think re-use can really be enhanced by going beyond just making resources available, to having proactive, overarching coordination.

Sorry for the long post - hope it is useful!
Angela

Hi Angela,

The is a new group on Nabuur- the Resource team-take a look at it- Lieuwe and I are discussing putting together a project management manual for Nabuur and we can use your help and fresh perspective.

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-Tanja

Hi everyone,

Tanja is correct - there is a new group called the Resource Team, specifically designed to overhaul the orientation and training manuals. However, the group is behind the scenes for now, and it's by invite only - If you'd like to help out, send me an email (romina@nabuur.com) and I'll add you to the group. :)

Thanks,
Romina

Hi everyone,
Although I am a facilitator, I also consider myself to be an active Neighbour and generally don't see too much disconnect between the two roles.
So- Angela- I really like a lot of what you said. Lots of sound ideas that can be easily implemented. I too find the website relatvely easy to navigate- although critical things like search functions are lacking, and finding tasks with maximum ease and visibility is also lacking. For me the website is simply a conduit to the real work that is being done in our homes/villages/workplace/ or cyber cafes.
I have one concern though- whilst it is very important to set up projects well, from the start, often the nature of these problems in remote viallges are not so easily "project managed". There is an element uncertainty, lack of clarity etc in some vllages because the problem needs to be worked out as we gather more info, make more connections etc. I'm personally not a huge fan of the GANNT chart as I find it limits my working style (professionally). I particularly don't think it always works in the initial phase of a project...later stages OK. So I would just like to add a caution around any forcing function where an LR and Facilitaor would be required to force a village problem or project into a project management template. There always needs to be flexibility. That's my two cents worth!
Carolyn

Carolyn, you are right, and I sometimes tend towards over-engineering rather than under-engineering!

Tanja and Romina, thanks for the invitation, however I really only have today and tomorrow left before I am heading off on a holiday, then moving house/job etc. So my availability for the next several months will be fairly limited. If you are seeking public comments on anything when I do check in I will certainly contribute.

Another idea for the website:

One-time verification
I am finding that almost every message I post brings up the spam filter. I don't know if this is a common problem but I wonder if it's possible to have some way of the website recognising that my IP is a trusted IP or something? Perhaps just verify registrations and postings by guests, and disable the spam filter for logged-in users? It does get a bit frustrating.

Sorry to keep posting - just trying to contribute as much as I can before I head off!

Cheers,
Angela

Angela,

Yes it is a common problem. I am getting the same thing. Every message I post I have to fill in the captcha, and I know of others with the same problem.

I hope your suggestion of a one off verification is possible because it is frustrating.

Melissa

Getting the website available to french and spanish speakers would be great...I wish you
considered Translation...It might be helpful for many people

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Thank you!

Hi, Here are my thoughts on the website when I first came here and also some at this point. I try to be as critical as possible and I hope it helps!

Thoughts to Help build Nabuur.com
- I really like the 10 things you can do today. A lot of people, including me, either don't have the time or lack the patience to get to know the entire site and want to start off right away doing things. the "10 things you can do today" is clear, it stands out, it gets me right to what is needed. So keep that and try to use it for other things also. In other words - MAKE EVERYTHING AS CLEAR AND SIMPLE AS POSSIBLE!

- I would make the Nabuur search more obvious to use, like implementing it in every page instead of only in the menu above. Like a little google search bar. I have the experience that people tend to search for things this way the first time they visit in order to get an idea about if there is anything fitting their skills or interests since most people are used to search things in a search bar as in Google, especially people new to the internet since Google is often the thing they first get to know.

- I would add a help page explaining the terms "Village", "Nabuur" and "facilitator" etc, since I still don't know what a facilitator really is after a couple of weeks after signing up (my choice of course, could have done more, but if there would have been an "about us" page that is blatantly on the first page it may have helped to get to know the words better).

- My first concern was - WHAT ARE THE RESULTS, and, HAS IT WORKED? It seems daunting to sign up for something if it looks like little has been achieved.

- Maybe even add an awards system to those who get something done? This may help some people to see that they have made progress. Progress is after all what everyone seems to be striving for.

So in summary:

- MOST IMPORTANTLY: Add an "About Us"/"Who We Are and What We Do" page on the main page of Nabuur that can be seen and clicked on easily, describing:

* What Nabuur Does
* Who "runs" the thing - a personal introduction if possible. People should know and relate to who's behind it.
* A very simple, very concise picture of how Nabuur works - a graphic drawing if possible, like the one that was drawn in the page asking for help for the site design with the little puppets etc. I'd really like to help with that by the way if that task hasn't already been taken care of.

- Show RESULTS OF WHAT HAS BEEN ACHIEVED. This was my biggest thought - "does it really work?" "There doesn't seem to be much happening". Perhaps a separate page on "success stories"? And show a small part on the main page with one succes story inviting the visitor to learn more?

I Hope this helped, take care,

dirk

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"A little knowledge that acts is worth infinitely more than much knowledge that is idle" - Kahlil Gibran

Hi Roy,

I have recently joined nabuur as a neighbour. While posting on several villages, I noticed that most problems are common and require a common set of solutions.

For example, rainwater harvesting - I have posted on 2 different villages in Uganda recently, and probably there are many such villages where this problem is already awaiting resolution (of which I am not aware of), or villages may come up with this problem after getting feedback from other villages. It takes a tremendous amount of effort by all concerned to keep on posting the same content on several villages for the same common issue, since people have to first understand the issues involved and a huge amount of interaction has to be done. In the present system this needs to be repeated again at another village, so it is better if all villages discuss this common problem at a common group on nabuur, instead of discussing it village-by-village. It will probably take several decades for a 'village-by-village' approach to make any reasonable impact in any region. During the same time the problems of hundreds of villages can be attended, whereas in the present system only one or two villages get attention at any time on such a common issue.

Other issues that are common to most villages, that I can immediately think of are:

- website development for most village schools

- donation of books

- donation of computers

- suggest ideas for income generation

- make proposals for funding

- creating logos

- discussions on green technologies, renewable energy, solar cooking

- farming techniques

- preparing manuals

- malaria control

- shipping of goods

- and so on........

Out of the 200+ villages on nabuur as at present, about 60% to 70% problems would be common among all villages. It is true that each village is a different entity. However, the focus is to be on the problems in these villages, and these problems will get better resolution if these are discussed on a common platform at 'Groups' on nabuur.

For each problem a different group can be created.

All villages can register their problems in separate groups.

The number of such groups may not be more than a hundred considering the existing traffic on nabuur.

Neighbours will interact through their posts with all villages in the group at the same time.

A possible solution could be provided by changing the navigation route to be followed by the neighbours.

PRESENT SYSTEM:
- villages A,B,C have common problems X,Y,Z
- villages A,B,C post problems X,Y,Z each on their own pages. Hence X,Y,Z each appear 3 times on nabuur
- a neighbour may see village A only, and post solutions to X,Y,Z only on the page of village A
- villages B,C are unaware of the solution, and continue to suffer
- the neighbour is completely unaware about villages B,C and so cannot help.

PROPOSED SYSTEM:

- villages A,B,C have common problems X,Y,Z

- Groups X,Y,Z are created on nabuur, if not already existing

- villages A,B,C each post problem X on Group X
- villages A,B,C each post problem Y on Group Y
- villages A,B,C each post problem Z on Group Z

Hence-
- Group X has registered problem X of villages A,B,C
- Group Y has registered problem Y of villages A,B,C
- Group Z has registered problem Z of villages A,B,C

Neighbours are thus required to interact ONLY at Group X for problem X, Group Y for problem Y, Group Z for problem Z. Neighbours are not required to post each comment at several places. Once a solution is provided to problem X, all villages A,B,C benefit together for problem X. And so on for problems Y and Z.

This is possible only if the focus of activity by neighbours is shifted to the Groups and not at the pages of the villages.

Since the number of neighbours on nabuur is fairly large (over 20,000 at present) it will not be possible to make individual requests. The changes will need to be made at an administrative level on the nabuur website. I can think of the following suggestions:

- the pages of the villages can be made only for profile, information, news, etc.
- THE FACILITY OF POSTING ON VILLAGE PAGES CAN BE REMOVED
- the village pages can be edited, or updated only by the village representative or facilitator
- ALL POSTS BY THE VILLAGE AND NEIGHBOURS COULD BE ALLOWED 'ONLY' ON THE GROUPS PAGES, and not on the village pages

Through this process, interaction on all issues will necessarily shift to the 'Groups' pages. And thereafter, hopefully, no more of 'reinventing the wheel' at every village.

The benefits:
- all villages will benefit together
- the magnitude and severity of the common problems will be highlghted better
- the focus will shift away from the 'village-by-village' approach
- the focus will shift to problem solving on a wider scale, so that a large number of villages will benefit from each solution 'at one shot'

Vijai