Barbara Merlo of Central Texas College
The Way I Manage My Projects with brightpod
Barbara Merlo, Director of Marketing & Outreach at Central Texas College // Killeen, Texas
Barbara's favorite gadget is her phone (Google Pixel). Her favorite news-reading app is NPR News.
Her favorite time-saving trick: Prioritize tasks daily, weekly, monthly and occasionally you get something done. Monica's favorite blog is 'Think with Google'.
What does your department do?
Marketing for a community college in Texas. My staff includes graphic design/publications, web design and development, and social media and media relations. We use an advertising agency for production and placement of most advertising.
Describe an average day at your college/ university/ department?
Depends on the time of year. I spend a lot of time in meetings and on email, but in general we are updating, creating and planning. We also support many campus events.
What is your work routine? How do you start and end your day?
I try to start the day by prioritizing tasks (in and out of Brightpod) and catching up on email. The day ends in a similar way.
"Brightpod has evolved to help us coordinate on large projects."
How did you find or learn about Brightpod?
We were looking for an affordable project management system, specifically for our graphics and publications projects to balance workload.
How many projects and team members do you have in Brightpod? Could you give us some insight on what kind of projects/ work you manage with Brightpod?
We customized Brightpod to meet our needs — currently we have 16 pods and 9 team members.
Were you using any other tool or method before Brightpod? Why did you make the switch?
No, we weren’t using something else.
Have you ever relied on Brightpod for something unexpected related to a project or a client etc.?
It has evolved to help us coordinate on large projects. In the beginning we were using it only for graphics and publications.
"It would make me very grumpy, if I could no longer use Brightpod."
Was there a learning curve associated with Brightpod? How did your team adapt to a new software?
A bit. It is fairly intuitive, but some people adapt more quickly than others. The biggest challenge was organizing it in a way that meets our needs.
What is your favorite, or most used Brightpod feature?
I use the reporting features quite a lot.
How would you feel if you could no longer use Brightpod?
That would make me very grumpy.
Is there any advice you want to give to other universities looking to switch to Brightpod?
Develop a plan before you start working in Brightpod. It is very customizable and you can use templates available, or not. Staff involvement and buy-in is key.
Thank you for your time, Barbara!
