Proposal for E-Portfolio
I am an information technology student at the University of Central Florida looking to make a mock E-Portfolio for my class. I intend to meet at least three specified goals as to how I want my professional image to look, presented in a web-based format.
Goals
When presenting myself to the professional world, I would like to meet three goals:
- Maintain a look of professionalism
- Showcase my wide range of technological-based talents
- Convey that I am up to date on the latest technological trends
Maintaining Professionalism
It is important for anyone putting themselves out there for employees to see to make sure that they have a clean, professional look, while not seeming too stiff or insincere. This is easily achieved in several different ways, include purposely breaking some conventions of formal writing so that the writing flows and comes off as friendly, including things on my resume such as a small section for hobbies, or in some cases, a small personal biography.
What not to do includes using things like internet smilies and slang (such as :) or LOL) or using a large amount of technical jargon where it is not necessary. A professional resume should be readable and understandable by anyone, whether or not they are up to date on technology.
Showcasing TalentsWhen presenting myself to an employer, I essentially want to sell myself to them. To do this, I must inform them of what I will be bringing to the company. In order to achieve this, I will want to make some mention of everything related that I am well-versed in, even if the skills are not integral to the position to which I'm applying. Not only might it offer extra incentive to hire a well-rounded professional, but it might also be beneficial for the company, if they do not have to train me in a particular area, whereas they would have to train another application.
Up To DateIn maintaining a professional image in the field of technology, I want employers to know that I am up to date with the latest technological trends and that I am able to quickly accommodate new technology. Not only will an employer also want to be technologically up to date, but they will want someone who can learn anything new in a relatively short amount of time. Furthermore, this provides incentive to employers who may be looking to update their existing technology to the newest. A secondary benefit to this is that it shows that I care about my field enough to keep up with it on a personal basis, rather than just for the sake of my career.
Proposal
As seen in the assignment in which we researched others in our field, the use of blogs (internet journals) is not an uncommon way to present a professional portfolio in the field of technology. I would like to use a blog to create my own portfolio. Doing so will allow me to meet my goals by:
- Allowing me to maintain a professional internet format. Web-based portfolios are very common, and a blog allows many of the same HTML conventions as a website does, while sometimes offering more easy authoring tools.
- Showcasing my talents by not only presenting them on my resume, but by publishing blog entries that, with a simple read through, would demonstrate a wide range of knowledge about technology.
- Show that I am up to date, as not only are blogs the new big thing, but again, in publishing entries, I would be able to show what news I have been following.
While the assignment called for a website, I feel that blog would be much more beneficial to my project. At a future date, if I had the need for a true website, it would not be hard to integrate the blog into it, as many free blog services offer website integration services. It also allows the portfolio to continually grow. Updating a blog is considerably easier than updating a website, and they can be updated from anywhere. Blogs also allow feedback from the community.
In addition, I plan to post entries to the blog to illustrate the concept of how the portfolio can grow. The number of entries will depend on what time allows, between working on other projects.