You’ve made it to Part 3!

It’s been a long journey and i’m glad you’ve stuck with it as the end is now in sight!

For us guys on the TPE site, judgement day was upon us. The idea for the forum had been sparked after the gripping England Vs Wales match, where people felt that some referee decisions could be discussed along with the “elephant in the room” .

Try or No Try? (leave a comment with your thoughts on that one)

So the forum was set up, the workflows were created and the site was ready for some members. Time to get some communications started whilst referee decisions were still on people’s minds. Phone calls and chats to some influential members of the international rugby community ensued along with invitations via e-mail sent out from the TPE site. It was now just a matter of waiting…and waiting. Slowly the members started to come in and some small discussions were developing around a few clips. Why were people not flooding in?! Were we being too selective? Had we missed the opportunity to catch people straight after the game by spending too much time developing an easily useable site rather than a site which was ready for people to join sooner?

I suppose the simple answer would be yes, I had spent a long time developing the learning tools and workflows for people to use around the site but I felt that these things needed to be in place. We may have got more members in had we added them sooner, but would they have known what to do? Would they have been able to move around the site easily? Eventually, people would have grasped what to do as the site is set up to be pretty simple to use, but I still feel that it couldn’t be used to its full potential without these workflows. So, a time to reflect whilst the rugby community was preparing for the upcoming fixture, France Vs Ireland.

With the site up and running and members already invited, the clips from the France Vs Ireland fixture could be sent out sooner, whilst it was still fresh in people’s minds. We needed to make people aware of the site again but without bombarding them with e-mails. What was the solution? The solution was simple, let TPE do the work for you.

By creating a Sponsorlink on the site, we could send an e-mail to our members during the game with a link enclosed. This link would open up a page with a video clip from the game they were watching at that very moment which could be viewed on a computer or smartphone. If that’s not showing something that’s fresh in people’s minds then I dont know what is! The link would remind our members of what we were doing and show them that we were getting the footage up on the site as the game was happening, so if they wanted to review a decision as the game was happening, everything was there for them once they logged in and joined in the discussions. VICTORY AT LAST

Following on from this whole experience, we are thinking of other forums that could be created to help develop a community of practice, with a chance to help teach and advise officials (just as one example) by using the internet and media available to us all. If you have any ideas of organisations or groups who could use this process for an advantage, feel free to leave some comments below or send me an e-mail: josh_bryan@visualperformanceanalysis.com

Thanks for taking the time to read some of these blogs, I hope they have been of interest to you. It’s my first experiences of blogging and I have found it very addictive and extremely helpful, it is a way to develop that most wonderful skill of reflection!

Now as a final treat for you all as you’ve been so kind, i’m going to leave you with the link that was sent out to the members of the Referee Communication Forum. Clicking the treasure chest will give you a sneak peek into the world of TPE and just one of it’s many uses.

I know, i know… i’m too good to you all.

JB