How not to use PowerPoint

I've always been a fan of keeping things simple. When giving a presentation I prefer to keep my PowerPoint simple and use it to emphasize just the key points. In fact there is a gentleman who has obtained some notoriety for his use of slides that only contain one word on a white background. Going one step further, you might consider leaving the PowerPoint at home in some cases. What I consider to be the best speech/presentation I have given was done last year without any PowerPoint at all.

The following short, and entertaining, video does a great job of teaching you how not to use PowerPoint. I'm sure you will find plenty to relate to; hopefully as a audience member and not the person giving the presentation!

Oregon Prospector outages

Late last week GIS Planning moved OregonProspector.com to a new computer server in order to increase the speed of the site and increase site reliability.

As is almost always the case, this created unforeseen issues such as trouble logging in for some users. As of today, Tuesday, it appears that these issues have been resolved and life is good again.

If you experience any issues please do let me know at ted.werth@state.or.us so I can get technical support working on it.

Including your contact information

I like to talk to the consultants and companies that receive our proposals via OregonProspector about their experience with the system. Generally reactions have been very positive. However I did want to pass along one bit of information from a recent discussion.

The client was very positive about having everything in one place (document) and had no trouble downloading and reading the information provided by our communities. He did mention however, that while each community provided a coverletter, some of these coverletters did not contain phone numbers and/or email addresses. This required the client to do their own internet research to find the contact information he needed.

Sometimes it is the little things that slip by us and this seems to be the case in this instance. So, this is just a reminder to always try and take a look at what you are submitting from the clients view. Will they know where you are located, do they have someone they can contact, have you provided them the information they requested in the format they need it?

In the same vein, recent discussions led me to realize that we (State) need to always include a general map of Oregon showing the location of each community that has submitted on a project. As a result I have developed a template that allows us to do that for each project.

Keep up the good work! The feedback is, overall, very positive.

Refrigerated Building Space

NEW!!! If you have a property listed that has refrigerated space you can now tag your property with that marker. What that will do is allow people to find your building when they search for buildings with refrigerated space.

To make your property show up in these searches you will need to go into the specific property listing and check the box for 'refrigerated space'

Certified Sites in Oregon Prospector

Properties with the State Certified Site designation are highlighted and moved to the top of user searches. You should review the sites in your area and check that Certified Sites are shown with a green highlight. If you have a certified site in your region that is not highlighted then contact me so we change it. Properties can only be given certification status through our administrative account.

If you have a land owner that would like to pursue certification you should contact Michael Williams, the new OECDD Industrial Lands Specialist. You can reach Michael at michael.williams@state.or.us or by phone at 503-986-0141.

Demographics

As many of you know there are some pretty useful demographics associated with each property listing. This function can be useful when checking things like workforce numbers in a particular radius of a site. In the past the radius was set for a default of 5 miles. In most areas of the state 30 miles is a much more useful radius so I have changed the default to reflect this. Of course if you wish you can change this radius to another number. To find the demographics for a site open a listing (single site) and look for the 'Demographic Report' tab below the map.