New Year - New Plans

Does the start of a New Year make you think about planning for the year ahead?

At the end of 2014 Thomas MacEntee introduced his Genealogy Do Over . 

I had every intention of getting this done last year. 
I made a start, but life just seemed to get in the way as it so often does, now to put that plan into action.

I decided a few weeks into the year, in 2015, that my first goal was going to take much longer than I anticipated. 

I visited the US in February 2015, attending the Rootstech/FGS conference in Salt Lake City, and in April 2015 I also spent a day at WDYTYA Live in Birmingham.

I regularly participate in genealogy hangouts, have my own blogs, a "day job", and run my family home. Ultimately something had to go, getting organized took a back seat. 

So this year I am continuing with my organization plans and hoping to implement some of the things I learnt last year. This applies to both my genealogy and my work files. Along the way I will be blogging about my progress and sharing things that I have found useful on either of my 2 blogs.

I have never been the most organized person and I have tried out a few systems with the aim of getting more organized. 

The above graphic shows some of the things I have had to consider under the overall "umbrella" of organisation. 
I have tried using both Evernote and One Note to aid organization, but at present, I am not exactly sure how I am going to make best use of their capabilities.

That being said, this Saturday I am going to the Genealogy Clutter Buster Mini Boot Camp. 
I am sure Lisa Alzo will have plenty of advice here. 
If you have been unable to sign up for this, both sessions quickly sold out, I am sure Thomas MacEntee will have it available after the event.


Hopefully I have finally hit on a system that works for me with what I am proposing to do.
This month I am concentrating on planning.

Have you made your own plans for 2016?

January is the month for Planning!

EXPECTATIONS

WHAT CAN I EXPECT IN 2015?

It is at this time of the year that we all get bombarded by new year resolutions and with the launch of the Genealogy Do-Over by Thomas MacEntee many of us are reviewing our work at setting ourselves goals for this coming year.

It is important that we give ourselves time to reflect and for those of us in the northern hemisphere the long winter evenings can be the best time of year to do this.

As I may have mentioned previously last January I attended one of The Boot Camps that Thomas and Lisa Alzo have been running. 

Next weekend they are running their Research Right Boot Camp (which sold out within a day), if you have not been able to sign up for this then it will be available from the following week. I have managed to sign up for this and hope to pick up some useful tips.

I have not managed to do much research at archives in the past two or three years and have been concentrating on getting a new organisation system in place. 
Those limited visits I have made were to look for parish registers not yet available online. 
I am hoping that next weekend's Boot Camp will help me optimise my research process so that I can make the most of my visit to Salt Lake City next month.

GOALS

1. Complete my reorganisation process
2. Optimise the research process
3. Ensure that all my sources are cited as accurately as possible
4. Make the most of visiting my cousins in the US and Salt Lake City for the Rootstech/FGS 2015 Conference

HOW WILL I ATTAIN THESE

This may sound a little "corny" but as the words of that song say "with a little help from my friends".

The genealogy community are a supportive group of people and by sharing and supporting each other we can all achieve our goals.

We must be realistic in what we aim to achieve and reassess the situation when we don't reach the endpoint we wanted.

Thomas MacEntee urged everyone who participating in the Genealogy Do-Over to slow down. Speed is not important getting it right is our aim.

The right plan with realistic goals will get more done. "More haste, less speed" is the saying that comes to mind.
I have parish register microfiche and some English counties have digital images available online, once I know what I have then I can concentrate my research objectives on those records not available in my home or via the Internet.
Some may say that goal number 4 should be number 1 and in the short term that is true. However without the other goals then I may not attain number 4. Goals 1 and 2 may not be reached before I leave the UK and 3 most certainly will not but that does not mean I cannot achieve number 4.

Preparation will be the key to my success and in my March post I will tell you if I achieved my goal and in April how I plan to make the most of my trip to Who Do You Think You Are Live.

Next month I hope to give you my impression of the first day at Rootstech 2015/FGS conference.

Applying What We Learn

Do you find that the number of opportunities to learn about genealogy and how to do it are increasing year by year?

I am sure if you read this blog then the answer will be yes.

If you use the internet and a computer for your genealogy there are an ever increasing number of ways that you can watch , listen or read about better or different ways of recording your research.

I like to join Hangouts on Air, watch webinars or other recordings, listen to podcasts and read blogs. In fact I am beginning to wonder if I actually find time to do any research.

Family Tree University run courses  http://www.familytreeuniversity.com/ 
(I participated in one last year having won a free registration), as does Pharos  http://www.pharostutors.com/ 
both of which are online, and you can book online for courses at 
The Institute for Heraldic and Genealogical Studies  http://www.ihgs.ac.uk/index.html who do day courses and a correspondence course. 
One of the new genealogy education courses is the Hack Genealogy Boot Camp http://hackgenealogy.com/bootcamp/  I signed up for the second event on 25th January 2014 and copies of the recording are available (for a charge) on the website if you want to catch up, to find out more go to http://hackgenealogy.com/genealogy-groove-boot-camp-25-january-2014/.

With all these courses available when do I find time to do my research??

In fact I have done very little research away from home the last 2 years, although I have previously accumulated a range of documents, and more of what I would have had to go to the archives for in the past is gradually being made available as digital images online. 

I also took a look at my organization and decided that before I attempted any further research I would get what I had in order. To this end, and with the knowledge obtained from the various genealogical education experiences there has not come a point yet where I feel happy to spend on a research trip away from home.

If there is one thing I have learnt it is to get the best out of any research trip one needs to plan. This should also apply to any online research, though I am sure it is something many of us forget to do (especially when we see those shaky green leaves at Ancestry).

How many times have you done a search with a negative result. 
Did you record what you searched for? 
You may need to repeat that search again at a later date would you remember what you had done?

We can all learn from courses but do not forget that we need to learn from our own mistakes. None of us starts out an expert but the wise among us learn from our experiences and the shared experiences of others to improve our skills and our methods.

I do hope my comments give you food for thought to maybe think can I improve what I am doing, what goals do I need to set myself and how am I to achieve them, but don't forget to look back to consider did I set the right goals or should I change them, am I too ambitious or should I expect more of myself.

The key to effective learning is to give yourself time for REFLECTION.

Why I am getting organized? and how features of Family Historian have helped.

At the Beginning of the Year I published a post on my blog about how I am trying to get organized see [http://genemeet.blogspot.co.uk/].

From the popularity of the Facebook group, The Organized Genealogist,  I am not the only genealogist who is trying to get organized, or become more organized.
If you are a professional genealogist then of course it makes financial sense to be organized.
If like me you are a hobbyist then you probably have much less time to spend doing genealogy, unless you are "retired" you will likely have at least a part time job and family commitments that can also take up much of your time.

So why should I get organized

• I have limited time to research so I want to make the most of what time I have.
• If I am organized I can find items I want easily and quickly.
• When others ask about relatives I have in my online trees I can answer their queries in a more timely manner. 
• I have a lot of people in my WikiTree [http://www.wikitree.com/] and most of them need updating or the sources need cleaning up. Not everyone is properly sourced.
• I do not want to duplicate my research. 
• How many of us have at some point wasted time researching something/someone we have done previously. Have you got duplicates in your files?
• This is not to say we should not go back and repeat something where we had a negative result on an online database. Online databases are regularly adding new records and can be worth searching on a regular basis for those brickwalls.
• I have a lot of paper records some are original records, others just copies or printouts. 
• I need to get these onto my computer so that I do not overlook anything they contain.
• I have numerous photographs. If I scan and add metadata to the digital files I will know who is in these photographs and when they were taken. 
• As my older relatives may be the only ones to know who is in some of the older photographs I need to make this a priority before it is too late.
• I have upgraded from Custodian 3 to Custodian 4 [http://www.custodian4.co.uk/] . I have spent money on this upgrade and should make sure I spent this money wisely. It now has links to the media which was why I upgraded. 
• Whilst Family Historian [http://www.family-historian.co.uk/] links to media from individuals and sources Custodian is useful for those records you have not had chance to fully analyse or where you are not entirely sure where they fit in the tree.
• Custodian is a useful program for anyone doing a One Name Study[www.one-name.org/‎] or a One Place Study[one-place-studies.org/‎].
• I have also upgraded to Evidentia 2 [http://evidentiasoftware.com/] and as I am keen to make use of this program to analyse my sources I need to be able to find all my sources easily.
• Finally starting later this month I will be involved with MGP Study Group 2 [http://blog.dearmyrtle.com/2013/11/call-for-panelists-dearmyrtles-mgp.html] I want to make the most of this opportunity and be ready to apply what I learn from sharing with others.

Let me tell you a bit more about how some of the feature of Family Historian have helped me with organization.

I have decide to go along the line of colour coding for the various lines of my tree which can be best illustrated by the fan chart below.

As a backup and for quick reference I have started, what some might consider a backward approach, by adopting a card index for basic family information using the same colour scheme (pink cards as no red available).

I have also used another facility available in Family Historian which is the named list.

Named lists can contain any record in the main record tabs of the program 

and notes can be added to each item in the list. The list report will show each of the notes added as illustrated below this report can be printed in various formats and allows the information to be sent to another device.

All the software programs I use have some powerful features many of which I have either not discovered or not used to any great extent. But as the volume of documents I have collected has expanded, I find that understanding what I am using,  and what features are available is becoming increasingly important. 

Do you use all the features of your software to assist your research? 

Could you benefit from understanding it better?

I attended a course on Family Historian for those with some knowledge and learnt that although I new a lot I was not an expert. If you get the chance to learn from others do so. It always helps to analyse why you are doing something and could you do things better.

A few ways in which you can learn from others from the comfort of your own home for free.

Google Hangouts or Hangouts on Air to view live, which may be available to view later on You Tube.

Genealogy Webinars see the calendar here http://blog.geneawebinars.com/

Geneablogs which you may not be aware of have a look here http://geneabloggers.com/

But you cannot beat the chance to speak to other like minded genealogists so if you can make it to a local fair, conference, jamboree or whatever they call it where you live then this will pay dividends.

Sharing and collaboration have always been part of being a family historian and even in these days of increasing online resources no one is an island. Make the most of others knowledge and above all enjoy yourself.

Next time I will discuss how I applied what I learnt at Hack Genealogy Boot Camp http://hackgenealogy.com/genealogy-groove-boot-camp-25-january-2014/