What’s the best way to see if what you’re doing is meeting the desired result?

Test it out with the people you are creating it for.

Shesita and I had the opportunity to do just that a few weeks ago. During our training at ASELSI, we used part of the time to share some of the videos we’ve been creating to make sure they are clear, understandable and meeting the desired goal. We asked for feedback on anything that wasn’t clear, any distractions, if the images and illustrations we used communicated what we intended, and other ideas and suggestions. We are thankful to have enough relationship with them all to get genuine feedback.

We knew it would be hard to sit through a little over an hour of the different videos, but they did it. As a result, we received some helpful feedback on the videos. On one the speed of the spoken words was too fast, another the subtitles weren’t readable, and one used a word that wasn’t understood. Shesita and I even caught a few things we wanted to changed that we had missed before.

Overall, though, we received great feedback. The videos were clear and understandable. They all seemed to enjoy them and said we were doing a great job.

We also discovered, to our surprise, how much more concise we’ve made some of our teachings as a result. We believe in this we have not lost any important details or information, but have keyed in on the main areas the local people we train need to know.

The chance to share this with them and receive that feedback continues to encourage us in the day-to-day work to get these done. As you’ve heard me say before, it’s not always fun and easy, but there is a joy in it when we remember why and for whom we’re doing the work.

We’re grateful for the chance to have shared with them. I think it encouraged us all.

Now, back to work. We have more videos to create.