HUD's Web Management Operating Procedures

Appendix H: Conducting Staff Training

Training staff to use the web - and HUD's websites - is one of the most important activities of Web Managers and Web Coordinators. Following is an outline that might help you conduct training for your staff.

Introduction and Overview

• Introductions - introduce yourself and all the participants. Don't assume they know one another.
• Tell them what you're going to do. Run through your outline so they'll know what to expect.
• Tell them why they need to know
  • To do their jobs better
  • To help customers better
• Background - Give them a little background on HUD's websites: HUD's Homes and Communities Website (www.hud.gov), HUD's Homes and Communities Website in Spanish (espanol.hud.gov), HUD's archives website (archives.hud.gov), and hud@work, our intranet (hudatwork.hud.gov). Explain the target audiences for each:
  • Homes and Communities: for citizens and partners
  • espanol.hud.gov: for Spanish-speaking citizens and partners
  • archives: historical documents (speeches, testimony, management plans, reports, obsolete program information) for researchers, historians, students, administrations who want to see what has been done before them
  • hud@work: HUD employees only
• Provide some basic statistics
• Provide a brief overview of current plans (see the State of the Web at: )

HUD's Internet Website: www.hud.gov

• Give them a brief tour of the website
  • Refer to "How to Use This Website"
• Show them how to navigate by topics, by audiences, by state
  • Explain that our audiences can get to the same information by topic or audience - it just depends on how they think about the information
  • Show them a state page and explain that the state pages are consistent across the country, so that all citizens and partners get the same high-quality information no matter where they live
  • State pages provide the bridge from generic national information to local information on our partners websites
  • State pages provide "inherently local" information to supplement the generic or national information on Headquarters pages
• Show them the site index and search page - http://www.hud.gov/assist/siteindex.cfm
• Point out our "killer content" - "Let HUD Help You" - those are the most important services we provide through the website...some of the major ways we use the web to achieve HUD's mission
  • Show them how you can search for a subsidized apartment
  • Show them how you can put in your name and find out if you are owed an FHA refund
• Show them the "quick links" - those are links to the most requested information on the website
• Show them the "highlights" section - that's where news releases and current "message" information is located
• Point out the About HUD page
  • Mission
  • Organization
  • Principal Staff
  • Links to all offices
  • Phone book
• Point out "Contact Us"
  • Show them the email policy
• Point out "Common Questions"
• Tell them about mailing lists - http://www.hud.gov/subscribe/
• Tell them about the shortcuts or "aliases" - the short URLS that they can give out to customers to get them to the most-used information on the website http://hudatwork.hud.gov/po/odoc/webinc/aliases.cfm
• Tell them about webcasts - http://www.hud.gov/webcasts/
• Show them the page(s) for their office (either HQ office page or state page)
• Take questions

hud@work

• Explain that we spent more than a year redesigning hud@work (in 2004-2005) to make it do what employees told us they wanted: less content, simpler content
• Show them the basic navigation
  • Drop-down menus
  • The topic box for their own office or region
  • A-Z directory
  • Show them how the topic box changes when they go to another content area, but they always can get back to their own topic box by clicking "home" or by clicking their office name in the drop-down menu
  • Point out the photos of HUD staff in the masthead - invite them to submit photos from their own offices
• Show them how to customize
• Show them how to use the locator to find people in an organization
• Take questions

Archives.hud.gov

• Explain that this website is actually a separate website, where older obsolete web content is moved to keep it available to the public, while at the same time we won't have to maintain it.

Tips and Tricks

• Show them how to set their printer margins so they can print the entire page
• Show them how to get the text version, to make printing easier
• Show them the "photo gallery" on one of the state pages, and tell them how they can submit photos of their own, showcasing good things that are going on as a result of HUD's programs
• Ask them to share any tips and tricks that they've learned to use, on HUD's websites
• Take questions

Thank them for coming, and ask them to spread the word about HUD's websites.