Author Archives: SDA Seattle

I am a Project Manager . . . now what?

A golden oldie excerpt from an SDA member’s white paper published in 2012.

I’ve just been made a project manager.  But now what do I do?

The first thing is to understand the key components of project management: Continue reading →

Take this quiz–you might be surprised at your leadership style

Managing Up

Great presentation by Pam Gibbons, of Gibbons HR. She presented Managing Up Through Effective Communication. According to Pam, at the end of the day, it’s not what you say, it’s how you say it. And knowing your communication style, as well as others, will help you be a more effective communicator. Would you like a copy of the self-assessment Pam shared with us?  Continue reading →

Raster? Vector? Say what?

If your repro firm asks you for a raster file, will you know what to send? What if the printer asks you for a vector file?

Leave it to Matt Virkler (knowledge manager at DLR Group) to tell you what you need to know. He presented a webinar for us on the types and uses of imagery.

  • If your printer asks you for a raster file, send over a tiff, jpeg, or bmp file.
  • If your printer asks you for a vector file, send over an ai, svg, or eps file.

SDA member Penny Nelson liked Matt’s “ability to switch into a web browser to show us how to search for images.” Member Lois Diemert said, “Matt’s presentation was exactly the information I was looking for to better understand the basics of working with images.”

Great presentation, Matt; thanks!

March Membership Madness – get the freebie!

Marshmallow Towers

Who knew learning about design charrettes could be so much fun? Presenters Lucas Branham and Pepe Izquierdo, architects with Studio Meng Strazzara, walked us through a hands-on charrette at our February 19 business practice dinner. We broke into teams, trying to design and build the tallest marshmallow structure using only 20 strands of spaghetti, one marshmallow, a length of masking tape, and an even shorter piece of string.

In Round 1, Continue reading →

What’s your firm’s risk if your employees drive personal vehicles on company time?

What’s the risk to your firm when your employees drive their personal vehicles for job-related duties? National SDA hosted a webinar presented by Daniel Brown and Oscar Goedecke of Travelers Indemnity Company. They offered risk management strategies: Continue reading →

Tangible Property Regulations

We had an excellent business practice presentation by Joshua Cohen of Bader Martin, speaking on the topic of the new regulations for tangible property. He left us with three take-aways for filing 2014 taxes:

  1. File Form 3115 to your return
  2. The Annual elections you have to file
  3. Retroactivity – look at prior assets

Are you in tune with yourself?