Creating Your Portfolio

This section of the help pages is to help you with creating or accessing your account. It includes information on:

• The My Portfolio Page
• Snap Shot
• Basic Information
• Education
• Credentials
• Experience
• Professional Development
• Videos
• Portfolio Visibility

The My Portfolio Page

When you have signed in to your account, you will be taken to the edit page where you can build or edit your portfolio. But before we discuss that let's start at the top.

A new button will appear on the main menu bar labeled "My Portfolio". This button will take you to the portfolio page where you can view and edit your portfolio.

When you first enter this page, it will be in preview mode, which will show you how others will see your portfolio. If you don't want others to see your portfolio yet, which is probably a smart idea while you are still developing it, you can hide the portfolio. Just skip down to the bottom of this page to the Portfolio Visibility section and follow those directions. We promise not to change any directions up here while you are gone.

If you are just getting started, there isn't much on this page. But as you work on creating your portfolio, you can come back here an look at it to see what people viewing it will see.

Here is the initial starting page of our fictitious ASL master, Sam Pelacount.

All we have so far is a location, nothing else. So we need to add some things.

The Edit Menu

So let us start by looking at the edit menu on the left. It has six links, one of which will be the current page.

The links are as follows:

View Public Portfolio

This is the page we are currently at. It allows you to see how others will see your portfolio.

Edit Your Portfolio

This is the place where you add things to and manage your portfolio.

Portfolio Visibility

This is where you specify whether others can see your portfolio or not.

Resumes

This is where you can create resumes to send out to potential employers.

Sent Resumes

This is where you can track the resumes you have sent out.

Account Settings

This is where you can change your account settings. Currently this only includes changing your password and deleting your account.

There is also a progress bar at the bottom which we can ignore for now. It is just to help you to build a robust and comprehensive portfolio. You can actually add as little or as much information as you like, though the more information you add, the better people are able to assess your skills.

So let's click on the Edit Your Portfolio link. That should change the contents of the page so that the body of the page now looks like this:

This page is the Snap Shot page and contains an overview of your portfolio. It is similar to the version others will see, but also contains links to edit the content. Again, there is not much here because we have yet to start putting information in.

Let's click on the Basic Info tab and start adding some information.

Basic Information

The Basic Information page is the place to start entering information about yourself. It contains all your basic contact information as well as information on what type of portfolio this is.

You can also change some of the information you entered on your account page here, such as your address and e-mail address.

At the top of the form is a field where you can specify your portfolio type. The portfolio manager currently handles four types of portfolios:

• Interpreter
• Mentor
• Interpreter Education Program
• Agency

Pick the one that applies to you.

When filling out the address fields, if you have multiple addresses you can add them here. This might be useful, for instance, if you are an agency with multiple offices.

If you want to get rid of addresses, each address except the primary address will have a "delete" check box appear beneath it after you have saved this page. You must have at least one address, so you cannot delete the primary address.

After the address information you have a place to put your phone number and e-mail address. These should already be filled in from the account setup, but you can change them here.

The VP number / IP address field is for video phones. They should either have a phone number or a dedicated IP address by which they can be contacted. The IP address is for video phones that run as a computer application instead of through the phone lines. If you have a VP number but need help acquiring these to share, please seek additional assistance.

Once you have filled out your contact information at the top of the form, there are two important fields to fill out.

One is a list of specialties. If you do not specialize, you don't have to worry about it, but specializations help potential employers to determine how well you would fit their needs.

The other is the personal statement. It is a place to describe yourself and your needs in a way that a simple listing of credentials and prior experience may fail to do. It helps potential employers to form a better sense of who you are and what you can do. It is perhaps the one part of this process that requires the most thought. A well thought out personal statement shows people that you put some effort into presenting yourself. Don't be afraid to revisit and rethink it frequently.

Adding a Photo

At the bottom of the Basic Info page is a button to upload an image for your profile.

The file can be a JPEG, PNG, or GIF image. These images usually have a .jpg, .png, or .gif suffix, respectively. The file size limit is 5Mb, which is about the size of an image from an everyday digital camera set to its default settings.

The image will be reduced for presentation on the site so that its largest dimension is not more than 178 pixels. A thumbnail for the portfolio directory will also be made that is 70 pixels square.

Once you upload the file, the file name will be listed next to the button. for large images, this may take a few minutes, especially since the server has to both upload the image and convert it to its display size.

You must hit save at the bottom of the page for the image to be added to the portfolio.

Once the image has been saved it will display on this page and on the Snap Shot page.

If you select a new image it will replace the old one. If you want to delete the image, there is a check box under the image on this page to delete it. Check the box and Save this page again.

You may need to do a little work to find a photo that looks right both when it is sized down and when the edges are trimmed for the 70 pixel thumbnail version. Otherwise you may find yourself missing a chin or an ear.

Before we move on, let's see what we have so far.

Education

The next tab is Education.

Unlike the Basic Info page, the education page starts blank, with nothing but a single link. This can be a little intimidating, but don't let its blankness get to you. It, and all the pages under the rest of the tabs for building your portfolio don't have any content because you haven't given them any.

They also won't show up in your public portfolio unless they have content. If you click your View Pubic Portfolio link you will see there are no other tabs yet except the Snap Shot.

So on the Education page, click the [Add a Degree] link. You should get a form like below.

The Institution drop down menu has a fair number of schools listed. If your school is not among those listed, the last item in the menu is "Other" allowing you to fill in the information for your school manually. This will alter the form to include name, address and contact information for the school.

Education should be reserved for listing degree work from schools and certain professional programs. Certification programs should be put under Credentials, which can be found under the Basic Info tab. There is also a Professional Development tab for workshops and seminars you have attended or participated in.

Let's fill out this form and click save.

After you have saved your educational information, you can add another school by clicking [Add a Degree] again.

Select the 'Show In Portfolio' box to make sure that this information is displayed when you make your profile public.

Do NOT click the [Add a Degree] link a second time without saving the form. Doing so with clear the form and the data you have entered in. This is true of all these pages.

Credentials

Credentials work the same way as Education, though the form is shorter. It is for listing certifications and licenses you have pertinent to this portfolio.

Select the 'Display In Portfolio' box to make sure that this information is displayed when you make your profile public.

Experience

The Experience page also starts out blank, but pops up a detailed form when you click on the [Add Experience] link.

Unless you are fresh out of college, you should have some things to list here. They can be volunteer work as well as paid work. If you need to acquire some work experience, see if there are people in your social circles (churches, temples, social clubs, etc.) who could benefit from your skills to better participate in organized activities.

So click on the [Add Experience] link and add some past experience. Remember that after you save, you can click the [Add Experience] link to add more past experiences.

Do NOT click the [Add Experience] link a second time without saving the form. Doing so will clear the form and the data you have entered in. This is true of all these pages.

Professional Development

Professional development is the place to add information on conferences, seminars, and workshops you have attended or participated in.

Now that we've added information to some of these pages, let's see what our snapshot looks like. Here is what Sam Pelacount's portfolio looks like so far when we click on the "View Public Portfolio" link.

I had added some education information and credentials for Sam, so those two items appear on the snapshot. The "More ... " links take you to the same place as the tabs that have appeared across the top, the pages that contain the relevant information. In this case, Education and Credentials.

Some of you who are paying close attention might say: "Wait! Where did Sam's name go? Wasn't it at the top of the page before?" It still is. His name, and yours, will be to the left over the menu. But the menu got cut off in the screen shot in order to fit the image into these help pages.

Videos

As with other tabs, the Videos tab starts you off with an empty page that has an [Add A Video] link on it.

Clicking this will open up the menu for adding a new video. You can have more than one video, so even after you have added a video, this link will remain.

On the left the page asks for a title, date of creation, and a short description. Providing these makes it much easier for others to understand the nature of the videos. On the right is a field where you can browse your computer for the video you want to upload as well as indicate whether you want it visible in your profile or not. You have the option of not displaying a video you have uploaded, and the default is to not display. So remember to check this box if you want the video to display.

A quick hint for making movies easy to find on your computer ... move them to your desktop before trying to upload them.

The system should accept most any modern video format that is used by modern video cameras. You should probably try to keep movies below 100Mb as well. Depending on the speed of your connection, plan on it taking at least a minute for every 10Mb loaded up. In other words, once you have submitted the video for uploading by clicking on the Upload button, it might be time for a glass of water, or coffee, or whatever.

Uploading the video will cause it to be copied to the server, reformatted to the right size, and converted to play in the built-in viewer the Web site uses. Some video formats may be a little scrunched or compressed as a result.

Once it is done (again, this could be a while), you will be returned to the Videos page with your video title and a play icon shown on the page. While you are in the editing menus, the video title will have an [Edit] link next to it where you can change the video information, hide it or make it visible on your profile, or delete the video entirely. Additional videos will appear each under the other.

This site does not have a way to sort the video order, so if you want them in a specific order, you will need to load them in that order. If you want to rearrange the order, you will have to delete and reload some of them.

Portfolio Visibility

The menu item below the Edit Your Portfolio link is the Portfolio Visibility link.

This page allows you to set whether or not people can see your portfolio.

It has three settings:

Hide Portfolio

Don't show the portfolio online. This is useful while you are still putting together the portfolio, or have found long-term full-time employment that precludes your seeking other work.

Show Partial Portfolio

Show your name and work experience, but not your contact information.

Show Full Portfolio

Show all information from your portfolio, including contact information.

Note that the default is to have the portfolio be visible. So if you don't want it to be seen while you are developing it, make sure to hide it here first, edit it, then make it visible again. Especially remember to make it visible again.

Since Sam Pelacount is only here to help demonstrate how the Web site works, his account is set to hidden, but if people could see it, it would look like this: