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Weeknotes #172 — Isle of Wight

A very busy week on all fronts. There is a lot going on at work as well as in my school governor life. My weekend was completely packed, going to see Magdalena Bay on Friday night and then getting away early on Saturday for two days of cycling. I’m going to have to pick another weekend to catch up with some sleep.

A week in which I:

  • Met with our technology vendor for our upcoming conference at the end of June. The technical requirements are reducing as we go, giving us less things to focus on.
  • Agreed the details for our digital signage setup for the conference.
  • Followed up with our vendor on the completion documents for our final Teams telephony migrations.
  • Took part in the status review for our client dashboard development initiative.
  • Created a presentation called Don’t Get Hacked, covering data breaches, password managers, multi-factor authentication apps, basic smartphone settings and virtual private networks. Since the presentation, a few of my colleagues have told me that they have changed passwords and/or purchased password managers so I am calling this a success.
  • Agreed the technical specification for an upgrade to a door access system in one of our offices. I hate doing rework, but it looks as though the specifications given to us were wrong the first time around. I’m glad we didn’t find out even later in the process.
  • Finalised the purchase orders for the new digital signage solution to be installed in two of our offices.
  • Was given a lead for my Agile Coach / Product Manager vacancy and set up an initial meeting with the prospective candidate for next week.
  • Attended training on a new Gifts and Entertainment system.
  • Joined the first part of the Teams Fireside Chat.
  • Spent a morning at school reviewing the technical infrastructure and making notes on things that we need to implement over the next few years.
  • Chaired a school governor meeting. Governance Services at Herts for Learning were as superb as ever in helping me to prepare for the session.
  • Had some real struggles on the bike. Noting how strong I felt last week seemed to be the kiss of death. Twice this week I started a turbo trainer session only to find that I was unable to complete it, spinning out the rest of the session at low power. It’s really difficult to identify the point at which you give up, having resolved only seconds before that you will keep going. My poor performance came back again at the weekend when we did our ride around the Isle of Wight. I could only keep up with my usual group for the first part of the ride. It then felt as though I couldn’t get enough air into my lungs; I had developed a cough which meant my chest was quite painful. Even walking to and from the office has left me a bit out of breath. I’ve tested myself for COVID-19 and it has come back negative, so maybe it’s just another minor bug that I’ve picked up somewhere.
  • Despite it feeling tough, enjoyed a wonderful weekend of cycling around Winchester and the Isle of Wight with a brilliant group of Berkhamsted Cycling Club members. We spent Saturday evening at The Ship Anson pub where it happened to be karaoke night. It was so much fun to be on a proper night out again after having been away for so long.

  • Watched the Conservative Party’s vote of confidence (which I couldn’t help referring to as a “vote of no confidence”) in the Prime Minister. I have my fingers crossed that this is the beginning of the end for the tenure of both him and his party.

Next week: Starting the week on the back foot from having been away all weekend, trying to catch up.

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