{"id":4913,"date":"2018-11-19T07:51:48","date_gmt":"2018-11-19T07:51:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/andrewdoran.uk\/blog\/?p=4913"},"modified":"2018-11-19T07:51:48","modified_gmt":"2018-11-19T07:51:48","slug":"weeknotes-4344-rallying","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/andrewdoran.uk\/blog\/2018\/11\/19\/weeknotes-4344-rallying\/","title":{"rendered":"Weeknotes #43\u201344 \u2014 Rallying"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/p>\n

The past two weeks have felt like a whirlwind. I\u2019ve felt like giving up on writing these weeknotes as they have seemed like just another rock in the sack that I\u2019m carrying around. It\u2019s a little bit chicken-and-egg: taking time to reflect on the past week (or recently, fortnight) in these notes is very useful to me and helps me focus for the week ahead, but I also have lots of things that I need to just be getting on with.<\/p>\n

Work is hectic. When I first started working in an office in the mid-1990s I would sometimes have days where 5pm felt like it would never come. I cannot imagine ever feeling like that again. I know that life speeds up when you get older but recently it has felt ridiculous, a mad scramble to do as much as I can every day. It\u2019s never felt more important to be focused on the most important work.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re rapidly heading towards December, a time in South Africa which is equivalent to August here in the UK. Most people disappear off for a summer holiday and the office is quiet. We have some big dependencies on people and processes over there. We need to make sure we get as much done as we can before December hits, otherwise things will tend to spill over into January by default. This week, things suddenly got a lot more difficult with a big reorganisation in the wider team and now we\u2019re not sure exactly who we need to talk to and what processes still apply. It\u2019s going to be more critical than ever to keep talking to everyone and make sure we\u2019re all aligned. Where we can\u2019t find a good answer on who to talk to we\u2019ll just have to keep going and broadcast what we are doing far and wide.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m feeling the pressure. We still have \u2018just enough\u2019 planning in place and I need to make sure this doesn\u2019t end up being \u2018not quite enough\u2019. My client went headlong into Scaled Agile a while ago, but we don\u2019t have time to suddenly move to a new set of agile processes across our dispersed team. I realise that many would argue that we don\u2019t have time not<\/em> to switch. I\u2019ve tried to decentralise the planning work with each of the owners of our \u2018big\u2019 milestones between now and the end of the current project, but they are not project managers and will not become highly skilled overnight. I am not sure how I can avoid taking what they have done and weaving something together in Microsoft Project so that we can manage the dependencies and focus points across the various streams. I\u2019ve started to look for a consultant infrastructure project manager who would spend time looking at the plan detail all day every day which will give me time to keep abreast of the whole programme. I\u2019m trying to do both the programme and project management roles at the moment and I\u2019m not sure it\u2019s sustainable.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve relearned that you can leave a one-to-one conversation where you have both been nodding at each other, believing you are completely aligned, only to find out later that you never were. Writing down what you agreed after the meeting is an incredibly useful and simple tool. And when the discussion relates to something that needs to be created, there is no substitute for quickly drawing an example.<\/p>\n

Since I have become a contractor, I have become much more discerning about taking time off to attend a training course. It has to be worth both the cost of the course plus<\/em> the lost revenue from a day away from a paying client. It took a bit of thought before I signed up to Mastering The Art of Public Speaking with Graham Davies<\/a><\/em>. The course caught my eye as something that could help me with having greater \u2018presence\u2019 in meetings. I\u2019m generally fine running everything from one-to-ones with senior executives to workshops and presentations in front of scores of people, but I have often felt like I am not thought of as an authoritative senior voice in the room. The course itself was excellent, particularly for something that lasts just one day, and Graham Davies did a fantastic job of bringing the whole room along with him. Ten attendees made it an intimate setting; we quickly built a rapport between us and were offering each other suggestions on what we needed to improve. I left with the impression that I have more confidence and a better delivery style than I thought, and just need to remember this.<\/p>\n

On Friday nights I always leave work with a big sense of what I need to do and then barely think about it all weekend. I\u2019m sure it\u2019s healthy to switch off but doesn\u2019t feel like it on Monday when I turn my attention to work again and it all comes flooding back.<\/p>\n

Outside work has been very busy too. On my way into work on Monday I saw an email from the People\u2019s Vote<\/a> campaign and Best For Britain<\/a> about a rally on Tuesday night. I had to sign up for the same reason that I went on the march in October \u2014 I want us to stay in the EU, I want to make sure I don\u2019t leave it up to everybody else I want to make sure that I can tell my children that I tried. The rally was great, but I did realise that the speakers were talking to a like-minded audience; it was only as good as the message that got outside of the room. Hopefully the media coverage helped the cause. None of us have any idea what will unfold over the coming days, weeks and months.<\/p>\n

School governing has been busy as usual. We had two meetings in the past two weeks and have at least three in the next fortnight. Our new Chair is doing a great job of taking up the leadership role and I’m doing what I can to support her. We need to try and find ways to get parents of younger children involved as governors and will be trying to get in front of them at various events from here on in.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been great to get together with friends, family and neighbours over the past couple of weekends. We\u2019ve just come back from a couple of nights away in Centerparcs at Woburn Forest<\/a>, which the boys loved<\/em>. It\u2019s only an hour up the road from where we live but it really did feel like a little holiday. Like any family we have a few arguments, but largely I think we really do enjoy each others\u2019 company and it was great to spend time doing things all together for a whole weekend instead of going our separate ways.<\/p>\n

My eldest boy has been suffering with a knee injury which has meant his running has been on hold. Sadly he had to miss out on round two of the Chiltern Cross-Country League<\/a>, but he came along to support his younger brother. I managed to cycle over to Milton Keynes for the event; it was lovely to get back on the bike again and know that I can still tackle 30 miles or so without any bother.<\/p>\n

After discovering Learned League on the second episode of the Hobby Horse podcast<\/a> I wanted in. Matt Haughey<\/a> was kind enough to help a strange guy on the Internet and get me signed up. After waiting patiently for the new \u2018season\u2019 to start, I\u2019m currently three days in and 19th out of 20 in my rookie league. I think the only person I\u2019m ahead of is someone who had forfeited matches. The questions are so<\/em> hard. But\u2026it is fun. I\u2019ll keep going for now.<\/p>\n

Someone mentioned to my nan that I had been getting into vinyl records which now means that I am the proud recipient of a big bag containing her collection. Digging through the records I have found lots<\/em> of signed LPs by the Strawbs<\/a> and Rick Wakeman<\/a>, who used to drink in and play at my grandparents\u2019 pub in Hounslow<\/a> in the 1960s and 1970s. There are also a few \u2018white-label\u2019 Strawbs LPs. I\u2019m not sure how rare these are, but I\u2019ve had to submit new entries to Discogs<\/a> as they didn\u2019t exist. It\u2019s going to take me some time to play my way through the collection and I\u2019m looking forward to discovering some new music.<\/p>\n

Next week:<\/strong> More of the same, and continuing to ramp things up. Racing to complete as much work as possible before November is over and done with. School governor meetings, a work reunion with a team from nearly 20 years ago, a gig and rounding out the week with Album Club<\/a>.<\/div>\n

The past two weeks have felt like a whirlwind. I\u2019ve felt like giving up on writing these weeknotes as they have seemed like just another rock in the sack that I\u2019m carrying around. It\u2019s a little bit chicken-and-egg: taking time to reflect on the past week (or recently, fortnight) in these notes is very useful […]<\/div>\n<\/a>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"webmentions_disabled_pings":false,"webmentions_disabled":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-4913","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-weeknotes","7":"h-entry","9":"hentry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11459,"url":"https:\/\/andrewdoran.uk\/blog\/2024\/12\/24\/weeknotes-304-pottering\/","url_meta":{"origin":4913,"position":0},"title":"Weeknotes #304 \u2014 Pottering","author":"Andrew Doran","date":"24 December 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"A week off work, largely spent pottering around at home. 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