A hard year

Yet again it has been a month since I last posted, so I'm only doing about a quarter of the writing I'm aiming for. Well, the reasons for it are plain enough. Clearly 2014 is shaping up to be a bit of a hard slog.


I'm not afraid of hard work, and goodness knows it's all in a good cause. I just hope the expectation - that this year of hard work will mean less work next year, and the year after... - is a reasonably achievable one.


Yet again this is mostly my own fault. I have chosen to work with a couple of charities, and as in particular I'm on the fund raising committee for one of them I am doing a lot of leg-work in that area. It's enjoyable and I'm learning (and developing) a lot. But it's amazing how easy it is to fall behind with the reading and keeping the momentum going on projects. For example, to help with fundraising bids in the future I'm leading on developing and rolling out a research project on how effective the charity has been helping its clients. I love being able to capitalise on the skills I learned doing my research degree, but it's not a small thing to do.


Also work-work is busy. I'm in the middle of running elections to our Board and have just delivered a project for my employer, which is as many of you know a NHS body, to become an "accredited safe haven". What that actually means is complex but it required achieving 100% against a framework requiring some 200 pieces of evidence. I was highly doubtful we had the capability to achieve this, and was playing a political game of managing expectations for some time, but no - we did it!


Now that the organisation has been around for a year and things are ticking over it will be interesting to see how the workload goes. I spent a lot of time trying to get the culture and ethics right and I've succeeded in the sense that people are thinking of the things I want them to think about when investing in healthcare services (e.g. the patient!) but in a sense it is a pyrrhic victory in that I have to be a lot more involved in every piece of work. On the plus side I have the extraordinary privilege of  working directly with patients and front line staff so I have the opportunity of subtly shifting the culture I my local area so everyone shapes and hears the same message at the same time.  


Outside of this I'm starting to look for my next career move. For the first time it's as much about the money as anything else. A bigger pay-cheque helps smooth the way for our long-advertised house buy toward the end of this year. Until then it's hard work, hard job hunting and hard saving; early half of what I take home now is put aside for that time.


Next week we are on a holiday with some friends - a canal boat in Oxfordshire and the midlands for a week. It will be nice to have the break before plunging back into the thick of it.


Here's to 2014.

Can't see the Wood for the Trees

Sometimes things go well and there is a prolonged stretch of smooth running in life. Plain sailing, blue skies. Other times a whole heap of crap lands at once - family worries, stress at work. Naturally when things take a turn for the rougher the universe piles it on... there is always room for one more woe...


And then there is Redwood Estates. Redwood are the estate agents who manage the building Husband and I live in; and are letting agents for the apartment we live in in particular.


For the better part of four years we have tolerated with good natured resignation their utter disdain for us and our building. The first winter we were here we were left for three weeks without heating as the boulder broke down. The same thing happened the next winter too. Because they unaccountable never had a key for the property I or Husband have taken the day off work whenever they demanded - never asked, demanded - to do all manner of things. Put in a new letter box for no reason, for example.


Year on year the rent has gone up by 10% or more; and we've had to pay spurious admin charges for the privilege of renewing the lease. Recently we've got into the practice of leaving a set of keys with them for them to use if they need to get in - we have no objection after all, so long as we have enough notice to get the dead prostitutes out of the bath and generally have a bit of a clean. We have suggested on more than one occasion that perhaps they ought to get a spare made for them to use? They have countered with the suggestion we go and get one made for them *sigh*


Well things have certainly come to a head now. Redwood, in their endless pursuit of avarice, suggested to the landlord that now would be a good time to get a valuation (cue selling our home out from under us - but we're only tenants after all). So they ring me, and all is well because finally having had a key made they can come in and do it right?


No, no, no. Thursday I get an email from them reading they tried to get into the property but the key didn't work. Could I maybe take some time off to let them in??


OK.... so, typically missing a couple of key points there. Firstly, not the day we agreed. So amazingly not the date we agreed they were in different MONTHS. Secondly, so what has happened with this key they had made? Ah, well apparently the key is fine there must be a problem with the lock. No, I counter, the lock is and has always worked. No, I haven't changed the lock. Looks like maybe Redwood have mixed up some keys?


I think I would have been better off saying something about their mothers. Cue a stream of emails that quickly cross the border into harassment territory. Heaven forefend anyone might write "sorry about the mix up of the dates. We promise we'll manage keys better in future." Instead, why not have three employees play some kind of one-upmanship tag team in an effort to... well, I'm not sure what would be a win for them.


In the end I lost patience and told them from now on they need to do what I have always taken a point of pride in doing - comply with the lease. Which, by the way, means keeping the flat secure and given written notice of a wish to enter the property; things a letting agent might be expected to manage given enough tries.


Well, this is a rant and a half but this is also about my home and my family and Redwood, you treat your tenants like crap while expecting them to bend over backwards for you. You seem unable to do basic things like look at a calendar or manage a set of keys, and it's not for me to manage your incompetence. As for me - four years of this crap: I need to be quicker on the uptake.


As for you - avoid at all costs.

Her

A little while ago husband and I went to see ‘Her’; a film starring Joachim Phoenix and set in the nearish future. I have to write I was blown away by what was one of the best films I have ever seen.

So, spoiler alert…

The film was incredibly well made, acted and directed and (assuming the world is still here) deserves to win some Oscars. I was really struck by the portrayal of a world where technology had eroded intimacy and people were really only interested in themselves. It was very clever how Joachim’s character was employed at an internet firm that writes letters (love letters, congratulation letters etc) on behalf of other people, for example, and how whenever he turns to a human friend for support they always steer the conversation toward themselves.

I also liked how the happier the lead character was the less technology appeared in a setting. Holidaying in a rustic shack. A picnic with friends. When first with his now-ex wife they lived in an old Victorian or early 20^th century house. When sad or lonely his is in very futuristic settings, and grappling with technology – losing at a computer game for example. That was a really nice touch.

As an exploration of intimacy and the impact technology may have on it; how we may get increasingly lonely in ever larger crowds, it was very powerful. People have their jobs, and their homes; computer games, and shopping. They go out, dinner, the beach. They just don’t have each other.

One of the most amusing parts of the film were how, in his loneliness, the lead tried to explore physical intimacy. I have to write it rather reminded me of the wonderful world of online cruising. Inappropriate forwardness from virtual strangers. Going out for a random hook-up with someone who turned out to have a weird fetish; or how a relatively casual meeting reveals a hunger for emotional intimacy that dooms any chance of a relationship before it has even begun. I saw a lot of that in my single days. If straight people are heading that way it might not be too healthy…

It is only sci-fi. Art holds a mirror up to life though!

Scarlet Johansen played the artificial intelligence Joachim’s character eventually find refuge with and as a clever twist she is more than capable of meeting his every emotional need one human is far too little for her and by the end of it he is left behind, able only to get his needs met from other people.  

Yes, it is a great film. A fascinating premise, well executed and though provoking as much as it is amusing and awkward. It deserves recognition.

Governance

As I have mentioned I work in governance in healthcare. This is a real challenge, but very worthwhile work (most of the time).
 

Governance is critically important to leadership and is hugely difficult to get right. All of the scandals we have seen like Mid Staffordshire Hospital (where, put simply, a lot of patients died unnecessarily because the hospital was poorly run and the leadership refused to acknowledge concerns) can be explained in terms of bad governance.

 

How good governance can be applied is poorly understood. Governance is not a tool in an arsenal of weapons that you can apply to this situation or that; and it is not a stage in a process. It is in many ways more a state of mind - it should pervade the culture of an organisation and inform any activity or decision.

 

I'll bet your bosses are very careful to keep good records or make a note of something when things look a bit dodgy, or they apply very high standards of behaviour when things have gone wrong and a situation needs rescuing. I'll also bet conversely when things are going well, or seem to be going well, they are very lackadaisical and almost laissez-faire in their approach.

 

That’s not really good governance; they should be consistent behaving in a way that means things are less likely to go wrong, and if they do very little special effort needs to be made to put things right. Part of this helping people take responsibility and crucially are empowered to take actions. Too many projects, especially in the public sector, devolve into politicking where so long as no-one can be blamed, and no-one's sense of entitlement is offended, it will be OK.

 

That's tough to deliver, especially from the ground up. I strongly insist with my employers that my role is NOT to do bits of other people's jobs they don't want to do; or to charge in to rescue people when things go wrong.

 

That isn't enough of course. There is still that traditional approach of governance being a basket of unloved virtue and you are expected to be the keeper of those virtues in order to let people get on with important stuff; and you get let out of your box when they need you - particularly when things get difficult. That's especially important because of that sense of entitlement.

 

Let me illustrate:

 

Project Manager: "I need access to patient data to do finish this well-advanced project"

Governance lead: "Sorry, but without a clear legal basis for having it I can't give it to you"
Project Manager: "But without it my project will fail"
Governance lead: "I can help you work out what you need and the best legal route for getting enough information to help you deliver your project even if the scope needs to change a bit"
Project Manager: "Oh that would be great, thanks"
 

All reasonable. Except the two parties now have two different understandings. The Governance Lead thinks the Project Manager will work within a system of information governance to manage his project properly. The Project Manager thinks the Governance Lead will make it OK to have what he wants. Uh oh.

 

What should have happened is the Project Manager should have talked to the Governance Lead when he was starting his project. It’s the job of the Governance Lead to make that happen – automatically if possible – but ideally without putting bureaucratic chains around getting things done. 
 

Tough job. I’ll let you know when I start getting it right!

Wet February, sunny October

I know we’re not that far into the year, so the Christmas break should still feel relatively recent, but the truth is I really feel like a holiday.

Husband and I and haven’t really done big holidays over the last five years. Christmas is (his) family, which can sometimes be a chore. If we go abroad we usually need to consider visiting my family. We’ve been to Paris a couple of times and we’ve had our lovely honeymoon in August just gone.

The last time I went abroad for the sake of it was with my ex, but that was right at the start of our relationship and it turned out he was embarking on an affair with me behind his proper boyfriend’s back (it’s complicated – he said they were finished, then that they were in an open relationship, etc – strung me along for a while. I was fine with it and wasn’t monogamous when with him either but that was then).

So…. Well, it occurred to me that Husband and I should bite the bullet and have a nice holiday somewhere sunny this year. Admittedly, late this year but still. Hire a villa, hire a car, and here we come sunny Corfu. In October. YESSSSSS!!! 

There are lots of reasons why not: we’re looking to buy a house so need to save every penny for deposit and the horrendous costs involved. I loath flying to a degree difficult to comprehend. We’ve never gone in for lazing around in the sun. 

Nevertheless, I was really taken with the idea and I think we deserve it. We work hard and between the saving for our civil partnership, and the saving for the much talked about house-buy we’ve not gone for extravagance much. Plus Husband really loathes his job so anything that helps keep us both sane will be good.

We already have a short break in April with friends, on a canal boat of all things. It will be great fun but again it’s not the same as the two of us on a break of our own.

Another things is this holiday is a good excuse to continue on my diet! I want to enjoy that infinity pool stark bollock naked and I wouldn't do that in my current frumpiness! Since the end of Dry January I have put on a little weight but in January I lost 8 lbs so I think wet February is going to have to become damp at best - all in a good cause.