Feedback on blogging

Here is the comment: The blog is interesting. But I don't feel I have time to read it... maybe I should make time? but in that case what to stop doing? and what if I also wanted to find time for a blog of my own? and what if all my colleagues were also writing interesting blogs? Are you reading lots of other blogs as well as writing your own? who is the target audience? what is / should be the balance between work and more personal stuff in there? do you have time to write an annual report as well?!

And here is the response: I guess this blog is an opportunity to communicate thoughts, ideas and generate a potential debate about issues that are mainly work related. There are only a few people reading but others say you need to gain some momentum and promote it to get to a tipping point where others actively chip in. If others want to do the same that seems like a good idea to me (please do - it's quite easy actually and doesn't take more than 5-10 minutes a day - happy to show anyone thow to get started). I am regularly reading a few other blogs within a "friendship" group but suspect there are few people currently doing this actively within the work context - although many students and others in a more social context. The target audience is simply people that know me or might possibly be interested in something that me or others might say. I think there should be some personal stuff in the mix - one of the things that I learned during recent 360 degree feedback and LSI inventories is that the separation of work and personal life is not necessarily a good thing and if it helps others to know something about you, your interests, family, experiences then that is overall a good thing to do. Whether you have time to write an annual report is a good question. I think that question could mean that if you have time to do blogs and other stuff like that then either you have too much time on your hands or you could be doing something more constructive instead. The other way to look at it, is that writing these jottings is sometimes done at work and sometimes on the move and more often than not at home out of hours so because I don't work a 9-5 existence I suppose that this is something that I principally choose to do in my own time. That's why I was wondering whether it was worth it and I think I'll persevere a little more (thanks to the four people who said yes it's down to you!)

Recycling and being green

Presentation by Ben this morning at LSS Board to tell us why the waste paper desk bins are being taken away. In Richmond Building (where I currently live) rather than JBP Building (where some others live) this has happened already. So the main focus was on how to communicate what is happening and why it is happening to the staff and students that will be affected. It is being promoted in three ways: reputation (e.g. league tables on green-ness), environment and saving money - those were the order of the slides........
Of course, Ben pointed out it's even better not to recycle at all - prevention of waste in the first place. A good example of that might be something mentioned a few weeks ago at Gartner - "de-materialise" - we used to have CDs but now we download MP3 files. It's a bit of a clumsy term so maybe someone has seen a better word or phrase. One small way in which IT could help is establishing a freecycle presence so will look into how that is coming along.

Is the grass greener at Warwick University?

Just a few thoughts after a long day including plenty of travelling to Warwick University and back - how can 300 miles take 8 hours in a car round trip? The M1 is a disaster zone. Anyway a good tour of the campus including SU, University House, Learning Grid etc - today was first year results day at 3pm with all the results issued at the same time by the central "hub" equivalent and then posted by departments - very carefully choreographed it seemed as we were in the Humanities Department at the time. Also a degree ceremony and the Arts Festival week celebrating the last week of the session. Last year, the English Lit course had over 1400 applications for 100 places in the first year and not only shortlists (round one) but then interviews (round two) every potential applicant. Must be nice to be a selecting versus recruiting University. Had a very interesting meeting with the new IT Director who has been in post for 3 months. The priorities sound quite familiar including writing a five year strategy/plan. The first eighteen months will focus on customer service (not technology), more robust infrastructure (network and email), getting a new management structure including co-location of staff sorted out, and finally building process review (and 6 sigma!) into the department and into the broader University culture. Key objective of new corporate plan for Warwick is doubling research in five years to break into top 50 worldwide Universities. A couple of nuggets about gartner and research made the trip worthwhile of their own accord. Always good to get out and see whether the grass is greener on the other side.

Warwick University thumbs up

I'm visiting Warwick tommorow for a couple of reasons - they are in process of refurbing the student union building, they have a new IT Director in post, I'm interested in what happened to the e-strategy five years on, and also hoping to make linkages with the UCISA and Annual Conference Committee. I suppose it could be called a "benchmarking visit". Last visit to Wariwk a couple of years ago we took a tour of the Learning Grid and SU building pre facelift and discusse the IT systems they use for Student Union activity (very extensive/impressive) - will hopefully get some up to date photos too. It is also the first tour of the Summer for potential applicants and Megan is going to tour the campus and visit the Humanities Building as she is interested in English Lit and Film Studies. The Warwick web site was easy to use to find out tour information and I also got into touch with the SU to discover it is the last week of term so lots of social activity going on in the plaza as it's Arts Festival week and also finalists get their results TODAY. COuld be a lot of hangovers on campus tommorrow one way or another. The enquiries and admissions people were very friendly and helpful and made a positive impression. I hope that Bradford does the same when potential enquirers call.

Surveying readers

So after about 6 weeks or so of doing this blog thing begining to wonder if this is a worthwhile spare time occupation or not. Very little feedback and/or comments which either means no-one is reading in first place or possibly posts are incredibly boring and uninteresting and/or both of the above. Therefore added a quick survey button to see if there's anyone out there. Please also feel free to add a comment or email me direct. If there's none I'll pack up in the virtual world it was an interesting experiment in communication for me at least and I've learnt quite a bit about how some of this stuff works.

Boundarylessness and LIW

From a recent discussion with Andy Walmsley, who used to work at GE, and introduced me to the workout concept. It has a bearing on LIW mentioned earlier.

In conjunction with Workout, Jack Welch introduced the concept of “Boundarylessness” whilst reorganising GE in the 1980s. It’s a cumbersome word but it became part of the GE core values as the organisation adapted itself to a changing business environment during the 80s and the 90s. Over time, many other organisations adopted a lot of GE’s management and communications practices after seeing how successful they were. Boundarylessness involved a fundamental change in the way that communication was carried out at all levels in GE. A very interesting (and also pleasingly succinct) paper on the subject can be found here.

This seems to relate to the U.S. Army adopting GE-style management practices (therefore, dare I say that such practices can work in a public sector organisation).

Location Independent Working

There is currently a JISC institutional exemplar about Location Independent Working which is running in the Business School at Coventry University. Its web site now has some of the materials they are using which were recommended by someone who had seen a recent presentation so I thought it was worth a look.

The key benefits appear to be related to changes to teaching methods and cross discipline projects resulting from hot desking. Obviously not all academics need a permanent office (they need at least two!) but does the same apply to support staff in the broadest sense? And as we are about to refurbish a building and potentially create new office space should there be a rather more radical approach for the staff in parts of Learner Support Services? I find myself doing LIW quite a bit - in the evenings and weekends at home, on the train when travelling about, on the smartphone, in meeting rooms on the campus etc. sometimes I come in a little later and work for a bit before setting off due to childcare and quite often I stay later too.