Holy moly that was a WEEK
I started to write these a series of posts on Bluesky and figured I might as well just do it in a blog format in an attempt to get back to week noting and make a bit of sense of the blur of this week.
Sometimes, when you work on a day rate, you wonder if you've really earned it.
And other weeks you KNOW you have.
Work
With client 1 [public health], I THINK we've cleared a massive hurdle this week (if I get the formal approval on Tuesday you'll hear me screaming with joy).
This week has been mostly writing board papers to get a BIG piece of service design work signed off by the client's exec team. This will be the first of it's kind in Wales, and probably UK and I'm SO EXCITED. And it’s so incredibly impactful.
We've built some much stronger relationships with other parts of system to get here which is only ever a good thing. And this has allowed us to put together a whole system, prevention joined with treatment, approach.
I had some really nice feedback from client about the impact I'm making on this, not just the "digital" stuff but the wider leadership coaching.
Getting to spend more time with our counterparts in England working on the same area. Which also means I’m getting to work a bit with one of my favourite humans.
I’m in London next week and am really looking forward to spending Thursday with our English counterparts.
Not a quiet week for client 2 [local government] either. We pulled a big presentation together at very short notice to feed back to their SLT on some big, gnarly challenges.
Brought in to support a team to work better but you have to look at the wider conditions in which they work. I can never just stay in my lane on this stuff. Teams can’t succeed if the world around them keeps working in legacy ways.
It feels like we landed the messages well and some momentum to both work with the SLT and hopefully on a real piece of work to show the impact of working in a different way.
Really enjoying coaching style conversations with leaders atm. Finally feel confident enough in my own experience to share.
Not work
Outside of work, renovations continue. WE ARE SO CLOSE.
Downstairs floor went in this week.
New windows next week and stairs should start to go in.
Reflection
A bad thing happened on Sunday night/early hours of Monday. I can’t talk about it any more than this as there is an active police investigation.
We’re okay now, but it’s been incredibly emotionally upsetting with a minor amount of physical/personal injury. It has involved having to give statement to the police on Tuesday evening. Never a nice thing to do and you’re always nervous and unsure.
The PC working on our case apologised at one point in the interview for going so fast with things saying he had ADHD and he’d slow down.
We just looked at him and blinked, said thank you for operating at our speed. No apologies needed. But the whole mood and vibe changed when we said we were both neurodivergent too. All of us felt more comfortable and able to be more ourselves. He made sure that if this thing went to court we’d have any support and accommodation we needed.
THIS is why it’s so important that we normalise neurodivergence and are open about it. Representation matters, seeing yourself in authority figures matters, being seen by those in authority matters.