Weeknote 15
How did we end up at Friday, I’m sure yesterday was only Tuesday. It’s been a rather intense week.
Dai has been away for the week on a business trip. So it’s just been me and the dog for the most part. Hugely grateful to my in-laws for taking Dilys for an overnight so that I could travel to London for an all day workshop. Rather over being on my own now though and am looking forward to tomorrow and Dai returning home. Though my mind is being taken off of it all by V visiting tonight. So many years working together at CDPS and we’re only finally just meeting IRL.
I missed a call with the architect to progress the house, but Dai was able to cover and it looks like we are making slow if steady progress towards starting. Working on very detailed costs and plans for the feature spiral stairs now.
I think I’ve also officially hit 3 months in the role. And really feeling that I know what I’m doing and can pick up and run with things now. Feeling strong and centred this week.
What I’ve been doing
This week has been a lot of zooming up and down.
Time with the team and making sure they have what they need to get into the work. Friday reflection from the team is that we’re doing okay - in the usual state of ambiguity and whaaaaaaat that you are in the set up phase of a new piece of work.
Time with A and L to make sure we’re aligned on where we’re going with the strategic backlog for the programme. L is doing some lovely work here, including on narrative. Some structure and foundations emerging.
Time with the delivery and policy teams to kick off this next phase of work. Really good, open and honest discussions to start to align ourselves around some very key things. We have agreement on no-big bangs, little and often and working on things with value.
Time with the TPX Planning Reform senior team to deep dive and plan strategy. I really do work with some bloody clever people. And they really have accomplished so much.
Time with our Heads of practice to discuss how we can work together best.
Time with A, the new civil servant who will take on responsibly for Create or update a local plan.
Time with policy folk to get to know each other and start to build a deeper level of trust as we move into delivery and need to work much closer together than ever before.
Time with spreadsheets and admin meetings. Not so much fun. Grateful to Stef for continuing to wrangle spreadsheets, not my strong point. Formulas scare me.
Time starting to get into Planning Data world with our team. Spending time with psd, E and S next week, which I’m REALLY looking forward to.
Time on biz dev.
What I’ve been thinking about
This week’s it’s more of a list of what I need to think about:
- governance
- the last parts of team shape/responsibilities
- joining up all the amazing TPX work across planning to better coordinate, share and help DLUHC join up and work together
What I’ve been reading
Not a lot this week. There just hasn’t been time for anything other than work and dog and sleep.
What I’ve been watching
Deeply immersed in the world of CSI (Las Vegas).
What’s blooming
The cherry tree has started. This tree is a thing of deep beauty - more photos next week when it's fully in bloom.
