Hi Marlis,
Another 2 months down, time to share the
best parts of it once more. I hope you are well and healthy as winter is about
to come knocking on the door. I saw that there were already some cold nights
out in the ACT. Melbournians are hilarious, one night of 3 degrees and a mild
panic envelops the city…J
Work
I am back AGAIN with Deakin University
(6th project…), but this time in the Records Management Department,
helping deliver a project that is supposed to make people more aware of good
practices so we stop breaking the law when it comes to data management. Most
people would find it boring, so of course I wanted to do it and we have some
pretty cool videos and documents now. It’s still as boring a topic as watching
paint dry, but I’ve also learned that there’s some real benefits, that I will
not bore you with J. The project itself is very challenging, in a non-fun way, with very limited resources
and extremely high expectations and scrutiny. I am working with a very talented
guy, but there’s only so much he can do, so we’re working well together on
making the organisation very uncomfortable. I think his boss and the big
boss-lady are really frustrated with my lack of willingness to just say yes to
their range of platitudes and ‘just make it work’ statements, but as long as
they don’t tell me to go away, I’ll keep showing up and make sure they’ll have
some semblance of success. Sjeesh, for smart people, they do some pretty dumb
things... I liked that 3 day a week job well enough, but then another team
mentioned that they could use my help and now I am also helping out with a
project that is very simple, but got really complicated with the help of a
change manager who I thought was pretty good at first, but she really stuffed
this up. It’s just the closing down of two video software programs for
recording classroom lectures and the release of a new video tool. Out with the
old, in with the new, 6 months, no sweat. Well, lots of sweat apparently! I’ve
spent my first two days on it now and have already said that we’re going to do
things a bit differently from now on. As in, 95% of the weird planned things,
we’re not doing that anymore. They had said yes to 150 hours of change
management… Any team that needs that much change, is better of being let go and
starting anew. Anyway, I am now 5 days a week there and by end of July, I will
have done good things, and put aside enough to not have to work the rest of the
year J. I’ve also picked up some work with the National Disability
Services people (Yumi’s work) once again and will get to do some workshops for
their 2019 strategy and then I am also going to regional Victoria In early
August (Sale, Shepparton and Mildura), which is a whole different kind of fun. I
never thought about what it would be like to have 4 different projects going on
at the same time, thinking I’d never have that experience. Well, so far, so
good!
Yumi’s
big trip
Yumi is currently traveling in the
Netherlands until Friday 15 June. She’s going there for a training in a
particular work thing that doesn’t exist (yet) in Australia. She’s left last
Tuesday and will be back next week Sunday, but the training is only 3 days, so
the rest of the time she’s visiting family and friends. It was on and off for
such a long time that I lost all interest and accepted a new assignment and
then it was on again and too late for me to get involved. In all fairness, I
don’t miss the Netherlands that much and speak to or see (on the computer) most
people quite regularly anyway. She’s having a good time so far, visiting her
parents, the Amsterdam crowd, my parents and sister with kids and then some
friends. She’s also getting her new passport. Last time she had to travel to
Bangkok to get it, this seemed a more cost effective way, haha. And as far as
souvenirs go…an egg slicer, some liquorice, markers (very specific brand),
toothpaste and some clothing. Living the high life of luxury now as you can
probably tell. I work from early to late, or I am volunteering, so this week
has flown by and next week will be no different for sure. I always miss her as
soon as she’s out the door, but as long as I keep busy, it’s not too bad and I
just count the days until I pick her up again. When she gets back it’s full on
again with her work too. She’s making good progress with the consulting side of
things and will be travelling to Brisbane with her stories and skills in a few
weeks, making the sector better in so many ways. Very proud of her!!
My
parents sold the house
It was all very exciting a few weeks
back and now it’s finally happened, my parents managed to sell the house!!! At
a reasonable price even! It was a typical deal only my dad could make, but
after a few days of negotiating, they both got what they wanted and now it’s
clean up and move time. It must be very strange for them to now have to
consider a new place to live and maybe even renting after having been home
owners for 30+ years. With everything that happened I think they are just
really relieved that this burden has finally been lifted from their shoulders.
They agreed to a 1 September delivery date, so there’s still some time to
consider options and sort through all the stuff that they’ve held onto for so
long and will now no longer have the space for, like some furniture and lots of
things from me and my sister. Well, I didn’t miss it for 20 years, into the bin
or to charity it goes. But apparently my mom is starting her own internet
business online selling off all their unwanted items and I wouldn’t be
surprised if she manages to get good deals too J.
Convergence
conference and change management
Late April I finally had my moment in
the sun to do my presentation on Fake Change and I think all in all people
enjoyed it. I had pictured it very different and spent so much more time on it
than I should. In the end I was just really happy it was over and done with.
Slowly but steadily I am finding that I really like being the person in the
background a lot more than everyone else seems to think, so I’ve started
extracting myself from any of that spotlight stuff, it’s just not working for
me. I did really enjoy seeing a lot of the change friends I’ve made over time
all in one place, they are a fun and friendly bunch and it made me realise I
have made some real friends all across Australia. I am also continuing to find
myself falling out of love with change management, or at least the current way
of change being managed. Everyone is just so confused! We’re fighting each
other on words and models, instead of doing what needs to be done. But instead
of going through yet another existential crisis, maybe I’ll just reinvent
myself again in a few months’ time and take Yumi’s advice. She thinks there’s a
job for me in integrity and reputation management. Well, I do have lots of
opinions on doing the right thing and do get a lot of positive comments on me
being all about the truth of matters and honesty, so she’s probably not wrong J.
I want to complete one more thing, the
Change Rebel Toolkit and then I’ll probably just shut things down, which will
be an interesting experience I think.
Change
Management Institute (CMI)
Despite my change of heart on change
(sorry for the bad pun), I am enjoying the teamwork I am doing with the CMI in
my state. The team has cleaned up a bit, with people not participating stepping
away and 2 others really stepping up. We’ve done a few well-appreciated events
on various topics now and have more ideas than we can realistically do, so
we’re once again ‘hiring’ volunteers for our team. It’s not too hard to find
people wanting to step up, but it’s often more work than they expected, even if
we clearly state the requirements and then they sort of fade away. Oh well,
I’ve had some really good opportunities and free tickets because of it and
people mostly appreciate what we do. I’ll complete my year as promised, put a
plan together for 2019 and then either step down or leave it all together.
We’ll see J. Working with the national team is much less fun,
lots of big words and ideas, but the same challenges. I’ve offered about 5-6
ideas now, still waiting for one to be picked up, which has completely put me
off suggesting anything else, it’s simply not worth the effort of me writing up
plans and such, to then not hear anything for months. I’ve had a bit of a
falling out with the National lead as well, which almost made me resign, but I
decided to be a grown-up for a change and concluded he was just a bit stressed
and busy, but it did nothing for my enthusiasm and involvement. He says that he
appreciated my feedback, but then when I really do provide my opinion and it
went against what he wanted to do, he threw a bit of a fit. Okay, he gets to do
that tooJ. I am just not going to keep criticizing and offer
plans for improvement (that I will happily work on too), no point if we’re not
on the same team trying to improve matters. Did I mention that I do the most
work compared to everyone, by far? I choose to do that, so there’s no issue,
but if I then find that we’re actually NOT working together, that just takes
all the fun out. Too much drama! Moving on….
Litter
picking fun
I am still enjoying the picking up of
litter all around town. I must look like such a weirdo to some people, walking
around with my plastic bags, all of a sudden ducking to the ground, into a
shrub or onto the road. It’s a bit like a treasure hunt I guess. However, I am
thinking that over the past 6 months, I’ve collected about 40-50 bags of junk,
which is close to 100kgs of plastic, bottles of all kinds, lots of tennis
balls, coconuts (no idea!), tin cans, flip flops, items of clothing and lots
and lots and lots of tissues. I’ll admit I always feel a bit self-conscious,
but perhaps that’s the point, it keeps you humble and once I throw it all in
the bin, I do feel like I’ve accomplished something. Especially when I was not
working and walking every day it makes walking around town a bit more
meaningful and people do really appreciate it, so maybe I am inspiring a few
more litter pickers around town too, who knows! I am planning to work with my
video producing friend Peter to launch a video for the Beach Patrol team once
spring and summer come around. I hope that a fun 2-minute video about what they
can do to help (or not make matters worse) will make a positive contribution
somehow. I’ll include a print of the poster once it’s done! Yumi and I are also
still volunteering an hour a month with about 30-40 others to clean up the
beach and surrounding areas, which always turns up about 40-60 kgs of muck, so
by 2019 Altona is much cleaner and tidier J
SES
After about 4 months with the unit I am
starting to feel like I fit in. I’ve taken on the cleaning up of the unit and
mucking out 35 years of archiving. I am sure you’re seeing the pattern here,
haha. Seriously, I found a manual on what to do in the case of a nuclear
event…Not sure what’s going on this side of the bay, but I haven’t seen a lot
of nuclear bombs lately…It is very rewarding to just throw all that old stuff
out and once I started, other team members gleefully jumped in too! I was
cleaning out the fridge and found ‘cheese’ that was fresh and well…in 2015. Soda
that was ‘only’ 18 months past the due date and mustard that had somehow
solidified... Wow! I’ve managed to get some archive boxes for free (another
good part about working with the archives team at Deakin) and my next job is to
sort all that stuff out. Our unit boss had to go away for a few weeks on med
leave, so we took the opportunity to clean out his whole office, he loved it!
Should have taken a before and after picture, but it’s safe to say that many
files were dumped in the bin. I’ve also been out on a few jobs over the past 2
months. One was fun for the technical side, but it was in a yard where two dogs
do their business and there was dog poo EVERYWHERE. Ugh, we could not get the smell
out of our noses for hours. But I got to use the chainsaw and pole saw, so I
wasn’t about to start complaining. We also did a state-wide exercise, which was
sort of cool and weird at the same time. We mobilised for a simulated terrorist
attack on the zoo (poor animals!) with 22 casualties and virtually no extra
info. So we all mobilised, which took about 2 hours start to finish (because we
knew it wasn’t real), so you end up with about 200 people in orange and 50-100
vehicles, going absolutely nowhere because there’s no emergency. It was
impressive to see it all work together so well though. I guess that if
something really does go pear shaped, at least we’re ready to go. In a few
weeks from now I’ll take on the finance role for our unit too, just so I keep
busy if there are no trees falling over J.
It seems like an interesting job and would allow me to see what goes into
managing the finances for a unit like ours. I am sure I’ll learn a few new
tricks, even if it seems fairly straight forward.
Short
notes
· Living in Altona is still very enjoyable. It’s not
quite the ACT, but close enough for it to not matter. The house is working out
well, we recently had some friends over for dinner and we’ve got everything
close enough to be comfortable. I really love being able to take a short walk
and see the bay/ocean, it’s an instant thought calmer and never fails to calm
my racing brain.
·
We’re planning to
take a short holiday in October (the 9th is my birthday and our 21
year togetherness anniversary) and do a bit of travel in January too, probably
somewhere tropical with diving for the short break and then to New Zealand for
the bigger break, good things to look forward too
·
On June 30th
we’ll be married for 11 years, I can sense a dinner date coming J!
·
I’ve joined a
mentoring program where I share my experience and support with someone who can
use some professional development support. I got matched with Julie from New
Zealand and we get along quite well. I am ‘meeting’ her tomorrow over video
link, where she’ll tell me all about her new job and how she’s been doing in
the first 3 days.
·
Next week I’ll
start getting involved with another volunteer thing, which is altogether
different from change, litter or professional coaching, this is about helping a
young person 8-18, probably a boy, with their social skills by spending about
an hour a week chatting to them online. I actually signed up for a similar
program as what we did when I visited with you, the difference being the age
and circumstances, but that program only ran in Ballarat, which is about 100km
away and not so practical J.
· Friends and family are all well enough I guess. My
friend Just is travelling all across Europe for his ICT job and now he’s even
gone to Kenya, so very cool! He’s working with the ministry of foreign affairs
and they have a software change he’s helping with. I always knew he was going
places, but now he’s actually going
places, hahaha.
Well, that’s me done once more. I hope
you stay warm and safe during the cold months coming and look forward to
catching up in a few months again to see where things are at by then.
Gilbert
