T Plus 2

Well I am all but officially unemployed after my last working day for HCC on Friday. I have to say my leaving presentation was fab. Daniel, the boss, did me proud with a quite humbling and amusing presentation which included a slide show and some very nice statements from colleagues especially Martyn Wilson my old boss in HIAS and County Inspector for many years. Thank you Daniel for the effort. It was really appreciated. For those who may want to see his handiwork he has provided the presentation (.pptx) online here.


It was also nice to get a good bottle of wine, a pressie that I can spend at PCWorld/Currys and a card full of good wishes for the future. Also a dear colleague Sue baked and decorated a lovely cake. Over the years I have seen many a cake that Sue has baked but this one is of course special to me. The verses on it could not have been more appropriate. Thanks too Lucey for another bottle of good wine labelled CM no less.

After the presentation I gave an ill-prepared speech that did waffle on. At the end I gave my solution for all the World's ills. During my 27 years I have changed. At the start back in 1984 I was single (not a bad thing in itself), childless (but then do I know?), Dawkin-esque follower of Carl Sagan ('God is a complication so probably not there') and it has to be said none-too morale person who largely served self. But I stand here now happily (mostly) married, father of 3 boys (such a privilege to have them on loan for these past 20 years), forgiven follower of Jesus who is hopefully a little bit more moral ad wanting now to start to serve others more directly. How come? Well I have come to truly believe it is good relationships and not science that will save the world. My relationships with my wife, my sons, my colleagues, with teachers in schools and most importantly with Jesus Christ the Son of God being examples to me of this truth in my time in education in Hampshire. He has never let me down though sometimes I've had to wait like now. 'Come on God - what's next?'

Oddly I guess but I take comfort from one of my favourite bits of the bible.

⁸ “Meaningless! Meaningless!” says the Teacher.
“Everything is meaningless!” ⁹ Not only was the Teacher wise, but he also imparted knowledge to the people. He pondered and searched out and set in order many proverbs. ¹⁰ The Teacher searched to find just the right words, and what he wrote was upright and true.

¹¹ The words of the wise are like goads, their collected sayings like firmly embedded nails—given by one shepherd. ¹² Be warned, my son, of anything in addition to them.

Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body.

¹³ Now all has been heard;
here is the conclusion of the matter:
Fear God and keep his commandments,
for this is the duty of all mankind.
¹⁴ For God will bring every deed into judgment,
including every hidden thing,
whether it is good or evil.

(Ecclesiastes 12:8-14, New International Version, ©2011)

It was at that point in my leaving speech that the tears did start to well up. However, I took Daniel's advice and ground my teeth so I could finish off without blubbering in front of the 30 or so people standing looking on. Thanks for turning up and patiently listening. One doen't get many chances to speak more openly about the things that matter to you with people at work. I recommend you take your chance when you get it. And thanks to all those who turned up that normally work at Winchester rather than Fareham (Karen, Lucey, Andrea, Jon A, Steve R etc). And to my wife Kathy, to Jon P and to Lindsey for coming in specially.

It was with a bit of relief for some I think that we all piled off to the pub then for lunch and a few pints. Wetherspoon's in Fareham (The Lord Arthur Lee) was the perfect venue in terms of reasonably priced food and a wide range of bitters at amazing prices. They currently have 'The World's biggest Real Ale and Cider Festival' promotion. See www.jdwrealale.co.uk. I ended up trying their triple taster offer of 3 x ⅓ pint of 3 different ales. 'Saints and Sinners' was 8/10 and 'Bloomin' Smokey' 9/10, don't recall the others. I ended up sticking with 'Saints and Sinners', partly because I found it amusing to order 'Saints' in Pompeyland. Again I have to say I was humbled by the number of people who came to see me off. We were there from 1:30 till 7:30PM. Thanks Jon and Lucey for your company for the full 6 hours. Giving up some leave to be with me in the pub was much appreciated. Thanks also to others that made a special effort to come along despite being at work still - Sue, Jan and Alistair from HIAS, Ian A + Charlie despite a hard days work in school and Ian G getting away from the Dell in Derby work for a few hours. And thanks to all those that couldn't make it but sent me kind words by email (Emma, Jon, Stella, Andy, Greg ...). And Carol you mean scouser, we will have to have that drink another time. I owe you loads. I will miss you.

I leave HCC realising that one does make more of an impact that one realises. I hope I may have left a good impression overall and that you won't forget me too soon. I will remember you all in my prayers and hope I will see you in the future.

Bye Hampshire and goodbye all you Wizkid teachers out there.

T-1 my last few hours at HCC

Well the time is almost upon me. This time tomorrow I will be unofficially unemployed for the first time in my life! I say unofficially because I guess I have until 31st March but with owed leave tomorrow is the last day at work.

Think of all the things I'm gonna learn; How to sign on; How to lie in on a weekday; How to plan your day with no-one else having a say (Hah Hah - I don't think so); How to budget drastically cos income IS less than outgoings; How to look for work, How to a avoid work... The list goes on.

I have cleared my desk already, deleted everything in 'My documents' in Hantsnet and on the PC local drive, cleared my Inbox, composed and switched on my 'Out of office' - forever - that was difficult to compose. I have even drafted the final email I will send out tomorrow. Unsubscribing my hants.gov.uk email address from all those educational mailing lists was surprisingly difficult. Quite emotional - especially ictprim and ictsec which have been stalwarts for giving and receiving advice over many years. All I need to do is make sure I have packed my cryptocard ready to hand over tomorrow along with my badge and phone.

The last two weeks have largely been dominated by handing over to the 5 or 6 people who have to deal with me not being there anymore. I do feel sorry for you guys. Trying to work out what tasks out of the nebulous mountain of stuff I have done over the last 4 years is not easy. Watching their faces as they try to grasp what I am on about as I describe my work was like watching greased up channel swimmers trying to grasp a bar of soap. It would be interesting to see what is still being done a year from now bit I doubt I will be around to find out

The boss, Daniel, tweeted, to quote:

Biggest presentation of my life on Friday. @olcinm leaving us for his next journey :-( got to do the legend justice!
Twitter for iPhone • 23/03/2011 06:35

Legend? Achilles and Eric Cantona are legends. Colin McQueen a legend? Naw! Still, I am looking forward to the presentation tomorrow. and am very touched by his efforts. Turns out he has been trawling SAP to find out about my employment record and it doesn't actually have much in it! I could have told him that. But let's see what he has found out. When I started back in 1984 there wasn't much in the way of IT to record events or data online. I guess they were using mainframes (aka Cloud Computing). The personal computer was just appearing. The first one I touched back in May 84 was a Sinclair Spectrum with those rubbery keys and the screechy FAX like noises stored on magnetic cassette tapes. Who remembers 'PEEK' and 'POKE'?

As to progress with the new life? None made, absolutely zilch. Not even a closed door. So this is really going to be a nail biting ride this time. I am taking that as a sign to take it easy for the first month.... Not really though. I have realised rather late that it would be a good idea to go up home to Newcastle to see my mum and brother. Eldest son resonsibilities and all that. Probably do some clearing out and decorating. Be good practice for what's needed back in Southampton.

Anyway I'm off for a curry now with most of the old ICT HIAS team, somewhere in Pompeyland. Better wear a blue hoodie. It's the end of an era for the National Strategy Consultants, of which I was one for 4 years. Times are a changing indeed.

T Minus 10

Well two weeks from now and I will be well into my 4th or 5th pint down at The Lord Arthur Lee Wetherspoon's in Fareham celebrating with colleagues my 'escape'. Quite a few said they will be there. I don't know if I should feel warm about that or whether it was just because I offered to buy anyone who turned up a drink!

The last few weeks have been quite hard at work really. I am starting to realise the enormity of it all. The handover document that had my simple task list has become 'Yellow Pages' according to one of the potential successors to my work. So suddenly my diary has become packed with handover meetings and blasting away at finishing off those little jobs I kept putting on the back burner. The new Wizkid support site has gone live, the support processes are tied down better. I'm struggling through the simplification of the Studywiz ePortfolio for Wizkid and wondering why I ever bothered setting up a trial of parent accounts because the schools involved haven't really done anything with it for one perfectly valid reason or another. If you ever want to develop a service change that involves schools piloting or testing, give yourself loads of time and communicate, communicate, communicate because you can bet your bottom dollar the school teachers won't. they're too busy and don't understand the depth of work you are beavering about on at the back end that really needs commitment and feedback on to avoid wasting time.

But what to do next? There was a great verse came up at church on Wednesday.

Isaiah 43

18 “Forget the former things;
do not dwell on the past.
19 See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert
and streams in the wasteland.
20 The wild animals honor me,
the jackals and the owls,
because I provide water in the desert
and streams in the wasteland,
to give drink to my people, my chosen,
21 the people I formed for myself
that they may proclaim my praise.

A couple of circumstances and this verse have created thoughts. How about running a pub? Our local right next to our church has starting advertising a lease for sale. Kathy and I have got quite interested. Why not have Christians running a pub with the offer of advice, guidance and a prayer room at the back for the punters? All those guys burying their heads in pint after pint could access some real help. 'Pint and a Prayer!' for anyone? Of course there are difficulties to deal with. We couldn't have slot machines or gambling going on. But we would want to bring back loads of old pub games that don't seem to be available these days. Anyway we shall see. I'm putting it before The Man upstairs to see what He says.

Oddly I have spotted that there are loads of pubs up for sale. Some are freehold, some leasehold. Those that are leasehold may be 'tied' to a brewery or drinks company others are free. The business seems to be difficult for many right now. But then if God wants us to do it He will bless it in one way or another. That's what's great about being a believer. Hope and Peace. All really exciting. Horizons broaden when you get into a relationship with Jesus. Things are never the same again.

Totally separate to this (at least as far as I can tell!) I've also decided to do some volunteer work with a special school in April. Just another thing that has come up after meeting with several special school teachers over the last term or so. I'm particularly moved by kids in wheelchairs because of cerebral palsy. In the past I have helped out with a couple of children, one with severe physical problems and the other less so.

Oh and I am Looking forward to a week's break between the end of 'something old' and the start of 'something new'.

So T-10 and counting...

T Minus 25

Only 25 days before I leave Hampshire County Council employ possibly forever. Forever, eternity, no more, never again, the last time. That is unless you believe the K Paxian theory that everything repeats itself exactly as the universe expands and contracts. One of my top 5 quotes from a film is when Kevin Spacey playing Prot says:

"The universe will expand, then it will collapse back on itself, and then it will expand again. It will repeat|this process forever. What you don't know is that when the universe expands again, everything will be as it is now. What ever mistakes you make this time around, you will live through on your next pass. Every mistake you make...you will live through...again and again, forever. So my advice to you is to get it right this time around, because this time...is all you have."

Sounds like Hell to those who get things wrong. Oops that's all of us. Perhaps that doesn't fit with quantum theory (which is after all just a theory) but in one sense it fits with what I believe - that we should make the best of the time we have. The bible puts it more brutally:

"Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment,..."
Hebrews 9:27 NIV

So my death/end with HCC is fast approaching. T minus 25 and counting. There is a sense of acceleration. I am being asked more and more frantically to deliver a summary of what I do and when I do it. re people really that concerned about my departure? I have a strange feeling that there will not be so much as a bang but more of a whimper as I walk out that door. Truth is I've managed to condense my roles and tasks down to two sides of A4 and that's in a large font size! I bet in 4pt it could fit on the back of a fag packet. Is it first impressions or last impressions that stick with people the most? What will people remember?

Then there's the bit about people starting to virtually draw lots to divide up my possessions. Key item being the large monitor (one of a dual set up) I have had the pleasure of using for the last 6 months. I could have done with it 2 years ago when I first started serious user acceptance testing. If I were to highlight one skill I believe I have discovered and made good use of it is testing software releases. I seem to have a knack in finding bugs or other faults in deployments of Studywiz to the Hampshire Wizkid service. Second to that may be problem solving. Oddly I also enjoy both.

Becoming experienced and perhaps expert in software can be rewarding but it too often just appears geeky to the 'normal' person. Most people just want the software to speed up the task and not get in the way of getting the job done. What is the biggest waste of time I see day after day? People getting bogged down in formatting documents either to fit a corporate standard, number sections and lists as they require or print in a sensible way to fit a human readable piece of A4 paper. I can see why newspaper organisations have a workflow that separates producing copy from editing and that from markup. They can't afford the time for prose creators fiddling about with making lists work. If project managers just learned to create the copy first and markup afterwards, or pass copy on to expert 'markuperers' I'm sure time therefore money could be saved. Templates are fine and should help but badly created complex templates, which no-one understands, in complex applications like Word 2003 used by people who really don't understand styles and lists anyway, are a nightmare, just waiting to waste your time. The latest incarnations of Mickeysoft Office are much better in that respect. They don't expect the user to understand so much and they have surfaced the things most of us want to do. But HCC IT staff are still using MS Office 2003.

Perhaps I will be remembered/missed because I'm not there in the office to help solve those niggly word, Excel or Access issues. Maybe I'd be better on a Service Desk? .... Naw... I'd end screaming at people suggesting they consider changing their job. Ask my long suffering wife. All she wants is for me to quickly solve the problem and get her back on track. Instead I want to teach her how to cope with the issue next time. That's why I think I will always see myself as a teacher at heart. I don't want to solve people's problems I want to help them be able to solve their own. Kathy's not interested enough in learning IT. And I can't blame her. Applications are not designed around people like Kathy, they are still suffering from being originally designed around IT people. Software that goes against that and tries to 'just work' isn't accepted by by the office or IT people. Take OneNote or the primary education equivalent suite by SoftEase. TextEase was (is?) brilliant. An object orientated application that broke the rules ... just like me.

That does tend to be my problem. I am often a bit of a square peg in a round hole and rather than accept having my corners knocked off and be reformed into the round peg, I bash away at the hole trying to make it square. Oh I did try to become more rounded, went on ITIL foundation and practitioner courses, flirted with the idea of doing project managers course. But it's not me. Clearly they are needed the way things are, but there is also another way.

Anyway lets hope I get the ending right.... this time.

Back at work

So back to work on today for the first day of my last term. There was an air of 'hangover' in the office as people struggled to get to grips with the IT again. Why is it so hard to print reports from SAP? Is the IBM document Manager incapable of properly handling Office 2010 files? At least we have got rid of Internet Explorer 6 for that modern browser er.... Internet Explorer 7 - well it is an improvement. No doubt centrally managed Citrix delivered desktops save loads of bother for the majority but isn't it about time we were given virtualised desktops that fix themselves or reset at a click of a button if we install something that mucks up the system. Mind you I can't complain as I have a local PC desktop so I can run 4 or 5 browsers for testing. Also, not wanting to be too negative, Citrix does a good job in integrating some of the PC Peripherals, as long as they are already running before one logs into the centralised desktop. I'm sure the system we use is the envy of many a local authority.

So how does it feel knowing this is the last term? Quite sad but decidedly liberating. Somehow some of the things that were depressingly 'necessary' no longer have a hold on me. It's a bit like death no longer having a hold. The future is no longer inevitable. The possibilities opening up before me make me realise yet again 'I once was blind but now I see'.

I will miss the people of course. I have learned so much by working in an office with a smallish group of people. Whilst a 'team' of project managers don't appear to work together as a 'team', being very individual people working on different projects to each other, for the majority of their time 'team' is what they try to build constantly among the people on 'their project(s)'. I was also never one for planning or accounting for my time. Most teachers I know plan of course but the plan is constantly changing and you do the work necessary until it's complete sod the time. Many's the time I worked till 02:00AM. And then there's 'The bells! The bells! that tend to run your life so you don't need to organise time other than in the minutiae of the 3 part 60 minute lesson. However, being surrounded by planners and time managers has meant something had to rub off on me and I am more capable of using MickeySoft OutLook now and considering cost though I was never given access to MickeySoft Project ;-). Reminds me of Luke 14:28

28 For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, 30 saying, ‘This man began to build and was not able to finish.’

But please, please don't get me onto 'Change Management'. Nice idea but too hard to do properly without stifling innovation. If you want to innovate in education ICT you need to bin CM. I find it ironic that the system in this place that appears to most need drastic innovation, bug fixing and development i.e. 'change', is the change management system!

However, as I was saying the people I have worked with have been great. I have learned so much and have humbly to state that some of the best role models have been younger than me and of the other gender. People have had to be very forgiving of my 'Geordie male chauvinistic', 'bull in a china shop' and 'call a spade a spade' attitude. And they have been. Thank you! I hope they have seen positive change in me and that they too have learned something from me. It will also be interesting to see whether there is anything left behind that lasts? I always remember my first long term line manager in the science department at 'The Romsey School' telling me that a sign of how well you have done is revisiting and seeing if the systems you left behind are still going.

So tonight as I look forward to these last few months I am liberated yet grateful and keen to ensure that I leave on a good note.

2011 - a big year

So here it is 2011 and this is going to be one big year. Why? Well first and foremost after 26 years with Hampshire County Council I have volunteered for and have been accepted for voluntary redundancy in March/April time. It has been on the cards for some time. As a Christian I am a firm believer that there is a God personally interested in each one of us and that He wants me to step out in faith into something new. I'm too young by 2 years to be able to retire and the redundancy settlement won't pay off the mortgage. So it either means downsizing, living by faith and/or finding another paying job. Haven't got anything clear in mind yet but a few ideas. I have clear evidence previously as well as faith that God will provide so no anxiety. But I would be lying if I didn't say I have some fear mixed with excitement that some may interpret as anxiety about the future.

Other big events? I said goodbye to Ben our 18 yr old this morning at Southampton Central railway station as he heads off to his duties at 45 Commando in Arbroath north of Dundee. He joins Zulu Company and believes they will be off to Afghanistan in March around his 19th birthday. More fear there but again I trust the Lord. We have talked about what may happen. Things like this focus one's mind. I have no doubt God goes before him.

Less fear about Josh returning to Nottingham Uni to continue with his Mech. Eng. Degree. He has amazed me by his hard work revising for exams. He's aiming for a first. "Why else go?" he says. His Christian faith is strong and an example to me! His 6 months with YWAM in Namibia changed him enormously. Mostly for the better in my view.

There is some fear over Sam. He starts his Saints Academy scholarship in July. Full time football and sports study. I enjoy football far more now than I used to. In a strictly couch potato and sideline supporter way you understand. But I fear it is a corrupt and corrupting sport. The fear is that Sam will be corrupted by it. My prayer is he won't. He certainly has the football gifting and ability to make it but does he have the character. I fear I haven't helped enough in that area. As a dad one has responsibility to set your sons (and daughters) a good example. We will probably stay in Southampton even though Sam could go into digs at the expense of Southampton Football Club.

Kathy is likely to remain a bread winner and may go full time. A major change for me may be doing much more housework to relieve that pressure from Kath. Guess it depends in plans God has.

So the next couple of months will be a time to look for God's plan and to discover where my hearts desires and passions lie. One of my favourite verses will be at the forefront of my prayers and thinking. Proverbs 3 verse 5-7

"5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; 6 in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight. 7 Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and shun evil."

As I said 2011 will be a big year.