Dan’s Weeknotes 2022–10–14

Hello friend. What’s good?

I’ve been rather inconsistent with my weeknotes recently. Not to worry. I’m here. I’m trying.

Since last time I went on holiday to New York City. The Big Apple that never sleeps. So good they named it twice what are you a wise guy? Hey, I’m walking here.

I had a great time thanks. What a place, really enjoyed it. Even the man in front of me on the flight home who decided to recline his seat the whole journey¹ couldn’t take the shine off a wonderful, nourishing trip.

When I got back I had two in-person all day workshops in the Citizens Advice London office. This was tiring (I had jet lag after all) but they were good. Then it was a weekend of rest.

This week has been catching up on stuff and trying to get some momentum back. Remembering all the balls in the air before they fall down and such. There were some highlights:

• Monthly delivery session with the team where we go through tickets on our data improvement Trello board. This is particularly valuable for me because it gives me a great oversight, plus it’s an opportunity to ask for help
• The fortnightly session using our main data product the Service Dashboard which always keeps me in touch with the latest trends in a wide variety of data about our services
• Using the insight from that session to put together my own data update for the leadership team I’m in, and also sticking to the discipline of writing it up for those who can’t attend our weekly meeting. It’s just internal blogging really
• Got the great news that we’ll be getting a Delivery Manager earlier than expected. They will spend half of their time working on one of our main priorities which is improving data about our Network of ~260 independent local Citizens Advice
• Caught another opportunity to host somebody one day a week from another team who’d like to improve their data skills through shadowing
• Got back into the data strategy work with a couple of conversations around the data principles framework. Two very different perspectives but still able to add some value through one framework I think
• Remembered that data mesh isn’t that fancy after all but rather it’s a pattern that’s been familiar for years and suits our purposes if we keep the hype at bay (thanks Suzanne)
• A couple of great sessions looking at a new data product for managing risk that colleagues in Operations have put together with help from Josie and Hamza
• Looking forward to more recruitment soon. Data Operations Engineer which is a new role got signed off, and two new data analyst posts as well.
• Collaboration and spirit in the leadership team I’m in feels good at the moment
• Crunched through a fair bit (although nowhere near all) of admin mountain on a pretty much meeting free Friday
• Finished the week receiving a little unsolicited praise which is always a lift²

Yes it was fine.

One thing I’m wondering about is how long do you stick at a thing before you change or give it up. Sometimes I stick at a thing longer than maybe most people would. Sometimes I am vindicated³. Sometimes not.

I think part of it is a reaction to experiences maybe 10 years ago when, having been familiar with various agile ways of working for a while, I came across teams who would move to make radical changes to things after a fortnight instead of sticking with it for a bit. I’m sure I’ve done the same as well.

But it’s a balance, right? Not everything comes good. And sometimes things should change or iterate quickly.

The specific here is where to channel the weekly cadence of data updates that we curate. I’ve never had a hand in as much content as I have done in the past 12 months. And it’s efficient, telling the same or similar stories in multiple places and there is so much to talk about.

Is it going to the right places though? Cutting through, changing behaviours, helping make decisions? I am not sure. There’s also a risk or maybe it’s a challenge that Tom made me think about the other week. Being too passive. Should I be suggesting what and how it should be in addition to what and how it is? Probably so. Probably need to do more of that.

Thanks for reading.

Also it’s boring but I have written this on my son’s Chromebook because I wanted to see what the experience is like and hey it’s fine. The Chromebook is small you see and I have this leather satchel I’ve wanted to use for work for many years but you can’t fit a ‘normal’ laptop in it. It’s not a hipster leather satchel like from the early 2000s this is not a midlife crisis no this satchel is something my parents had made for me for a birthday and it is a precious object. Anyway a long time ago I hoped I could inherit former boss Steve O’s small MacBook Air when he left the Houses of Parliament but inventory management colleagues wouldn’t give it to me after all I don’t know maybe I wasn’t important enough. So finally I have the prospect of taking my leather satchel to work that’s pretty exciting right?

Footnotes

¹ I am fairly tall so this manoeuver from the man in front of me not only mean I didn’t have enough space for my legs but I also had to crane my neck down to see the in flight entertainment. Also he was bald with a lumpy head which is fine no shame in that BUT my normal eyeline was drawn to the back of his bald lumpy head instead of the screen and I wanted to watch Stanley Tucci in Italy and the Tony Hawk documentary not a bald lumpy head I don’t think that’s unreasonable

² I CRAVE IT

³ Like all that cake I made for work for example. Most people make some flapjacks once or twice and that’s it. Not me