Dearest gentle reader…It continues to be a period of heavy workload and trying to balance equally urgent demands across three big events (PAIRS in person, PAIRS online and our own conference). And bonus, we’ve picked up another urgent commission…Jeni’s protecting me from most of that though (as she did from doing the Board papers for next week’s meeting) - it’s appreciated but a tricky feeling.
What I’ve been doing
Before I forget here is a link to a video that is well worth a couple of minutes of your time - it amplifies the voices of students that took part in our pilot of a distributed dialogue around generative AI in education. It serves to remind us all how important it is to involve - and hear - young people in decisions that affect them.
Aside from event logistics (progress is being made but wow there’s still so much being a bit scrabbled around) and my freelance gigs I mentioned in my last weeknotes that I was attending the first Strategy Design Festival, hosted by Dirk Slater and Allen Gunn, which I did.
Pitched as “an opportunity to discover how participatory, adaptive approaches can make strategy a living, breathing practice that your organisation weaves into your ongoing work, and uses to guide real decisions rather than sitting on a shelf” - I was intrigued into how about thinking about this for different organisations I work with and in particular Connected by Data who are committed to participatory practice in what we do. The day was highly interactive (not always a comfortable space for me) and one thing that struck me most was the huge generosity of everyone there. People wanted to listen and show curiosity about each others’ work and strategy experience. Particular shout out to Jess Day and Petra Backovska who are working with fab organisations empowering communities and shared openly with me about their learning. The whole day was well paced and I’ve left with lots to think about - some to enact immediately and some to come back to when it is an appropriate time…and that feels like the best balance of “actions” from a jam packed day.
As a footnote - I want to remember to come back to exploring more about these organisations that were represented there and intrigued me but I didn’t get to chat to them.
As another footnote - but an important one - the event was held at the wonderful Coin Street Neighbourhood Centre. It was my first time here and I highly recommend it as a venue with great spaces and staff, and I plan to book it myself in the future.
Talking of venues, yesterday I “popped” to Manchester for the day to scope out our venue for our March conference. The Mechanics Institute is the “birthplace of the TUC”…and they’re very proud of that association. The building has not been updated so much of the original decor (including a range of stained glass windows marking the different union chapters) remains. I think it’ll be a good space for us.
What I need to take care of
This is less a ‘todo’ and more about how I approach a particular situation. I feel very uncomfortable in small group discussions with people I don’t know (particularly if the subject isn’t something I feel strong in). I was reminded of how hard I found this recently at an event when we were very quickly put into groups where the task meant we all had to talk/contribute. I’m very comfortable learning by being talked at (in an engaging way) and maybe some discussions later. I know that everyone has different learning styles and there’s a desire to make events “interactive” but gosh if that doesn’t undermine the experience for me (and I suspect I’m not alone).
What I’ve been inspired or challenged or moved by
Intrigued more than inspired or motivated … I am a Premier League football fan (for my sins) and have always been interested in tracking how well a professional pundit does at predicting the weekend’s results and how well he does compared to a ‘celeb’ guest. This year BBC Sport have added in an AI predictor - they simply ask Microsoft Copilot Chat to “predict this weekend’s Premier League scores”.
I’m fascinated in seeing how the accuracy of all three pans out over the season (for reference the pundit always beats the celebs over the period of a season even if on occasional weeks they beat him). Over halfway through the season and on a total points basis the AI is winning (although actually is behind ‘readers’ - but I’d argue the volume of these are a major factor). However the leadership table is always done on outright win weeks - which brings the pundit out on top at the moment.
What I’ve been reading
What a revelation reading every day for the National Year of Reading has been. I finished “Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow” by Gabrielle Zevin in a mere 20 days! It was a really enjoyable read with a long timeline (which I enjoy too). I can see why it was a best seller.
Am now onto ‘Cheer up love: Adventures in depression with the crab of hate’ by Susan Calman.