Not so much #Weeknotes as #Monthnotes but it all counts.
This month has been sandwiched by trips to Edinburgh – at the end of January to experience the Firestarter Festival and I’m writing this on the train heading to SDinGov where Jukesie and I are speaking about hiring and recruiting. I’m very much looking forward to it – the speaking, seeing all kinds of interesting people and generally having time for brain stimulation.
February has been a month of intensity and then rebalancing and finding a new normal.
In a conversation recently someone described their work as like the bit in Wallace and Gromit’s Wrong Trousers where Gromit is trying lay track ahead of the speeding train (and the evil chicken/penguin). Well, that immediately resonated (fortunately no evil chicken though). The work we’re doing as an organisation is trying to move very quickly, with currently very few staff, so it can often feel a bit full on. On the other hand though, we’ve got a complete blank slate and a decent budget, so it feels very different to other jobs where you’re trying to move quickly but with no budget and masses of restrictions. We can (and are) hire companies to help us build our strategies, so in many ways our jobs become those of direction and management, rather than having to do it all. My personal challenge to myself with this job is to step out from the weeds and do more of the bigger picture work. This does require a team though, and at the moment I’ve been firmly in the weeds, busily hiring that team!
Recruiting
The largest part of my work for 2019 so far has been running four recruitment campaigns. We’ve had a phenomenal response – which is so encouraging. Our CEO even joked she’d been ribbed by her peers for stealing all the good people in government, which is quite fun. The most important thing to me was to hire diversely, to go beyond Civil Servants and those who people would expect to do the job. It seems to have worked, which is brilliant. We’re now out the end of the interviews and into final meetings and offers. It will still be ages before I have anyone actually on the teams thanks to clearance and notice periods, but I’m feeling very pleased with the volume of work done. Of course, I worry hugely about all the experiences of individuals along the way, and I’d really like to explain to each of them that what looks like a blunt email from a system is the result of 150 applicants x 6 sifters x 4 scores x comments and not a reflection of who they are or their potential. I know that each one of those forms is a person who put in hours to try to distill who they are into some boxes, and I wish I had the time to give them all and support them, but unfortunately I can’t. And I can’t hire for potential (instead of actively demonstrating requirements against a job description), which I wish I could.
We do, however, have an incredible opportunity because we are hiring whole teams. We have the benefit of not having any staff, having plenty of work, which means we can hire three of four people for a team, and think about how they will fit together, what different skills and experiences they will bring, and how we build each team as a whole. This is brilliant, because usually you’re hiring for one or two roles, and they have to slot into a space in an existing team. It also means you usually just have to take the person that scores top, which is a blunt tool. Obviously we’re still taking the people who scored highest at interview, but we’ve a pool of the let’s say 14 people who scored top and are then considering what combinations should make up the four teams that have vacancies. I’m really enjoying thinking about what my new team will look like (brilliant, by the way. I can’t wait).
I like doing work with tangible outcomes, where I have an idea of how it is I personally add value. I was particularly thrilled that one of the other ‘Heads of’ wrote me a lovely thank you note for my efforts and its impact on the whole organisation and my boss commented she was really impressed with how much I brought my ethics to the work I was doing, and really pushed fairness and diverse panels. These are good measures for me.
As a side note, given the diversity references, I should mention that for the first time I had to go hunting for white men to help on interview panels (because I had women and people of colour and our panels should include women, men and people of different ethnicities). An interesting problem, given the manels we often talk about. It provoked more than a few smiles.
I’ll be talking more about how to improve recruitment and what you can do when you’re hiring at SDinGov this week, so look out more about this.
Planning
Towards the end of the month I’ve been turning back to the work of networks and communities; my “proper” job. I’ve been doing planning for what my team can deliver, thinking about both what I want to personally achieve and how I want to spend my time. Interestingly I started off with how I think I should spend my week, how much time I think should be allocated to things like conversations with people who ask for a chat (not quite mentoring, but I like it and it seems to be helpful), team time, strategy, being actually in documents… I say interestingly because it’s telling that I start with that rather than outcomes. So I also forced myself to sit down and do outcomes. I don’t really like SMART objectives. Much musing, including on the train today with glorious views.
Amid all of this is a deal of personal reflection; Iβm largely driven by a combination of guilt and optimism. This isn’t exactly news, nor have I fixed it. But talking about it is useful.
Carla recently talked about the idea of walking backwards into chaos – to roughly summarise, the idea that when looking at the past it appears ordered and so we see that and imagine the future will follow similar patterns, but its not! So strategic planning based on the past will struggle. I hear this, trying to frame the now based on the stories we’ve used to understand the past imagines something that probably doesn’t exist. I don’t particularly enjoy uncertainty so, this feels uncomfortable but resonates.
Being in a new organisation
All this setting up of a new organisation and a blank slate brings with it a consciousness of culture. I’m definitely watching behaviours and decisions with an extra layer of awareness, knowing that these are much more within our gift than in pre-existing trams.
This also comes with learning to communicate with a new team, because our frames of reference are all different. Setting up a new organisation means we’re thinking about culture.
And because it’s all hands to the deck, I’ve learned about the finances and handled that for a bit, and I’ve been doing other tricky things too, like procurement. More on that another time.
As with all this, thanks to good friends for the support amid the busy times. I nearly felt nearly submerged at points but was rescued by my lovely work wife (sorry to her actual husband, I’m stealing her) and good friends knowing to ask and poke when I’m not ok. I joke about the bat signal going up, but I’m very grateful for the gang around me. It actually makes taking time off last year feel more ok, because then it’s something I’ve learned from and will try not to repeat, rather than something happens when things are overwhelming.
Topically enough, I pinched this from Emma today…
In other fun…
My siblings are enjoying the regular messages about which royal I’ve spotted going past the office today (not a royal in the picture, just illustrative of Horseguards on a casual Thursday)
I went to Valencia for a weekend…
And thinking back to where this blog post started, I had a glorious time at Civ Tech – I didn’t know much about the brilliant work they’re doing and now I’m very jealous.
Every time I come to Edinburgh I want to move here, and the lovely people and excellent jobs don’t help I tell you!
Interesting things I found on the Internet
Here are 24 cognitive biases that are warping your perception of reality
Our 2018 Financial Results & Taxes β Convivio
What To Expect When You’re Consulting – which really rang true.
I really liked this from Rachel on her first 40 days as CEO so very human and appealing.
p.s. London is gorgeous, did I mention that?
controversially 