Ten year Plan - How it is going!

With Hindsight!

Word Count 833 

A friends wedding nearly six years ago  prompted me to start considering where I was heading.  It may have been the beginning of the "mid-life" crisis or a realisation that we were heading for major changes in my career path at the time.  At the time I did not realise quite how much of the crowd I was!

An interesting career that had experienced a lot change up to that point http://www.linkedin.com/in/philipspalding66, was about to become more interesting.  I sat down in the pre-wedding gathering in Weymouth (it had only just been announced as an Olympic venue) and contemplated the 10 year plan.  I made a statement that I would not be teaching full time in the classroom by the age of 50 (Eddie Izzard's new 40!).  I had an early night on the final night went back to the B & B.  Early next morning I boarded the ferry from Weymouth to Jersey.

In Jersey I stayed at my usual hotel in St Helier, the Mountview, and contemplated my statement.  I had a few pints in the more traditional pubs in the West End of St Helier.  A very good one with sporting prints from "antique" times was the venue to watch the Test Match and listen to the sage at the bar who also turned out to be the chairman of the Jersey Cricket Federation.  Picked the right pub!  But then you only have to look at the outside of the pub sometimes and know it is not going to be just q quick half to test the beer and atmosphere.

A few days of visiting my distant cousins in the north of the island (http://www.durrell.org/).  The orangutans seemed well, the funky gibbons were being funky.  They share an enclosure to simulate the Sumatran and Borneo rain forest habitat.  By the end of the break as I flew back into Stansted I had a bit of a plan.  Not quite a cunning plan but one that had light at the end of the tunnel which did not seem to be generated by a Eurostar! 

Another year on from this the following August and certain career paths appeared to be getting narrower (now we see the result good or bad?  http://www.eadt.co.uk/news/suffolk_cabinet_member_under_fire_after_suffolk_slumps_in_league_tables_1_1472060 ).  I was sitting in the bar in Pefki, Rhodes with a good friend shooting the wind as we  prepared for the Wedding.  A Rhodian escape started to be planned.  The mad engineer friend of mine combined with the agri-IT-scientist-teacher came up with a cunning plan.   A sustainable living/ well being plan, but in essence still a plan.

Two days alter back at work and the plan was shelved for another year until I went to Crete.  Fabulous island, cradle of European civilisation (forget mainland Greece)!  Schools Organisational Review (SOR) was just stating to come in and Haverhill along with Lowestoft was in the firing line.  A little bit of relaxation in Hersonissos led to realisation that work-life balance was really not balanced favourably on the cliff edge.  A couple of good nights spent in the company of a very attractive and relaxed Irish girl from Dublin and we started planning again!

The plan was expressed graphically in the Logo above. Sometimes you do not always need to write things down since the written word can always be misinterpreted by "experts".  Visit to a local print shop, and day later had the plan on a disc, five polo shirt (I went there and got the Polo Shirt, T-shirts were not good enough quality).  Scratch Rhodes, Crete would appear to be part of the plan! 

So back to work and another year of battling career change I finally hit the buffers.  An article in the Harvard business review started me thinking.  A position I had occupied through major career traumas such Ofsted, special measures, six (not really sure if some were actually allowed to be) head teachers and school federation was that of a Middle Manager.  The Harvard Review produced some insights (http://2pointfiveageofman.blogspot.co.uk/2010/12/death-of-middle-manager.html).      I had started to blog by this time.  The following March, I made a clean break and walked away from the pressure of achieving continual goals against the trickle down management culture of similar to First World War Generals.  Whistle goes and then over top! (Blackadder Goes Fourth clip here  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IglUmgYGxLM).  

Two years on from the break with the treadmill and the BlackAdder goes Fourth clip seems apt in the context of the East Anglia Daily Times article  http://www.eadt.co.uk/news/suffolk_cabinet_member_under_fire_after_suffolk_slumps_in_league_tables_1_1472060.  

Still have weathered all this, the ten year plan is half way through!.  I have achieved the stated aim of not needing to be in the classroom full time or managing change (for change sake?).   Last time I jumped out of a plane I definitely had a parachute, this time I have to construct it on the way down!  Necessity does become the midwife of creativity and invention!  Here is to more blogging and on ward and upward up with up hill skiing!

Καλημέρα σας και είναι εδώ για τα επόμενα πέντε χρόνια! Ή θα έπρεπε να είναι ένα νέο σχέδιο δέκα χρόνια!

Wellbeing on a Thursday

Getting closer to escaping to that break on Crete

Started Thursday 17th arch 2011
Words 399
S.I.= 79.8%


These are a few of my favourite things


A time to pause briefly.  I have been driving around West Suffolk in ever decreasing circles.  A lot of ground has been covered in what has been quite a complicated piece of organisation and logistics.  Most of the task complete.  Very interesting to see how many businesses there tucked away in barns or down  little country lanes.  Telework  (Telework Association http://www.tca.org.uk/) ideal way to reap benefits of working in a rural environment while having a global presence.  Communications are not great East to West in Suffolk.  However West Suffolk is almost grazed by the M11 and Stansted (plea to airlines could we have a service to Crete from Stansted restored since Aegean Airlines became Greece's national carrier have to trek all the way to Gatwick or Luton) is on the door step.

Looking forward to taking advantage of some the opportunities that the Olympics 2012 events can offer tickets have gone on sale.  There are also opportunities for small businesses to be able to bid for part of the supply chain services.  Most large projects have apparently been managed by multinationals (had a conversation with a big Aussie friend who is subcontracting in Stratford) and most of the actual work is being done by firms in East London.  Suffolk on the doorstep, West Suffolk even more so as only 1 hour away, has a great opportunity.

Todays' blog is ostensibly about wellbeing.  I have found the last few weeks that as I have cranked up the wheels of personal industry that even micro blogging can be useful if you are a small business person to not only sometime record your experiences but also share your expertise.  Shouting in a desert can be almost the same as trying to clap using only one hand.  Tweeting at the moment is turning up a vast array of new contacts and opinions.  As people start to get used to tweeting you start to see the personalities of people emerge.  they are generally positive and forward thinking.  This is infectious on a damp foggy morning in Suffolk. Unlike Facebook 140 characters makes you think of the message you are trying to convey.  Blogging definitely falls into the category of a Reflective Journal that can be used to manage and assess your own Wellbeing.  To quote one of my fellow tweeters on Wellbeing, happy  tweeters keep followers. 

Wednesday and the light at the End of the tunnel

A triffid?

Started Wednesday 09 March 2011 0645 GMT
Words 420
S.I.= 84%

New career starts today... not tomorrow


A sense of purpose is starting to develop as each way point is reached on the voyage of career change.  I have now reached the stage when I can start to write about the new career rather than the plan about how it will take shape.  So far planning has been effective for my futurology skills.

The sense of purpose  that I had when I started teaching had died a number of years ago.  This was a something at the time I did not realise since at the end of each year my benchmark Stats the SATS tests indicated the effectiveness of what I was doing compared to the internal results of Maths and English (usually 20% or in some years 40% difference between Science and the rest) and favourably compared to county and national data .  This was all done without the massive input of advisor/consultant, resources (many years I had no budget at all when a nearby middle schools head of science had 5 GBP per pupil per year to teach science to 9 to 13 year olds this is a paltry investment considering how even 1 inspired scientist engineer can generate millions of tax pounds for the future).  Plus I did not have the same staff and advisors (which came out of school budget) and we still for many years remained on special measures, I even had to do the washing up as I had no technician for many years, well over half, of the 13 I was in teaching.  Yes I persisted against a lot of obstacles because I realised that the pupils we had in front of us were our pension scheme so against the odds of the way the National Curriculum was being run, I continued.

Now I am bringing that same sense of purpose and drive to my new career, working for myself.  This time however, the organisation is mine and will be run primarily with Wellbeing as the foundation block (see Monday's blog).  As the loads get heavier at times in the year the the Wellbeing will be subject to compressive forces, but if the block is suitably robust the business' most important asset (me, have to think that way from the start) should survive as dynamic loading should be within my stress coping envelope.  That is the philosophy behind my actions.  the next few years are going to be interesting as I build a sound economic future independent of banking gamblers!

Tomorrow's bog about Wellbeing!!  

Monday Morning Week 6 of Chinese New Year

Loch Ness  monster spotted on Holiday in Crete

Started Monday 7th March 0530 GMT
Words 531
S.I.= 106.2 % Aspirational Target not met
Week before the Ides of March


looking at the calendar planning what is going to be a very busy week I stated to think of the associations with the times of year.  The Ides of March falls next week on the 15th March.  I have not had a look at Pepys diary for a while, I wonder if anything has changed (ie similar situations different names).

What do I need to achieve by the end of the week?  The first priority is to make sure that I have considered a Wellbeing strategy.  I have found some of the course notes and literature from 2006 when I was a Wellbeing facilitator in my previous job in a school.  As a staff governor ( I really need to update my Linked in profile to reflect my experiences adequately) I took on this role at quite a difficult time for the school.  Special measures  looming again (we just avoided it again), eventually a change of head, acting head was in place, School Re-organisation taking place from 2007 (moves to close Middle Schools in Suffolk, happened in Haverhill and Lowestoft but unsurprisingly not happening anywhere else in Suffolk).

Against this background the one thing that senior management should have been putting in place was a wellbeing strategy but this did not happen.  Now I am running my own business with a view to employing others in the future it is time to make sure that I build my business to be a stress resistant organisation since I can set the agenda and learn from these experiences.

The first question should always be what do we want to achieve?  The second question is what are the benefits to us?  The this what are the costs, both financial and from an emotional intelligence perspective?  The most important out of the four process is the do next bit setting  out aims with a clear time frame and success criteria evaluation.  A detached non-emotional evaluation of the aims then needs to a priority no matter whether there is success or failure.  To quote one of my Twitter communicants    (I will not put her link here as you can search for me and then locate janeaninspires if you so feel inclined) "Tomorrow, instead of looking at what you don't have, examine all that you do have and be grateful! I'm just saying..... :)". Even better  is her comment, "Even if you win the rat race, at the end of the day, you are still a rat! :)" although I still like to win but maybe do it with the original spirit of Baron de Coubatin.

PS also start Advanced Electricians course to be able to install and certify Solar Panels.  A distance learning course I will be using the Wednesday Blog (have achieved career change so do not really need to revisit preparation phase) to be able to keep a reflective diary of the e-learning practice.

PPS Forget almost what was happening with Samuel Pepys? A little bit of blowing his own trumpet (but that is what most diarists do to a certain extent)?  And he was contemplating a career change.  Even then Lawyers and barristers were earning obscene amounts!

Wellbeing on a Thursday

Started Thursday 3rd March 2011 1735 GMT
Words 477
S.I.= 95.6

A year on .......and light has gone back on


A year ago I stepped away from the bull pit of teaching.  The climate in Suffolk schools was indicated recently by the story detailing the effect of top down micro management practices and demands of society on teachers to cure all of it's ills.   I started my own process of establishing a life greater than work balance on this day last year.  On the 2nd December 2010 I stated blogging with the express aim of ordering my reasons and methods of how I had come to make that decision.  More importantly I have used this blog to explore and formulate a game plan for change.  The is blog has been used in part to  establish my own sense of wellbeing and manage a career change in what has been described as  one of the most diffiuclut set of economic circumstances since the 1920s.

I would balance the statement with a conversation I had with a family friend I met in the street yesterday.  This person is the wife of father's former business partner.  She has just retired as teacher after nearly 39 years.  The conversation switched to her own childrens'  experiences of the last year.  She related how her daughter's husband had experienced redundancy three times in the last year.

As we further chatted we moved onto are we really worse off than in the 1920s and 1930s.  Her own father was a Staffordshire farmer during this time.  She could recall her sister who is 20 years older than herself (she comes from  large family as was the case in those times) telling her about the crops her father had to bring home from market and plough in as he could not sell them to anybody.  People did become destitute and follow the Road to Wigan Pier.

Today we do not really have the same constraints as then.  The Welfare state may be being cut but those that sleep on the streets are often there because they choose to escape to that place not because they have to (possibly in a banker free world, I might be drawing too monochromatic a conclusion).

A safety net does exist for those that look for it, we have become over sensitised to story of abuses of the system.  Rightly the ones who take advantage of my diligence in paying my taxes should be exposed.  I also include in this group the leaders of councils who have turned public service into a sector that believes it is doing the same work as private sector PLCs.  I have mentioned before in blogging I believe in a cooperative way of doing business.  Empire builders eventually find they have it collapse around them.  Could we not all benefit from living in a mutually beneficial society that is not part of he ME generation?  Philosophical statement aired.

Monday Week 4 Chinese Lunar Year

Started Monday 28th February 2011 0629 GMT
Words 490
S.I.= 98 %

Week 4 of the Career Change Journey

A good week ahead is planned.  The stone has been rolled up to the top of the hill.  This is the week where the potential of my new start-up business begins to start to roll.

The business plan for each individual area is now going to be formally written.  I have talked about the pressures that have been placed on middle managers in a previous blog.  My own solution to this has been to go back to the fundamental idea of having a product or a service to sell.  I have hopefully? No. I have  used my diverse skills to formulate a economic activity diversification scheme that fits my own particular circumstances.

The underlying principle to be able to achieve this is wellbeing.  This is something that was not a prime concern for the people who I was working for in  previous career incarnations of teacher and and agriculture research.  The curse of the ME culture of the eighties, nineties and noughties promoting the emergence of the yuppie is hopefully over.  Or more importantly will not be a major influence on my activities.  It has to be remembered that a 20 year old yuppie in early 80 became the thirty something in the 90s and the 40 year old redundancy candidate in the noughties. Having trailed along 6 years behind these characters I experienced most of the downturns    just when their 3 year career plans required a change.

My hope is that now reality of monolith building created by the spending from central government has been recognised we may have a healthier future.  Transparency is talked about all the time.  The interweb does make available the same information if not more than what central planning operates on.  By having a fuller picture of the financial constraints most eventualities can be planned for rather reacted against. More refreshing to see the word consultation now actually being used  in the correct way by government.  Would like to have the phrase U-turn banned from journalism and parliament.  It is a sign of adaptability to dynamic processes and the fact a plans when written are not correct when they are implemented as information and situations change.  It is not a virtue to be intransigent about turning (vague reference to somebody who used to wield a handbag).

PS Really good idea launched today a scrappage scheme (reported on BBC Breakfast News London region edition) where old unwanted cars are collected auctioned off and the proceeds donated to charity, may only operate in London but it is a start possibly leading to a new recycling activities of second hand parts.   I have an old Mark 1 MR2 buying new parts is often difficult for older cars which do not really do a lot of miles so a second hand part with life left in would be more carbon footprint friendly. 

Wellbeing on a Thursday

Started Thursday 24th February 2011
Words 479
S.I.= 95.8 %

A small business person but part of a  a big organisation


A Thursday yet again.  As now a small business person I am taking today to reflect and assess my own wellbeing.  Three weeks since lighting the blue touch paper is the rocket still rising?

A big part of the overall consideration of starting your own business is whether you have the resilelnce and the motivation to succeed.  There was an old advert put out by one of the banks in the eighties showing a happy confident individual walking into the house swinging his briefcase.  He announced to his spouse (people did tend to be married in the eighties) that he had the bank on board, he had his backers etc while the being watched adoringly by the home maker.  The reality is and always has been not quite like the advert.

The reason to start your own business are often personal circumstances owing to career change due to redundancy rather than something that is planned.  A good way of assessing your readiness and suitability to a life where you are the boss is a new pack  Working from Home from Law Packs written by Shirley Borret the development director of the  Teleworking Association.  Advice on how to go about being self-employed and the considerations that have to be taken regarding Wellbeing are covered.

One of the biggest problems with being self-employed is the potential to be isolated and feel isolated.  A good way of avoiding this is to be a member of a local group such as a chamber of commerce.  I attended Haverhill Chamber of Commerce's  (part of the Suffolk Chamber of Commerce) informal evening last night at the Sturmer Red Lion (a village that has featured in a few blog posts previously).  I met very interesting people all committed to what they were doing.  There was Elaine who runs Best of Haverhill and has a number of projects on the go that I found refreshing to hear about and recognise as to how her skills complemented the aims of her customers.   I talked to Chris who had just started his own courier business that is now Defra registered to be able to transport birds and animals to shows.  I must though remember where I put the business cards in the many pockets in my jacket, though as we are all Haverhill Chamber of Commerce members it will be easy to get in contact.

The benefit of networking as a small business of events like this extend to Wellbeing .  We met in a friendly atmosphere, people may have been sometimes working in the same market area but it was not like a convention of double double glazing salesmen thrusting a card in your pocket as you shook hands. An opportunity to recognise that all small businesses do experience that fundamental work-life balance dilemma, but can still be smiling. 

Wellbeing on a Thursday

Started Thursday 10th February 2011 0503 GMT
Words 472
S.I. = 94.4%

We are going to the Gym, escaping the Zoo, are you journeying too?

Pausing and reflecting is always a good way of assessing your own personal Wellbeing.  The start of a new business or becoming self-employed is potentially a very stressful occasion.  So pausing and reflecting.

On Monday I blogged about a personal target of  making sure I attended a gym on a regular basis.  This is incredibly important from the point of view arranging your work/homelife balance when working as a home-based worker and business person.

Reflecting on the week is usually a Friday experience.  However, a trojan horse virus on Monday, the first ever that had managed to get past my Firewalls and McAfee programmes.  The holes in Microsoft Windows were  apparent.  Couple this event with BT having an upgrade on Monday night and no broadband until Wednesday morning I could have been in a position of not having an IT using business after only 3 days.

Luckily I have the skills myself to be able to allow business continuity so had back ups of data and alternative strategies of working via the cloud.  Thursday morning and I am just cleaning off the last Trojan off the main system.  The diversified (almost a farming term here) systems  were able to cope although at points my own coping systems  were running at almost 100% capacity.  Having a good work life balance allows the capacity to cope remain  greater than the demand caused .

So planning ahead to arrive safely at Saturday Evening is a good exercise considering the bouncers that have already been bowled. I can cope with these on the Cricket field having opened the batting and kept wicket for a number of sides when I was younger. Sport is definitely a good training for life as I am constantly being reminded.

The gym that I had my induction in on Monday has a very simple system where they encourage the exerciser to be their own personal trainer. The roll back of the general nanny state attitude that pervades British Society? Maybe. A simple colour chart on the wall matched to general time based workout cards educate you to judge what your body is telling you about your physical state while exercising. Inductions to gym where the trainer takes you the edge of your pain envelope have been the norm, but this would appear to not be necessary. Eight o'clock is a good time for me today to take a break and go to the gym,

On the dipity calendar you will see one event I am attending next week that fits very well with some of the IT experiences, This event is being run by Menta and Business Continuity experts. I am always willing to listen to others just in case I have missed the Elephant in the room.So planning ahead to arrive safely at Saturday Evening is a good exercise considering the bouncers hat have already been bowled. I can cope with these on the Cricket field having opened the batting and kept wicket for a number of sides when I was younger. Sport is definitely a good training for life as I am constantly being reminded.

On the dipity timeline you will see one event I am attending next week that fits very well with some of the IT experiences. This event is being run by Menta and Business Continuity experts. I am always willing to listen to others just in case I have missed the Elephant in the room.  

Wednesday and Career Change

Started Wednesday 2nd February 2011 0021 GMT
Words 311
S.I. = 62.2 %

The age of the part-time worker?

The part time worker accounted for nearly 97% of the employment opportunities taken up last year.  The time of the portfolio career is now, it is already happening without consciously or voluntarily being adopted (see previous blogs).

The worrying part of this is that the banking system has become so entrenched in offering mortgage products that rely on full-time employment (usually with both partners workers) over the now relatively short period of 25 years.  People are living longer and will have no legal compunction to retire at 65 very soon.  The state assistance, we had probably better get used to calling it that rather a pension, already does not appear to be given for post Baby Boomers (anybody born after 1962).  Even state sector (now public sector)  pensions are not as attractive a deal to compensate for the "vocational" nature of the job.

Insurance products such Mortgage Protection and Payment Protection Insurance taken out for a rainy day (or months) increasingly do not do what they claim to on the wrapper.  The future may not look so bright for many who are trapped in the house as an investment rather than a home scenario at present.  This dictates how flexible you can be in the choice of what you do to raise your happiness index to a 10.  Many people are doing this and have been doing this for sometime, I am realising that I have been speaking to them as they have been around me for a long time.

So 21st Century Working here I certainly come!  A good starting point for this is the Teleworking Association  (link to blog), a not for profit type organisation of which I became a Director at last weeks' AGM.  So if I do mention it you will know I am only promoting what I preach and practice myself.     

The Friday Analysis

Started Friday 27th January  2011  0936 GMT
Words 296
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Have I got to Friday yet?

Websites that have been visited and thought to be useful

Olive trees - they can be grown in this country Villagio Verde
Teleworking Association -  http://villaggioverde.co.uk/

Looking back to Monday, have I had a non-reactive week?  It certainly has been a very busy and hectic week.  The tracks that I talked about in the blog four days again had literal truth. On Tuesday I attended the AGM of the Teleworking Association.  This was just off Haymarket.  In order to reach this destination I had to train it.  I returned back to Cambridgee station by way of Liverpool Street, the tube to Haymarket followed by another journey underground to King's Cross.  They seem to have sorted the one system of people flow well ahead of the 2012 Olympics.  I passed the by the  Emirates stadium on the way back on the non-stopping train to Cambridge.  I was therefore back in Haverhill (my home town) by 4.30 pm having taken the bus on the final leg of the journey.

On Wednesday I attended in the afternoon a  lecture on Steam in Agriculture delivered by Tom Doig  at my Local Arts Centre (see Link in near the title above).   This reinforced my growing conclusion that things do not really change in production only the distance the end user is from the field.  As with everything the further you are the way from the event the more like magic it appears to be because of the disconnectedness.  Hence we now have a lot of children answering surveys who do not connect cows and milk.

 So in conclusion for today, yes, I have had a week that was non-reactive since I did  not have to perform Newtonian mechanics and send the problem back in the opposite direction after meeting head on.

The Thursday musings on being well

Started Thursday 27th January 2011 0238 Google Server Time
Words 488
S.I. = 97.6 %

Central Heating makes you fat?

On the theme of home working I spotted the above headline in the Daily Mail of the 26th January (Kindle Edition).  According to the article the central heating present in nearly homes may also be responsible for some of the obesity found in the general population.  The effect that central heating  has on the body is to make it feel warm and content.  There is therefore no reason to move.  As the body is up to a more than comfortable temperature natural heat generation by burning calories is not necessary.

This has implications for home workers and their overall health and Wellbeing.  The majority of houses have incredibly efficient thermal barriers to insulate their houses.  I have a late Victorian House that is in a conservation area.  When I was teaching I never quite got round to putting in those double glazing units that would have made the house extremely warm as toast.  Now that I am living in the equivalent of a game preserve (I didn't realise I was such an endangered specimen) I am not allowed to have double glazing units under planning regulations.

The consequence of this that I do not have the locally excessive hot spots that may encourage the conditions whereby unintentional torpor occurs.  So maybe what I loose in perceived pleasant conditions (with accompanying heating costs) I might make up in the long term with overall health benefits.  As we experience more cost cutting in pursuit of headline savings my long term heath costs will also be reduced owing to the fact that I have "shivered" the reserves off .  I might also be able to run to the bus quicker when I am unable to afford to run a car as fuel prices take me back 50 years in time to when everybody used Public Transport.

The design  of my house is the original design.  Some neighbouring properties have had their stair well moved form the centre of the house to the side.  The living room and dining room have then been knocked through to form open plan living.  I am not a great fan of this as it often is a temptation to turn the TV on during meal times killing the art of conversation (another stressor on Wellbeing).   However, the movement of air around the house can be aided by adjusting the radiators so that downstairs they pump out more heat than upstairs.   The flow of air up the stairs is naturally encouraged.  High ceilings mean that  a cloud of hot air develops in each  room.  The carpets in the bedrooms insulate the downstairs rooms, while the loft insulation keep the heat in the bedrooms upstairs.  The same chimney principle is also useful for maintaining a cool house in the summer by opening the appropriate windows.  Simples?

 More on this theme of energy management for the home worker and the promised plant lore will feature
in the Blog 2pointfiveageofman.net.

Career Change on a Wednesday

Started  Wednesday 26th January 2011  0700 GMT
Words  372
S.I.= 74.4 %

Career change is never easy.  Finding the right advice is also not very easy.  The world is not a very friendly place to the people who are having to act quickly because they have financial pressures owing to past trust issues with their financial institutes  (I will leave you to fill in the gaps of what this might mean).

I have  a little expertise in skepticism gained from that so called University of Hard knocks over the last 26 years, a whole generation of slaloming through those gates on the downhill course!

I have visited sometimes many fonts of business knowledge.  I have  been dropped in the font a few times, but managed to swim away.  Each time I have become, just, a little wiser.

As I personally contemplate dipping my toes into the digital ocean and go self-employed for part of my economic activities I have found the Lawpack series, in my case available locally from WHSmith or Staples.   I have used the Self-Employed pack.  This gives a series of useful documents and also a  booklet with a self-assessment test that   tests your motivations for going self-employed.  In other words do you at the moment have the right skills or persistence powers to make a small business a viable start up.  If you do not then it does identify areas that you may need to consider bolstering.  Like  taking a  psychometric test new skills and experiences can alter your profile and your perception of your suitability for this mode of living.

Relevant to home working is a new pack that will appear this week.  I learnt this from the author who is a member of the Teleworking Association.  I am personally going to obtain a copy as I have already used the self-employment pack as an aide de memoir when ticking off the way points to being self-employed.

Tomorrow the forecast is for light snow so I will catching up with those bits that need doing such as the Blog articles for 2pointfiveageofman and kritirecharge.co.uk.

Wellbeing tomorrow is the theme and being well in the dark of January is difficult to achieve.  A herbalists' lore (I am a Botanist/Agriculturalist by training)  will be dipped  into to promote health benefits.  

Wellbeing - the relaxed Thursday evening

This blog started with a full moon

A full moon in Rhodes


Started Thursday 20th January 2011,
Words 355
S.I. = 71%

Yesterday I blogged about embracing the new challenges for economic Wellbeing in the UK.  The challenges I suggested might be partly overcome by using the computing cloud that has come to over above us. The element that will make it a success is the ingenuity of the people using the tools.  They weren't interested in making them themselves as they had other more important roles in my opinion.

The roles in a cooperative society that they chose have been of educators, farmers, engineers, healers, parents and custodians.  Those roles have not changed but some have found they are no longer are required to be managers in  most cases.   They can do what I suggest the majority of people want to do set their own targets and recognise when they have reached their goals.

I read a story in one of the Kindle editions of the newspapers, I will track it down and edit this post later, that suggested many people were keeping quite for fear of the consequences of stating the core facts before they had been embellished by their boss.  The information that is used a s the basis of most decisions is usually readily available now in what Bill Gates called the new university, the internet. Managers are no longer able to hide their mistakes since there are many people watching.  This I hope will lead to a greater Wellbeing of most as they become managed more intelligently and have their emotions taken into account.

I will finish on that.  I have gained my Black Belt in the  Zumo dojo today.  It took over 24 hours for all the tasks to be completed so that I could have a Web 2.0 optimised work tool.  I could not have done this without  the BT Superfast connection and wireless connectivity.  So although I was not particularly happy with BT a month ago it seems as usual to have come good in the end, until the next upgrade.  It is just a matter of applying skills and persistence and not about writing how you are going to get somebody else to solve the problem .

Web 2.0 for Educators - Part 3

Started Tuesday 18th January 2011 8.28 am
Words 337
S.I. Index =  66.8%


The return of the Agora?

If you are reading this you were not too affected by yesterday.  The return to the time of being a  nation of shopkeepers may appear to be a hard step.  We have all been convinced by the idea that if it is delivered to your home it is of better service quality than  queuing to buy it with everybody else.  This is the real life outcome of  the attitudes  portrayed in the John Cleese and (later) Two Ronnies sketch.

The idea of greater prosperity driven by technological advances was supposed to release us from work to have more leisure time.  A premise was enshrined in law that you had to retire at certain age whether you could afford to or not.  This was  taken as a right and was  supported by the National Insurance scheme.  However these expectations no longer apply.  The reasons  are political opinions and I choose not to work in that area.

So how does this relate to Web 2.0.  Well we have  realised the musing from one of my favourite books Hitch hikers Guide to the Galaxy.  The Babel fish is alive and well in the form of an Android phone.  The skills needed to operate a Web 2.0 driven lifestyle will have to be gained rapidly if you are going to compete over the next few new years and retain all your assets (home as opposed to investment property).   The scenarios announced yesterday that included the NHS revamp and the transfer of maternity leave to become paternity leave makes the idea of Teleworking a necessity for most businesses.

For more on Web 2.0  visit the Blogs 2pointfiveageofman.net  and kritirecharge.co.uk.

Hopefully we will then all be able to reclaim our own village green before the council sells it for redevelopment.

PS Look out for the FSB's Keep it local campaign.  Events for social and micro-entrepreneurship will be appearing on the Dipity timeline via the link above.

The worst day of the year?

Started Monday 17th January 2011 849 am GMT
Word Count = 457
S.I. = 91.4 %

This is supposed to be the worst day of the year.  The BBC  have been saying so all the time since 6.00 am.  The NHS is being shaken up with  Middle Managers going and practitioners of first point of contact services ie Nurses and Doctors are becoming in charge of the care not the people behind the desks who are mostly unqualified medically. 

The concerns of some in the business community of the negative economic impact of fathers being allowed to get to know their children was debated.  The Wellbeing to society of welcoming this change  I believe going return more economic benefits than  costs.  It only becomes a problem if you mortgage is based on the joint income of both parents.

 A problem around joint mortgages was created in the eighties when banking regulation was relaxed. We employed the dinkies before they became 30 something and then wanted to start a family.  The cost of this when recession came and both were made redundant wasn't felt by the banks as they still the property to redeem the debt against.  A win win situation!

A life coach was talking essentially about how to get yourself together (lyrics by U2).  To be able to do that can be quite hard especially if you have been a Middle Manager in the public sector.  This is why I started this blog on the 2nd December 2011.  You can listen to all the advice but the person that has to do the career and lifestyle change is you.  Choosing the SMART choices can take a very long time or a short time depending on how you recognise opportunities for success .  Sometimes it is difficult to see the next hill when you are hurtling up the first.  

The Lighthouse Family were on the sofa being asked why they had not been heard of for long.  A comment that struck a chord with me was that they had experience such a vast change in life. It was apparently like skiing very fast down hill.  At the end of my first year in teaching my boss conducted my first appraisal.   The only thing she wrote down as she listened was a drawing of a stick man skiing up a bumpy hill who had not reached the summit.  A very emotionally intelligent manager for me on that occasion. 

The target for the week is to blog on solutions for the news items mentioned on the BBC this morning. 

The Lifestyle tools I have been using for my own  Wellbeing can be found by clicking the buttons in the bar near the title.  For dynamic content You are looking for the buttons  Blog 2pointfiveageof, Blog kritirecharge.co.uk, 2pointfiveageofman.net  and kritirecharge.co.uk.  

The Saturday Supplement

The first time I went in a plane
I jumped out of it.  A Reims Rocket
 was the plane. This was
 not such a silly idea if you
plan ahead and have a parachute
It is only the last inch of 2000ft fall that
does the damage

Started 15th January 2010 09.18 GMT
Number of Words 286

Saturday again time has come round really quickly.  I am going to take this opportunity to take my foot off the gas a little.  Three blogs running, two domains and countless, alright a few, meetings this week around the subject of a micro enterprise designed to support social entrepreneurship has been quite tiring.  But rewarding.  I have distilled down the root cause of my career change into what I feel is a reasonable game plan. I can go and watch  whatever sport I choose this afternoon.  I will be without that now unnecessary and lingering feeling of guilt for not doing the never ending mountain of work expected as a teacher. So  I will  select some of the best experiences of the week.  

Web 2.0 has been a theme.  I came across this video of a little kitten which I used as a final link in yesterday's blog.  We also as the cricket was finishing had a visit from Batman and Superman. 

On the subject of cricket a very good book is Bob Woolmer's Art and Science of Cricket.  I recommend that any parent whose child is taking up cricket should read  pages 616 and 617 which show a bowler's  logbook .   Youngsters can easily become over bowled if they play for school, local club and if good enough county.  Even if you are not a cricket fan the Chapter10 is a brilliant guide to physiology and fitness for any sport. Which leads me onto the final point of mention that a new gym aiming to promote Wellbeing is opening in the town.

I will have a wander down the High Street and complete the Saturday ritual by buying the East Anglian Daily Times

Wellbeing: Are you a Dragon's Den Entrepreneur or Lifetime Indentured Apprentice

So what's your TV preference? Are you a Dragon's Den fan or an Apprentice fan?

Started Thursday 13th January 2010 6.35 am
Word Count 488  Word Limit 500

Success Index (SI) = 98%

SI < 100% =Aspirational Target Achieved

Thursday's Wellbeing theme happens to coincide with the announcement of the Bank of England interest rate.  For the people in this country who still have to be economically active to service their debt this is a very worrying time.  It is probably affecting their overall Wellbeing.

These  people have inadvertently found themselves to be indentured servants of the banks. They  expected this indenturing to allow them passage to the Land of Opportunity across what they thought was a relatively calm sea of life.

They expected to have their release from their indenturship when the law said they had to retire.  

For convenience sake and because they trusted their bank they purchased their ship's ticket through the bank's travel arm.   They shook the hand at the end of the banks' travel arm and watched in wonderment as it then changed into the banks' mortgage arm. 

 As they continued to shake this same hand that had miraculously  changed to the mortgage arm, they listened carefully.  And for a small fee signed up and agreed to vary their financial outlook by reducing their monthly payments.  

Unfortunately like any voyage across an ocean bad things do happen at sea.  The banker was very happy and able to enjoy a skiing holiday.  The  servant wanted to go skiing (spending the kid's inheritance) so again looked down at the hand he was shaking  and was left in awe and wonder as the arm changed back to that of travel again.

The servant became very upset. The bank patted themselves on the back and paid themselves their bonus out of the money the servant had paid  to buy the indenturship.    However, they had signed the loosely worded indenturship and the terms had been met by the bank.  They felt powerless even though they had been morally and ethically wronged.

What I haven't shared so far is that I too have been paid a performance bonus by my bank.  However I am not a banker.  I have been a cooperative society member for the last six years. I buy all my financial services from The Cooperative bank (My Bank shows their corporate face). I receive my performance bonus twice a year.

When I became aware that my financial Wellbeing would be  changing rapidly,  I sought to avoid this Tsunami on my sea of life.  One of my decisions was to change my mortgage to a more expensive ten year fixed mortgage. I continued with my vocation even though I was metaphorically dying on my feet.  So when I finally stopped shaking my employers' hand and walked away I had all my fingers, though they were a little bruised. The bruising is just starting to go 6 months later.

I will share more in the blog 2pointfiveageofman.net.

So what are you? An entreprenurial Dragon? An endentured apprentice? Or a member of a society that cooperates for everybody's benefit?

Which one would you like to be?

Tomorrow the  theme is reflecting on the week's progress.

Week 2 A River runs through

Started Monday 10th January 2011 Started 9.20 pm

Words 350

A very large amount of water flowed past the bottom of my street.  Still the artery is now cleansed, still has the odd shopping trolley here and there.

Previous post set the aspirations of what turned out to be a busy weekend putting the finishing touches to the structure of this blog page.

The next steps for this week are to publish details of the courses I am making available on Schoolsforeverything.  The link you will see in the bar below the article title.

The structure of the blog is such that all information on this page is free.  Links away from the page may lead to opportunities to buy services from or via me.  Alternatively they may just be informative or empowering allowing you to also benefit economically  ie the pay free links to the FSB and Teleworking Association.  My aim is to provide links to websites that promote those aspects of social and micro-entrepreneurship.

This is not about who has most desirable shiny objects and charging the Earth for said baubles. As I have tried to explain in some of my previous blogs (the demise of the role of the middle manager being one example) how managing the change that many people are experience in the UK is a challenge but only another a mole hill.  The trick is to step over the molehill.  If you are feeling extremely small and put upon by the systems you have been working under I can empathise in the true sense of the word.

So by the end of the week one brick in the new foundations of my personal wealth and wellbeing (wellbeing being the more important) should have been put in place. I will repeat the mission statement I made in last night's blog.

In 2017 I will take home the same salary as Steve Jobs.

I will earn $1 salary for the work style and incomes I am involved in at this instant.  This will be more than just enough.

Tomorrow's blog as promised last week will be part 2 of Web 2.0 for Educators.

   

Micro entrepreneurship. What has worked well

Taking the Bull by the Horns,
Minoan Bull

 Started 7:30 am Friday 30th December 2010  
Words 577

Micro-entrepreneurship  is the sub-theme of this blog.  After evaluating the blog yesterday (Blog content) this is the first part of the new cycle.  So what have I discovered and achieved this week?

First is that small can be beautiful.  The danger with a lot of social networking tools is that they can take over and become a means to themselves.  Many businesses are finding that employees are spending a lot of time on Facebook, for example to the detriment of productivity. 

Personally, I do not visit Facebook all that often, owing to the fact that I do not want to know everything that a person is thinking.  Mystery and secrets can be wonderful things.  Also not clever if a recruiter wants an insight into your character.  A small blog article when written well and focusing on a single topic may be  more effective than a display of all your knowledge.  This often leaves a reader a little overwhelmed much as it does in a conversation. The discipline of micro blogging via Twitter removes a lot of the stunned and wonder factor.  However, my experience of Twitter is that there is a lot serial twittering, how do they get the time, whose message sometimes becomes diluted because of the sheer volumes of tweets.  From some sources it is almost like spam email, especially teacher recruitment agencies.  Do they not realise that if you are teaching you only have a small window of opportunity to indulge in tweeting?   

Linking activities and drawing almost Chinese walls between web presences is another conclusion from this week.  Why repeat the same information in a blog (dynamic presence) that could be better served by a static  presence,  a web page?  After all a blog should be like a reflective diary.  It should not be an out and out sales pitch.  Written in a journalistic style it can intrigue and lead people to want to know more.  They  interact and find the information you want to give them.  Then you can do the micro-entrepreneurship from your static presence. It is about time management.  What is the most effective use of your time for producing income streams as a micro-entrepreneur?  

I have spent a bit of time this week looking at a number of areas. Use of Web 2.0 and Cloud Computing and how to make people come to you for your services (which will appear on Tuesday).  Institutions for professional development, which will appear next Wednesday.    On Thursday, those tricky work-life balance issues.  As a Wellbeing Facilitator/champion in a former employment I have over the years acquired some knowledge of this often murky topic.  Which brings us to the free running or free blogging of the weekend, general on Saturday and Lunch on Sunday.   Monday is for that aspirational moment and the intention to ski uphill.

So how long should it take.  About a half-hour per day.  You can always go back to important issues at a later time.  They won't go away, if they do they are not as important as you thought.   This time frame is not difficult, as a teacher I have used reflective practice on occasions.  The trick is to focus on the positive benefits of the experience to best practice.  An Australian technique that was championed by pupil behavior gurus many years ago (do not hear about it too much now) was the ratio of positive to negative comments.  This also applies to any form of communication.  Nobody likes a miserable basket!