Staring out on this new road I wrote an article in 2021 about knowing where you are to be able to plan how to get where you want to be. This is a brief update of the intervening 5 years following my self published Strategic Aims. I have reached more than 60% of the aims though there are some elements which need to be addressed and others updated or replaced as 10 year strategies go, 60% in 5 years is an acceptable return.
I am still a fifty something Programme and Project manager in the UK. In The last 5 years I have worked for 5 different organisation and fulfilled by strategy pledge to work with more people and around the UK. I have been taken to Manchester, Birmingham, Brighton and London and look forward to more of the same in the next 5 years. In short i thought I would like contract work and I actually love it, it really suits how I work and where I add most value. Developing short term project and programmes is a challenging place to be and I have rarely been happier with my working life.
I am married, I live in beautiful North Wales with stunning views out over the Dee Estuary looking overlooking Liverpool, Manchester and beyond to the Pennines. I have a Son who has just reached 25 and is now on his own career path in something that he loves in Hotels.
My wife and I have been bitten earlier in our lives by the travel bug. We have travelled, I would say extensively but whenever you look at a map you realise that the world is a very big place indeed, there are an awful lot of places left on the map. Far to say that we have taken every opportunity presented in the last 5 years. In between projects and on one occasion due to a delay trading off location for engagement, helping the client saving the budget through period of downtime at the same time as making a big dent in the must see and live ‘to do’ list in Uruguay, Argentina, Chile and Brasil. We want to do more of that, now, in good health than retire at 67 and risk not being. I don’t see myself ever actually retiring. I think it is a common thought process for a product of Gen X.
Volunteering, I have reached a natural cycle with volunteering and sports, Iater many years for the first time I am now not on a single board or committee. That will change in the next strategy revision. I will be adding to that a real understanding and engagement in AI. Not simply as a work tool for myself and organisations as they seek to use it but also for wider political and social aspects of a technology which has promised much over the last 5 years and now seems capable of delivering. For good and bad.
So there you have it, my position on the map
Destination Statements: Now I can make may statements of what I want to be (my strategic intent) make sense and work out what change themes and metrics can be applied to make the change. I am going to do this and blog them over the next period of time.