The government I work for called a snap election and the political power is going in a direction it hasn't for 90 something years (we're still in interregnum so updates may be vaguer than usual
After sprinting through our mapping activities over the summer, the next step was user research - so I spent a lot of time putting together a plan for executive approval - after much coordination, many comments and much discussion, it went forward a day before the election was called. Suffice to say we have no done any external user research yet
So our main focus has been internal research. I helped facilitate a few sessions and now we're in analysis.
We've also put together a lot of materials together for our recruitment approach, which we're waiting to move forward with.
I welcomed a new member to my team and worked on providing onboarding resources.
I've been setting up some trauma-informed practice resources for our team, and I'm working on setting up some formalized training and coaching.
I attended a Creative Changemaking in Action learning event with some members of my team
On the personal side, September and October were months when my home life felt more hectic than work. Not only did school start, but also every little thing associated with school (hot lunches, PAC, teacher meet and greets, school bus, fundraising, field trips etc) along with every other activity (girl guides, beavers, swimming, tutoring etc) .... all the life admin, all the mental load. Then in October I travelled a bit - Kelowna for Canadian Thanksgiving and Ottawa for a little visit. And I had a birthday, and halloween.
Related: I did a little experiment where I listed everything I did in one day, not including work tasks (so, kid things, chores, life admin.) It came out to 54 things!
The reason I did this was to make myself feel better - so I could say, "see? it feels like a lot but it's not that bad." It had the complete opposite effect, but it validated my exhaustion.
I had a lovely chat with someone (hi Owen!) who reached out to talk about a blog post I wrote years ago which still feels very relevant (despite the cringy title.) As a result of our chat, I've been making more of an effort to connect the people in my free time instead of hermitting. And on my birthday I resisted the urge to stay home and organized a ghost walk with some lovely people. It's been very nice, and also tiring.
In Ottawa I caught up with Paul and we had a good chat about government, digital transformation and political things. We both worked at GDS, and thinking about that work and the political context at the time slightly eased some of my apprehensions about what's to come for BC.
What was good
Connecting with people, in and out of work.
Lots of good discussion about research approaches and recruitment.
I attended some really inspiring learning sessions. One session, led by Jody Bauche and Kendra Gage, framed engagement and reconciliation work as an ongoing practice of relationship-building, where people with different worldviews can and must work together respectfully with humility, curiosity, positionality, and agreed shared values.
What was hard
So much documentating. I've spent too much time lately documenting plans and seeking approvals. I'm fortunate that in my 15+ years of this work that I've rarely (if ever) had to do this level of pre-planning/documentation, because I've usually been in teams where the approvals were either not required or done by someone else. It slows things down so much.
Feedback. I've been getting and giving a lot of feedback on things recently, and I've been thinking about how feedback is not always the gift we make it out to be. The best feedback strengthens work, but all feedback slows things down, and feedback for the sake of feedback (especially when it's 'nitpicky') often adds delays without adding value (as someone who gets hung up on small details, I am definitely guilty of this.) Anyway, the takeaway for me is to prioritize feedback and let go of some things.
The start of school came with lots of anxieties for my children, especially my eldest who was starting a new school and taking the school bus on her own for the first time. But two months on we're mostly settled.
What else?
I started off November with a bang by speaking about some healthcare work to 250 people. But more on that next time.
I read a few books. Most notable was probably Searches by Vauhini Vara - it feels very relevant to the current moment.
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