4.08 — weeknotes — smart place with twin city, Issy — getting out and about!
Great to get out and about this week again, I have the opposite problem than normal for the weeknotes, usually I don’t have enough photos but this week have far too many as there have been lots of opportunities!
Tuesday I was in Hounslow House for a visit from our twin city, Issy-les-Moulineaux — https://www.issy.com/en. It’s been a few years since they have come to visit Hounslow given the pandemic and it was great to be able to meet them. One of our team had a starring role as translator for the day — multi talented team in Digital!
I gave a short presentation on the Smart Place work that we have started in the Borough, Issy have done a huge amount of digital work as part of their tourism work — really impressive. We are really keen to work together in this area. So on Thursday I went to the Festival of Business that the Chamber of Commerce were holding in Brentford to continue the discussion. We have a few things that we are going to explore further.
On my walk to the Holiday Inn in Brentford, it was really nice to actually see some of the things that the Council has been working on for a while. I saw the Brentford Digital Dock, a flexible office space and meeting rooms in the centre of Brentford — https://www.digitaldockbrentford.com/. I also saw the rainbow pedestrian crossing, a real positive sign of the inclusion in the Borough! It was also nice to hear an advert for Fostering at Hounslow on Gaydio (LGBT dance radio station) — another really positive sign of inclusivity in the Borough — especially during LGBTQ history month.
Also on Tuesday was the next module of my Level 7 management course. Unfortunately I had to juggle and missed a bit of the middle of the day as I was doing the Smart Place presentation. We had Donna Hall (ex CEX Wigan) come and talk to us about her experiences in Leadership — was genuinely inspirational. She gave us so much to think about! Shaping into a really amazing course — even submitted the first assignment this week as well. Not written anything like this for years and years so was a really push! Glad it’s done!
Thursday was the monthly Hounslow Leadership Group meeting where we had a focus on all the work and support across the council and the borough for domestic abuse. Some great work taking place across the borough and the support and help for staff is really good. A rather strange one as I really didn’t need to do much in the session — found myself having to sit on my hands a bit!
Day off on Friday, which is nice, and needed! Going to spend the weekend in London :-)
Tune of the week: (Little bit of cheesy dance to end the week!) Darude — Feel The Beat
