4.10 — weeknotes — International Women’s Day and a call for good IG/IT policies…

This week saw international Women’s Day on Tuesday — a global day which celebrates the achievements of women but at the same time calling to #BreakTheBias that Women encounter all the time. The council has had a number of events over the week and coverage on social media has been really positive I think.

The point that I have seen come up a few times this week, is that Women’s day isn’t just one day a year, one week or month but needs to be every day. A shift in the thinking needed to really embed the change. The council has a range of staff networks including Women’s Equality Group, good to be in an organisation taking it seriously. We also have some colleagues on the LOTI Upfront Confidence Course for Women and the Socitm Empowering Women training — both with amazing feedback.

I don’t know whether this is an obvious thing to say or not but I certainly wouldn’t be the person I am today without the Women in my life. Friends, family and colleagues have all had a part in shaping me as a person.

I started the week by kicking off the project to renew and refresh our policies for Information Governance and ICT. Our current policies are of a time, and need to be bought up to date. They are also too long and need to be relevant to the world that we work in now and accessible to staff — or they end up gathering dust on a virtual shelf and are no good to anyone. We are going to do this is true digital style — starting off with some discovery and user research — what makes a good policy — do we need all the policies and so on. We are going to do this in the open as well and after raising it with Eddie and LOTI colleagues on Wednesday at the all member meeting — we are going to do it in LOTI style!

Had a great meeting on Thursday on the policies with LOTI and a colleague from Royal Borough of Greenwich and we are going to further this piece of work together! If you have any great examples of policies that you wouldn’t mind sharing please mail me.

We had our Digital Inclusion Group on Monday where the group went through the latest progress of the Commitment — some really good work happening here. We also welcomed colleagues from NHS into the group as well and are trying to further the working together to join forces across the Borough.

Tuesday was so nice to get into the office, I didn’t have a particular need to go in, other than trying to go in at least once a week to break up the routine. Was really nice to be in the building. Managed to meet up with a few people, have some really good chats and catch-ups with colleagues. Even some hybrid meetings — although probably not good to talk about that as an experience.

Nice to see what was happening as part of our Spring Forward work, we have a number of stalls on the ground floor where partners and colleagues are there to show what they are doing in the borough. We even had a Therapy dog come in!

I even enjoyed the train journey in, managed to read some of my book that I haven't done for weeks, I did however forget that the station isn’t a 2 minute walk from Hounslow House but more like a 10 minute walk. Ended up having to run for the train — luckily the nice guard took pity on me and kept the doors open for me!

Looking forward to being in the building for 2 days next week.

Tune of the Week: Beyoncé — Run the World (Girls) (Official Video)