5.25 — weeknotes — how is it 4 years at Hounslow already???
I was meant to have Monday as annual leave, not for any specific reason just that time of year to use it up. But there was so much I needed to do, so cancelled the leave but kept the diary as out of office. Bliss! Managed to write the reports and do the majority of the bigger things I’ve been putting off. Ghost annual leave may be something that I need to do on a regular basis!
Tuesday was a hectic day in Hounslow House, apart from fun with trains in the morning, half an hour late for no particular reason. CLT and SLT with reports on Hounslow House use and a digital update. Although we are not calling it the World of Work any more, it’s just how we do things now, it was a good update around the thinking around Hounslow House. Through our Transforming Community Experience (TCE) work, we have ambitions to change the ground floor, to make it more welcoming as a community space. We are also thinking about some pragmatic and tactical changes around the colleague floors to make them more collaborative than they are now.
The Digital update was the first as the new Digital Portfolio in the Delivery Plan although in reality nothing practically changes. Was a good update the key projects, lots going on. Also had the Finance and Performance meeting with the Chief Exec — generally good performance over Digital & IT in terms of performance. Some additional KPIs needed for Information Governance across the Council so will add these for next time and a bit of work needed on the budget.
I was lucky enough to speak at the Digi Gov North event in Manchester on Thursday, just before Andy Burnham. Talked about collaboration and some of the things we have been doing at Socitm / LOTI and Hounslow. Was good to share some of the things we have been doing we some of our Health Partners — was all fine until I lost my way half way through and although it felt like a week, was probably only 30 seconds — took some water and carried on! Andy Burnham was really good — spoke about Doing Digital Differently and the differently was genuinely enabling everyone to access Digital.
Friday was the London and South East regional meeting in the lovely Tower Hamlets new Town Hall. Was a different session — no PowerPoint — a focus on people and a really interactive and connected conversation. Would have been better with some more people coming along — need to have a think about how we can engage more. But that was a great start.
Four years at Hounslow has gone so quickly. I said to someone the other day that it feels like I have been there for 6 minutes and 60 years all at the same time. Covid got in the way, started 6 months after I started, so it really messes with the timeline in your head.
So much has been achieved over the last 4 years, we have delivered so much into the Borough in terms of digital inclusion — connection rates have drastically increased, we have given hundreds of laptops to residents and we are ensuring that digital is part of everything that the organisation is doing. New systems have been implemented, new teams have been built — massive amounts of change. Some things have taken much longer than anyone would have wanted — a number of the legacy systems are finally getting there though. Always more that we can do and always could do things faster — but the change, the culture change, unpicking the data and the technology from years and years ago takes time — but slowly slowly getting there!
Tune of the week: Elton John — I’m Still Standing
