A message from a public sector worker

I’m tired of reading unfair criticism of the public sector; it’s in my timeline on Twitter, it riddles the national press like Cancer and even some of my friends seem to think it’s okay to do. They are wrong, they are all wrong!

I’m sick to death of reading some of the Public Sector workers that I look up to talking, almost apologetically, about working in the sector they do. I work in the public sector and I’m proud of this fact! Collectively, the work We do is amazing, We make a difference every single day; We are a diverse and multi-talented workforce dedicated to serving our communities. You would miss us if we are not there and I sincerely hope you never have to experience this.

You need to understand that We are angry, You need to understand where that anger comes from. We are angry because we have a Government that is striking at our very heart, willfully eroding our ability to deliver outstanding public services; We are angry that colleagues have lost their jobs to redundancy and that the loss of their skills and experience makes us collectively weaker; We are angry that our pensions are under attack; and We are angry that there is so little understanding that the Sector many like criticising most is paradoxically the Sector they rely on most.

On 30th November the public sector unions have declared a day of strike action and rightly so. Industrial action is never something we relish doing, We’d all rather be doing our jobs, the jobs we love. Striking is a last resort, but what other options do we have to make our voices heard than standing together in protest?

I’m serious here, show me another way, convince me we can show our opposition to this Government’s erosion of our services in some other way and I’ll recant all this in a heartbeat.

I suspect a lot of the criticism is bourne of ignorance of exactly what it is that we do, I encounter this all the time when I talk to people. Channeling the immortal voice of Tyler Durden allow me to explain:

Here it is, We collect your bins; We plan, build and maintain your roads; We make sure company’s maintain certain compliances; We make sure restaurants don’t poison you; We run your libraries; We care for the children no one else can or will; We safeguard vulnerable adults and children; We manage the residential care homes that you put your relatives in when you can no longer cope; We heal and care for you when you are sick; We fight your fires; We police your streets; We strive to communicate with communities in the best way we can; and We do all this on lower-than-average salaries, ever-decreasing funds and expectations of savings to be delivered.

Think about this, I mean really think about this, read it again if you need to…now think about this: Do. Not. Fuck. With. Us.

Support the public sector, we’re fighting to best deliver the services you rely on!

 

Two Poems – I am Parenthesis and Boredom

I’m currently working on a number of blog posts, unfortunately none of them are likely to be finished nor edited to the point of readability today. With this in mind I thought I’d use today’s post to share two of my poems with you.

The first poem is called I am Parenthesis and came out fully-formed one morning when I was a student. It forms part of a sonnet sequence, called Moments, which I started at University and have been adding to ever since, one sonnet for every year of my life and always written on the eve of my Birthday.

Moment 2: I am Parenthesis

I am parenthesis,

Curves drawn in freehand

That bend central (spine-like) to stand,

Yet contain nothing.

The sentence is grammatically correct

Without me,

I am an empty bonus.

Nothing

You are a palimpsest

A feint outline of something

I want to see, because

I am a cordon for nothing

And you almost exist,

So, I search to see

A part of you that fills me.

Ends

Quite Recently @Radiovicky recorded me this poem and I loved it! You can listen to her version amongst her Tinyvox Tapes

The Second poem is called Boredom and is a little bit surreal:

Boredom

Fluid inside fluidity

Smoke—distant—ejects lips

Spirals upwards

Wispy, white-on-blue—

You—

The entity observing this

Cease to be

Fluid inside fluidity

Becoming me—

Me—

The being writing this

No longer true

Fluid inside fluidity

Becoming you—

Thought melts through plaster spirals

You imagine were not there.

Floorboards creek to perceptions changing footing

Your eyes are closed, looking

At blue-prints

Tattooing leopard-print;

He escapes before you finish

Diminish? —

We dart with him

To the tranquil within

And there we are stopped—

The spirit adjusts the light of his soul,

Too bright;

Betraying hidden might.

He shades his whole,

Leaning his wasp gently against our leopard.

We prepare with lies,

Echo infant cries.

His mandibles trace possible patterns,

Lost and gone amongst lantern-light.

You incite

Silently,

Everything about yourself.

The spirit watches us leave,

Wishing us health.

I think that he will grieve

That this day we had course to leave,

Though I simply perceive—

Time elevates at rest

A room

Four, torn walls;

Carpet alive,

Mirror hive

Reflecting that within

Monsters eating at skin.

Place?

Why, of course, the face

Where they eat what is best,

Whilst time elevates at rest.

We found it impossible to be bored

When with that smoke we fully explored.

Ends

If you enjoyed these, you can hear me reading some more of my poetry over on my Audioboo:

•  The Branch Snapped off in the Infinite Storm
• A sonnet on love and a sonnet on death
• Housecoat

Memory through Music

I was inspired to write this post by Jules Jackson who wrote a brilliant post called The Soundtrack to Your Life, which I’d recommend that you read…

Despite a total lack of any musical talent (anyone who has heard me singing in the shower can attest to my total inability to carry any form of tune) music has always played a huge part in my life and I find it one of the greatest evocations of memory.

Here are ten memories and the associated soundtrack:

I’m 8 and we are going away to Cornwall in the caravan; it’s the first time I can remember my Dad treating us to his tastes in music. He sings along, capable of carrying a tune and sometimes Mum chips in too; she sings a line here, a chorus there. We listen to the Beatles, Electric Light Orchestra, Cat Stevens, The Carpenters…I remember Follow the Sun by The Beatles most of all: hopeful but sad and a taste like Werther’s Original.

I’m a little older, maybe 10; we’re going away in the caravan again and I’m allowed to sit in the front seat next to my Dad, who is driving. Mum and little brother, Rob, sit in the back. Roy Orbison is Mum’s choice, one of her favourites. There is the repeated refrain ‘Mercy’ at the end of verses and, each time, Mum tickles my ears, which makes me giggle…we all laugh.

It’s 1996 and I’m 14; this is my favourite track from the first music album that I ever buy, the debut, self-titled, album from Savage Garden. I listen to it constantly for months, it’s exciting and it’s mine. Years later I will still remember this feeling each time I buy a new album.

It is 1999 and I’m 17; I’m in the Gatecrasher Superclub in Sheffield. My hair is long, but gelled into hugely improbable spikes and I have swirling patterns made from dots of UV paint all over my face. People have travelled from all around the country (and some much further) to be here on a Saturday night. It feels like being a part of something amazing, a huge mass of people intent on nothing more than dancing and having a good time. This track is playing and a man I’ve never met before tells me he loves my hair, we exchange a sweaty hug and he dances off into the near-dark, grinning broadly. I grin too.

It’s 2001 and I’m 19; I’m at the University of Warwick studying for my degree, the serendipity of chance leads me to meet a fellow student who plays me this track, I’m enthralled, want to hear more and so begins a love of Trip-hop and especially Tricky. The student’s name is William Snow, we spend hours-on-end chatting and laughing together. Neither of us know it, but the future will see us become the dearest of friends; he is Best Man at my wedding, my thousandth man, as Solomon says.

It’s 2002, I’m 20 and the time is 5am; Will and I are walking back to our summer home, across the exposed Gannel Estuary after a night in Newquay’s clubs and beach parties. We are both intoxicated, giggling, silly as we stumble across stones and wet sand sharing stories and secrets like gold and jewels. We start singing this track by Roots Manuva, alternating a line each, until we have finished when we begin again. Before turning in we agree it’s some of our best work, we laugh; we both have work in 3 hours, but it does not matter.

It’s 2004 and I am 23; I’m at a bar with friends when I first see her. It is like I have never seen another human before, I stare, I can’t look away. My friends are talking to me, but I don’t hear, they have faded away and it is just me and her. She comes over to speak to me and it’s exciting but familiar. One day this vision of beauty, spotted in a bar, will be my wife. From the beginning she is the reason I wake up happy, she is my friend and companion, lover and confidant, she is the radiant light melting the frosty dawn and I love her eternally.

It’s 2005 and I’m 24; we are in the church in the village of Wales where I grew up and we are surrounded by all our friends and family. Everyone is sorry, everyone is tearful, we are all gathered there to say goodbye to my Mum, Jaki, who has lost her short battle with Pancreatic cancer. I am touched by the sea of faces that occupy every single pew, that lined the side of the church when the seats ran out. Eva Cassidy sings Fields of Gold and I finally crumple, cry against my family. I am afraid that the tears won’t stop, I come to learn that they don’t, they only slow as the happy memories return. I miss my Mum.

It’s 2006 and I’m 25; we are surrounded by our friends and family again, this time the circumstances are much happier. It is our wedding day, it is the happiest day of my life so far, we are dancing our first dance to James Blunt’s Your Beautiful and I am carefully avoiding treading on Lara’s feet. At the end of the dance, she smiles at me and it’s amazing; I know I will carry that smile down the ages, that it will light my darknesses and warm my nights. I am content.

It’s 2011 and I’m 3 days away from my 30th Birthday; Mos Def’s Umi Says is playing on my laptop as I write this blog. I have never grown tired of this song since it was first played to me and it never ceases to make me smile. I’m smiling now, remembering and smiling.

So, now to finish, just like Jules:

So what I would like to know is:  What is the soundtrack to your life or your life?

We all have them so share…

Change Communication: Rumour Watch

Following on from my post about Change (My favourite word beginning with C) I’ve been giving some though to the common issues that arise during a Change process and some potential tools that could be used to overcome them. Today I’m thinking about Rumours.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines ‘Rumour’ as thus:

Rumour (Noun): Information, often a mixture of truth and untruth, passed around verbally.

My experience is The Organisation is afraid of rumours, they see them as an issue that should be eradicated and come up with a number of solutions to this end that, invariably, will fail. It strikes me you’re as likely to succeed stamping out rumours with reactionary activity as you are to prevent the flow of glacial ice by giving it a stern talking-t0. I think, all-too-often The Organisation looks at rumours in the wrong way.

For me rumours are a good indication of two things about any organisation. Firstly, on the positive side, I always see rumours as a good indication of organisational health, the desire to pass on a piece of information points to an informal information sharing network, which only tend to spring up when you have a workforce who care about the work they do. Rather than worrying that you have rumours in your organisation, start to worry you don’t and no one cares enough to informally pass on information.

The more negative side of rumour is that they often become most prevalent at a time when staff do not feel like they are getting enough information about things that are taking place. During a change process, information is often the most valuable currency; if you’re going through change and suddenly see an increase in the number of rumours circulating throughout the organisation, I would be be inclined to see this as a very clear message from staff: We do not have the information we need around this process. There is no doubt, in this interpretation, that rumours can be damaging to the Change process and, in extreme cases, increase the time it takes staff to engage, but how can you combat the rumours?

One thought I had for helping The Organisation to address rumours during the change process is to run a organisation wide Rumour Watch scheme. Just to say I’ve searched to see if there are any accounts of company’s using anything similar and have not managed to find any, but that doesn’t mean there are not. Likewise, if you like the sound of this idea by all means take it and make it your own; I’m not precious, if it’s used somewhere and  proven to be effective then I will be happy!

The Idea

• Using existing channels, encourage staff to send in the rumours that they have hard circulating around change in the organisation. It would need to be made clear that no areas should be seen as taboo and that no questions will go unanswered, while reassuring that those who wish it will allowed to remain anonymous.

• It might be difficult to encourage people to be honest about the rumours they have heard to begin with, so perhaps start by addressing rumours that have already come to the attention of managers.

• Once you have rumours coming in, it’s time to start answering them. Pick somewhere well used, such as intranet or electronic notice board, and publish the rumours and explanations of the reality on a weekly basis, drawing staff attention to this through normal internal communication channels.

This approach will only work if you are prepared to be completely honest with your workforce. Sometimes rumours will be raised that are entirely accurate but that you were not expecting your staff be aware of yet, deal with it! If they do know about something you thought was secret, then there is little use continuing to pretend that they don’t or that no one else will find out, all the effort you make trying to prevent it will be futile, the evil of the world cannot be forced back into Pandora’s Box!

Love to hear if people have any thoughts on this: Does it seem like an good solution to the ‘problem’ of rumours within organisations? Do you know of similar schemes being operated by organisations during Change? Do you have any organisation rumour horror stories? I’d be interested to hear from you, why not post me a comment below.

Please note: I make frequent references to ‘The Organisation’, this is used as a generic term, it does not immediately (or logically) follow that I am necessarily referring to the organisation that I work for or any other particular organisation.

#warwick4amproject got our Shakespeare on.

Despite claims this morning to the contrary, I have not temporarily evolved beyond the reach of sleep so this is the post I started this morning on getting home from the Shakespeare’s birthplace (If you want to read more on the background see: The 2nd Warwick 4am Project.)

I had a fantastic night, so I’d like to start by offering a huge thanks to everyone who took part on this rather icy November morning and made it the experience it was. None of this would have happened without Sasha Taylor, Nivi Morales, Glynis Powell and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, thank you all for making such a memorable evening and to all our photographers for bringing their cameras and enthusiasm to capture the magic of 4am.

13 photographers were present and we had total unrestricted access to the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust visitors centre, the house grounds and Shakespeare’s birthplace itself. On behalf of all those who took part, I think I am safe to say that we are eternally greatful to the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust for their kind hospitality throughout our time with them.

From the very moment we arrived at the visitor’s centre where our experience began, we found ourselves in the very capable hands of Don Foster, one of the Trust’s guides who took us on a whistle-stop tour of the visitor’s centre and the history of Shakespeare! Don was proof of a theory that I have, but seldom get to test, that the ability to talk with great passion and enthusiasm about a subject at 4am in the morning is truly an indication of a genuine love. It was during this tour that an early highlight of the event came for me, with a chance to see and photograph a genuine First Folio:

First Folio of Shakespeare's Plays

I imagine that’s how Christians would feel seeing the tablets bearing the ten commandments, it was my first time being that close to one of the folios  and I have to say it felt exciting.

Unfortunately, due to the constraints of time, it wasn’t long before the tour of the visitors centre was concluded and we were led through the house gardens and into Shakespeare’s Birthplace. We couldn’t have had much better conditions this morning for creating an atmosphere around the event and as we walked through the grounds low fog gave everything a ethereal air of improbability. Once in the house we were treated to a brief history of the building and its occupants before, at 3:57am we were invited to explore the house. We were all very grateful that Don, from the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, was always on hand to answer any questions that any of our photographers had on history and the artefacts in the house.

The photographers needed little encouragement to explore and within moments of the off everyone had gone their separate ways, spreading out throughout the house and grounds searching for their ideal shot, which is always great to see. I spent my time wandering around the house capturing photographs on my phone and taking in the history of the place. For well over an hour (Special thanks to the Trust for allowing us those extra minutes to finish off.) the house reverberated with excitement and the sound of shutters closing and in what seemed like no time, we found ourselves huddled together outside the house for our final shot of the evening:

2nd #Warwick4amproject Group Photograph

 

It was a highlight for all of us who had been involved in organising  to see lots of tired faces and beaming smiles from the photographers as we all trooped out from the Visitor’s Centre at the end of the event. Thanks again to all those involved and to anyone reading this who hasn’t yet been to the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, it’s well worth a trip to Stratford-Upon-Avon just to pay them a visit!

You can see the pictures taken at the Warwick 4am Project on our Flickr Group and my shots from the evening can be found on My Flickr Page.

What next

Just about everyone present this morning asked us at the end of the event what was next for the #Warwick4amproject which was lovely to be asked. We are currently looking into events for 2012 with Coventry Cathedral being one of the venues we’re hoping for next, but watch this space, we have your email addresses and will notify you as soon as we have more definite arrangements.

On a personal level, I think Shakespeare’s Birthplace is going to be pretty difficult to top as a venue, but I am always happy to be proved wrong. If you have a venue that you think might be ideal for a 4am Project and would be willing to open it at this magical hour in the morning, I feel sure we know some photographers who would love to come and take some pictures.

Call to arms

If you’re reading this thinking, ‘I’d love to be involved in something like that’. Then it’s very simple really, if no one is running an event like this in your area, you’re welcome to join in and come along to our next event, but better still, why not organise your own event for your area. What’s stopping you?

Learning to read stone

It is around 4am, I am 19. seeking a moments peace in a night of excess, I stumble from the beach party on Newquay’s Towan beach and around to the next cove and sit beside a large rock, my back against it. I stare out to sea. I enjoy a cigarette, spend a few minutes trying to send myself a text saying: ‘You’re awesome! numsaying?’ (yes, that’s true!) and assess an enjoyable evening. I don’t know how long I’m sat there before I’m joined by someone else nor how long after that before his hand brushes me the first time, then again and then again, I look over. My new companion is gently running his hands over the stone, he has his ear pressed against it and his face is a mix of concentration and elation. I ask him what he is doing, he says: ‘trying to learn to read.’ I make plans in my head to leave soon, he carries on telling me that rocks have been around longer than anything and they’d been watching and storing their memories so they are not lost, ‘it’s all there for us to read, we just need to learn how to unlock  it’. I diplomatically ask if he’s worried about never learning to read stone and he smiles, ‘I probably won’t, but I’d still like to try, should we stop trying things because we may fail?’ I’ve never forgot that.

I’ve written every day for as long as I can remember, these days I write on a laptop, but once upon a time I wrote on paper, a lot of paper and I saved it all. I’ve recently been reading through some of my old writings, stuff going back to my early teens and it’s been both interesting and insightful. I’ve remembered lots, discovered one or two gems of phrasing, pretty much proved the words of a friend that, the only time adult men will experience the thought patterns of a teenager is if they ever suffer serious bouts of mental illness, more interesting than this though I’ve noticed trends. There are certain themes that influence my writing today that have been fairly constant and the earliest theme I found was around the evocation of earth.

Throughout the writing, whether prose or poetry frequently there is support from imagery of the earth: a short story about a man who finds he’s dying and sets about engraving so the stones won’t forget him; a poem about an  man making a book of sand, stones whispering secrets to the night, soliliquys of stones and it goes on. It appears to me an entirely subconscious decision from an early age, I certainly didn’t make the decision to go all earthy, but earthy it seems I am. In terms of the elements: Air, Wind, Water, Fire I have always felt a greater enjoyment and deeper sense of connection with Water, but imagery of water is infrequent throughout my writing.

Sometimes the things that we resent most growing up are the things we end up being most grateful for when we’re older. My parents used to take us to a range of stately homes, archaeological and heritage sites across the UK when we were growing us, sometimes I thought they were boring, but mum loved history and felt it important we see such places. I remember how much my mum loved stately homes, her usual, worry-frowned expression replaced with wonder, awe and excitement, she’d smile. I remember she would walk slowly around making sure to take everything in, read every exhibit, sign and notice, see every artefact and touch as much history as she could. Like my companion on the beach at 19 my Mum was trying to read history from the objects that were there and that saw.

It’s funny how wrong we can be, child me sometimes found it boring visiting those homes and 19 year old me thought trying to learn to read stone was a futile exercise. One of my favourite things as I’ve got older is visiting archaeological sites and I always try and touch as much as I can, searching for that deeper link to objects brimming with stories to tell. Wht not try this: next time you visit a historical site, touch as much as you can, maybe if enough of us do it, we’ll learn to read.

 

The Second Warwick 4am Project

Today I’m excited, as in just under 12 hours I will be taking part in the second Warwickshire 4am Project.

What’s a 4am project?

Well I’m glad you asked. The 4am Project was started by Birmingham-based photographer and creative-type Karen Strunks  in 2008 after a night out brought about a realisation:

After a night out a while back, I was driving from one side of the city to the other. It was around 4am and I was really struck by the cityscape. Streets and roads normally teeming with people and traffic were deserted. The city was asleep and it felt like I had it all to myself. I liked it. – Taken from the 4am Project site

Since 2008 the project has truly become global with the idea of photographing the seldom-seen world of 4am capturing people’s imaginations! I’d highly recommend spending time looking at the gallery on the 4am Project site

I first got involved in organising a Warwickshire 4am project following a tweet from my dear friend Sasha Taylor who was keen to organise one in Warwick and on the 29th May a small group of photographers met to take pictures of St John’s House museum in the town and a good time was had by all.

I should make it clear that I’m not personally a photographer, I like taking pictures but this in no more makes me a photographer than owning a pair of Dr Dre Headphones makes you a hip-hop mogul. For me the draw of the 4am project is two-fold:

1. There is something intoxicating about sharing time with people who are passionate about their chosen artform. I remember looking round at the last event and feeling both happy and proud to have been involved in something that gave all these brilliant people access to a totally unique experience; and
2. It’s about the experience; I love old buildings, the way they are infused with history that seems to whisper and echo down the ages and the opportunity to have access to such buildings at a time few others will ever see, for me, is truly magical! (For more thoughts on this see: On Learning to Read Stone)

So after the first 4am Project in Warwick we were keen to organise another one, but as the lyrics go ‘life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans’ and it’s fair to see until a few weeks ago we weren’t much closer to securing a venue…then enter stage left Nivi Morales who wanted to help us organise another one and with the brilliant matchmaking of Glynis Powell had already found us a venue and wow, what a venue it is!

Tomorrow morning at 4am, thanks to the kind support of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, the second Warwick 4am Project will be taking place at Shakespeare’s Birthplace in the centre of Stratford-upon-Avon! I can’t begin to even put into words, as a writer, poet and lover of literature, just how excited this makes me! I’m heartened by the huge response we’ve had from people and the amount of fantastic photographer that will be present there later. There are only 2 tickets left, so if you’re reading this and thinking ‘why am I not going to that’ then head over to our Eventbrite page and book yourself a ticket!

You can find out more information here:

Warwick 4am Project Home

You should Follow on Twitter:

@Sasha_Taylor

@Nivi_MS

@Paulcoxon81

@ShakespeareBT

@mdoness

@KarenStrunks

All of us organising the Warwick 4am Project are feeling a massive and equal amount of love and gratitude for The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, the work they do is truly amazing in preserving some of the most important history this country has to offer. We highly recommend visiting the Trust Website and their amazing buildings if you’re ever in Stratford.

My favourite word beginning with C

As a writer I love words and language. The English Language, alas the only one I speak, is a beautiful construct, it evolves as we do, increasing it’s lexicon as we find new and interesting ways to describe the world around us. ‘Retweet, Manflu and infograph were all added to official usage this year whilst aerodrome and charabanc all had time called on their existence having fallen out of popular usage. Despite this loss and gain of words, some have remained constant and it’s one such word I dedicate this post to.

The word that I want to talk about is one of my favourite words and concepts. This word was the heart and soul of Charles Darwin’s most celebrated works; in 2008, this word was exactly what the American people wanted to hear and became the catalyst for them doing something that they had not done before; and earlier this year, this word rang out throughout the Arab World and announced their spring of popular discontent and uprisings. The word is, of course, CHANGE.

I was raised to embrace change and over the years I have grown to love it. In my humble opinion there are few greater thrills in life than affecting positive change on whatever scale, micro or macro, it’s a truly amazing thing to be involved in. This said, I have come to realise these sentiments are not shared by everyone.

For many people, change of any type is something to be feared and to be resisted. For these people, things are better when they stay exactly the same and I have noticed this is especially true of Organisational Change, which is the focus of this post. Seth Godin likens change within some organisations to a unicorn in a balloon factory. The people working in the balloon factory know how to make balloons well, just so long as nothing changes, but a unicorn is unknown and many don’t know how to react and they find themselves paralysed with fear. Many of us work in balloon factories, but all of us are living in a world with an ever increasing number of unicorns.

If you’re reading this, whether you work for a Local Authority, like me, or somewhere in the private sector, the chances are that you will have experienced organisational change recently. The global economic slump and faltering recovery has lead (and is leading) to change on an unprecedented scale, the models that we relied on and that worked yesterday no longer work today; the unicorns are running amok.

I find it interesting how organisations deal with change and the way that change is communicated. Time-and-again I hear the same story: a few months into a big change process, where no particular attention has been paid to communication, issues begin popping up all over the place. You begin to hear managers complain that staff are not getting behind the change, malicious rumours are flying around and damaging things begin to leak out to the press, which has the knock-on effects of increasing pressure on everyone and lowers moral dramatically. I was inspired to write about this as there seems to be a worrying trend when these issues start arising.

Picture the scene: 2 months into a change process, no extra thought has been given to internal communication above the norm and a group of managers are meeting to discuss the problems. Manager one reveals that there has been another leak, highly damaging and untraceable; manager two admits savings targets are unlikely to be met as staff are not engaging with change and it goes on…round the table, everyone has issues. Eventually someone will chip in, normally with the smug satisfaction of someone who has created lasting world peace and solved the energy crisis whilst being fellated by a mermaid, they will say: ‘ah but change is a process they are just coming to terms with it…’

They normally go on to talk about the natural cycle of emotions to change, maybe draw a nice curve with the following 5 elements:  Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and, finally, Acceptance. Normally this is used to justify no special attention being paid to internal communication, ‘hey, change is a curve right? They’ll get there in the end, let’s just leave them to it!’ Five stages, sounds cool right?

Some of you reading this may recognise the 5 stages from somewhere else, if you’ve been through the process of grieving for a loved-one you’ll know them as the ‘5 Stages of Grief’ or the Kübler-Ross Model of grief. This for me is the first problem, if you’re comparing your change process to the death of a loved-one then there is something massively awry with your approach to change.  Grief is something that happens to people against their will; no one chooses for a loved one to die, no one plans to get divorced or to get raped and here’s the big difference with change. In my opinion, change is something you should do WITH staff, not something that you do TO them.

In my opinion, change communication is simple and best summed up by this: communicate often, keep on message, reinforce the need for and the positive outcomes of change and provide an outlet for staff to ask questions. Simple and no one has to die.

What Remembrance Day Means to Me

I remember we always used to go to church on Remembrance Sunday. There would always be a big service of remembrance at our local church and, dressed in our best, the whole family would go. Sometimes there would be service men there, some young some old and whenever there was, my mum would always go over and speak to them.

I was about 8 or 9 when I first overheard exactly what she said to those men. It was beautifully simple: ‘Thank You’. When we got home I asked her, with the innocence of childhood, what she was thanking them for and this is what she said: ‘I thank them because they have made great sacrifices so we can enjoy the things that we enjoy today!’  I was confused and told her we had learned at school that war was terrible. She explained that wars were terrible, but that wars were never started by the people who ended up fighting them (I learned later many, too many, fighting wars were little more than children). She made me promise that, however my opinions of wars might change, my opinion of servicemen and women should not. It was important to her that I ‘should never stop being grateful for the sacrifices they make’. I never have.

Today I’m wearing a Poppy. Today I’m remembering. Today I’m remembering my Granddad and everyone else who has fought, suffered and lost in wars. Today, as always, I am thankful for the sacrifices made by our armed forces.

If you’re reading this, I’d ask you to remember that today your opinion of wars is largely irrelevant. Today is about the people for whom war isn’t simply a subject to be debated philosophically from armchair safety, today is for those brave heros who lived and suffered through wars. Lest we forget!

Well that’s my difficult first post out of the way. Feeling quite good about it. If you’ve read this post and don’t like these thoughts, stick around I have plenty of others.