Week Minded

Highdown Hill, West Sussex - Photo NJG

It's Friday, one of my non-work days. With some time to myself, I've been reflecting on how it's gone.

What's been happening? How did I show up? Did I learn anything? Did I apply any of that learning? 

Well, yes and no.

Being present in social media channels means that one gets exposed to a lot of noise. Sometimes I contribute to that noise; sometimes, I hope, helpfully.

The week started off really well, with my weekly walk and talk with my Counsellor followed by my continuing to walk further, exploring local pathways not previously walked, but trusting my sense of direction and following the waymarks. In total, some 10k in uncharteristically glorious weather, the benefits of which for my mental and physical wellbeing lasted well into Tuesday. Joyous.

This week also saw two "[insert cause/subject here] Week" campaigns which are both areas of personal interest to me - "Learning at Work Week" (#LAWW21) and "Dementia Action Week" (#DAWW21). 

One of my professional bodies (for whom I work part-time) is an active sponsor of LAWW and we have discussed and acted on this both internally as a team and in our support for the HR, L&D and OD profession externally.

This blog is my activity recognising that, enabling me to reflect on and share what I've learned this week.

It's also Dementia Action Week, a cause close to my heart, for family reasons. I'm a research volunteer for the Join Dementia Research (@BeatDementia) programme, and have been contributing to their online studies since 2014. A few weeks ago, they asked their volunteer community of study participants if they would be prepared to be interviewed to share their story of how and why they got involved. I was selected, interviewed and my story was published this week, as part of their DAW campaign, here: "Making a difference through online research studies".

My hope is that people reading it may be prompted to get involved themselves and thereby add to the data which will hopefully speed understanding about and prevention or cure of this cruel disease.

Then on Wednesday morning, I learned from a friend on facebook that another friend from my college days back in 73-76 had died suddenly of an aneurism. A year younger than me, a wife, grandmother, photographer, generous sharer and all-round lovely person, her death hit me quite hard. 

I've spent a lot of time in the last few months discussing and sorting out my and Mandy's end-of-life admin - Lasting Powers of Attorney, Wills, Funeral Plans - and, having survived heart surgery myself six years ago, death has been much on my mind. Sheila's death and her family's loss really brought this to the fore.

Wednesday was probably the low point of my week. Thursday, however, was satisfyingly clear-minded, focussed and productive.

And here we are, it's Friday already, and today I chose not to join in the weekly 08:00 am #LDinsight tweetchat with my #PLN (Personal Learning Network), and had a long lie and leisurely breakfast instead.

So, what, if anything, did I learn this week?

It's good to to talk | Sometimes you don't need to have a clear destination in mind and you can just enjoy the journey for itself and for whatever physical and mental nourishment it provides | It's OK to have a down day; don't beat yourself up about it | You don't always have to show up; the world will keep turning.

Have a great weekend, folks.

What's in a Number?

Photo by Alexander Suhorucov from Pexels

Ten years ago today, I wrote and published my first ever #blog - "The Blog Bullet - Bitten!", the first of an inconsistent series of musings, commentary, reflections and occasional rants, the culmination of which is today's blog marking that 10 year 'anniversary'.

I've said before that, for me, posting into the digital and social media space is not - and should not - be a numbers game. Twitter, for example, has never been about the number of followers I have, or the number of retweets I get. Blogging has similarly not been about how many posts can I get out per week/month/year, or the number of pageviews (although you bet I do check the stats!).

And yet, with an absolute acknowledgement of the irony herein, here I am writing a blog specifically to make up the numbers and celebrate a spookily serendipitous numerical milestone - 120 blogs in 10 years. That's an average of 12 blogs a year - one a month.

Almost like there was a plan.

But there wasn't.

My purpose in blogging was to reflect and expand on my professional interests and experiences in learning and development, and my interaction with others in related fields, beyond the then 140 character limit of Twitter. I hoped that it would be a two-way street, that others would engage with my posts and that dialogue would ensue. Sometimes, that has been the case.

I've tried to be guided by the mantra "Does this need to be said? Does it need to be said by me? Does it need to be said by me right now?" (Attrib. Craig Ferguson).

Sometimes I've even managed to follow that rule.

Blogging remains a very personal thing for me, and I've taken a very non-systematic approach to it. For example, last year (2020), I posted just two blogs - both about how I was coping with and feeling about COVID-19 and its impact - and in 2019, I posted 15! 

This flies in the teeth of all the accepted wisdom about consistency and audience-building. But, sorry, if I ain't feeling it, it ain't getting written.

That said, I'm grateful to everyone who's ever taken the time to read and comment my posts. If you've found any value, inspiration or just entertainment, then that's good enough for me.

I can't promise anything different in the months - maybe even years - ahead. 

Twitter will continue to be my go-to micro-blogging channel but there will always be that longer blog thing, that blog thing needs to be said, that blog thing that needs to be said by me, that blog thing that needs to be said by me right now!

Like today.

 

Branded Social

Last Saturday, I facilitated a couple of social media workshops at the Sussex CIPD branch Student Employability Skills Conference at the Jurys Inn Hotel in Brighton.

The focus was on helping the talented, emerging HR practitioners currently studying for their CIPD HR qualifications, as well as the more mature practitioners keen to explore and develop their knowledge and understanding of social media in their practice, on developing their professional and personal 'brand' via social channels.

My own professional life has been transformed and enriched by my interactions with others via Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube etc. and they have become an essential part of my own personal learning network (PLN).

As you would expect, I used these tools themselves in the lead up to, during and after (the 'tail') of the conference. In the two workshops on the day (a morning and an afternoon rerun), we played with them and discussed practicalities, everyone's different experiences, collectively answered and reassured ourselves about some of the perceived negative aspects of 'showing up' in public, and some practical advice about operating safely and within/despite corporate social media policies and guidelines. I was very impressed by the openness and insights of the attendees (the majority of whom have grown up with the availability of these channels as a fact of life), as well as the honest curiosity & enquiry of the more experienced HR practitioners who have not yet fully ventured into the social media spaces.

We are well met and better connected as a result.

If you want to get a flavour of the richness and diversity of the subjects covered at the conference and the open, 'social' conversations that happened in the room and online at the same time - and are still happening - check out the Twitter hashtag #MyFuture18. 

And please connect with me on any of these social channels (niallgavinuk) to discuss if and when I can help you with how you or your people could benefit from improving your social media use and brand presence, especially in the L&D and HR world.

Why Tweetchat?

Friday's @LndConnect-hosted #LDInsight Tweetchat on Twitter was framed around the question "What’s the toughest thing about being in L&D?"

Does that first sentence mean anything to you? Or am I talking goobledygook?

Do you use Twitter? Do you know what a Tweetchat is? Do you know what I'm talking about when I refer to @LnDconnect or what these funny @ and # symbols actually mean?

For some people it will indeed be gobbledygook; they are not interested in, and do not use, Twitter, and they will move on without concern. Others may well be aware of Twitter, but may use it in it's more 'social media' sense, connecting informally around people and topics of general interest. Others may use Twitter in a professional capacity, to listen to and learn from other people in their field. And others will use Twitter as an extended Personal Learning Network, with whom they actively engage, discuss, share and learn from.

In each of the above cases, the numbers involved get correspondingly smaller with each group, until finally, we arrive at the participants in the regular (every Friday morning) @LndConnect-hosted #LDInsight Tweetchat. It's a loosely moderated conversation on Learning and Organisational Development topics, which is grouped by the use of the #LDinsight hashtag into a stream which keeps the interactions, comments, questions etc nicely gathered together for ease of discursive flow. 

But there aren't that many people who regularly join in. A recurring theme recently has been about bringing more views and opinions into these conversations, both from within the L&D/OD community itself and from outside - the 'customer voice', if you will. Two conversational streams emerged today - one challenging why non-L&D/OD people would be interested in the first place, and the other about why more L&D/OD people don't show up in this chat, never mind why 'outsiders' don't.

In my experience, some L&Drs find the very idea of a Tweetchat intimidating and/or they lacked confidence of 'public speaking' in an internet-wide forum, whilst others feel that they have nothing to say or contribute to the discussion. We did a quick self-examination of the timeline to check for jargon, of which, reassuringly, there was little (although some later tweets today have cautioned that one profession's jargon may mean something completely different in someone else's!).

But if the future of learning is digital, collective and social, as we are so often told, and are trying to move ourselves towards, why are so many in the profession so reluctant to show up in such an informal and rewarding space? Is it down to timing of the chat? (clashes with the commute); is it fear of saying the 'wrong' thing? (what exactly is the 'right' thing anyway?); is it unfamiliarity with the medium/channel (bet they use facebook in their private life); is it corporate policy? (thou shalt not use social media); is it concern about being seen and engaged with by peers and customers? (can't afford to be seen not to have all the answers, gotta preserve the mystique); is it reluctance to change thinking and practice? Or are Tweetchats just seen as self-congratulatory/self-sympathising chatter for the self-elected 'elite' in the profession?

Those same questions could be asked about why non-L&D/OD people don't join in L&D Tweetchats. And, as importantly, why we don't involve ourselves in other discipline/professions' tweetchats; questions about perceived relevance, value and availability perhaps? What do you think?

I'd suggest that the very fact we felt able to think about how we could engage a wider church, in the chat itself, speaks volumes.  I'd encourage everyone to dip their toes in the water. If you're in L&D/OD, try out #DLinsight (https://twitter.com/search?q=%23ldinsight) every Friday morning between 08:00-09:00UK, #Chat2Lrn (https://twitter.com/chat2lrn?lang=en-gb) or #lrnchat (https://twitter.com/lrnchat?lang=en-gb), or search the Internet for other unrelated, but relevant to you, topics of interest Tweetchats. There's rich learning to be had in all these spaces, folks.

And if I can help you find your way through the social media clutter, don't hesitate to get in touch.

Getting the Get-Together Together

You might remember that I'm organising a 40-Year Drama College reunion in Edinburgh in September.  If not, well, I am. Moving on...

I've mentioned before about how different this experience is being/was going to be since I organised our 20-Year reunion in '93, thanks to the wonders of social media, most especially facebook. 

But those already on facebook are in different groups, different event pages and different friends lists; some people are only on Friends Reunited. And here's another thing - News Flash! Not everyone's on facebook, or Friends Reunited, or email... I know; who'd have thought it? So it's been a bit more challenging to track people down and to get as many people as possible invited. Oh, and the college alumni office was a total waste of time and energy - two phone calls, two emails asking for some support and I heard nothing back, not even an acknowledgement.

 

So, I've delegated those who have engaged on facebook or with whom I'm already in touch via email or telephone, with tracking down as many others as they could. And, as a result, I've had a fair number of email addresses, phone numbers and facebook page referrals. Today, I did a round of mails, calls and facebook messages and it looks like we have a quorum. We are good to go!

I also delegated (well, begged for help on facebook) the task of finding a venue to those still living/working in the Edinburgh area.  And one or two did, with one person in particular - step forward Evelyn Langland - putting some real effort into narrowing it down. So today, I was able to finally book our venue and announce same to the facebook community.

Now I just need to encourage everyone to make sure everyone else is aware of the details - date, time, venue - book my own travel and accommodation, confirm final numbers with the restaurant nearer the time - and my work is done.

And my learning from this? Social Media is not the answer to everything. Sometimes, it gives the impression of connection, when in fact, all you've got is a name on a list. If you ain't talking, you ain't connecting.  Just as face-to-face #tweetups and #unconnect conferences bring my Twitter professional connections to life, so this reunion is bringing my ex-college, 40 year old, virtual connections into focus and reality.

 

I can't wait.