New job, focusing on people, content designing, development (Weeknotes 11–20 Sep 2020)
So it seems that with the beginning of a new routine, I’m ready to write weeknotes again! I’ve also written some reflections about change, losses, shame, and self-care. A lot has happened since my last blog/weeknotes, including changing jobs!
The last couple of weeks have been a tale of 2 halves. In all honesty, my primary focus has been on my kids and supporting them in their first few weeks at school. It’s a big change for all of us. There’s a lot of school admin and homework to keep on top of, which can be a challenge! We’re still finding our feet and getting used to the new routine.
Work-wise it’s been really great to start getting some normality back to working hours. I’m just hoping that school continues to stay open!
The first 2 months in a new job
I’m now 2.5 months into my new job at Government Digital Service. It’s been a really interesting time and I’ve learnt so much.
Throughout the last 2 months I have:
- Made heaps of notes in my new notebook (which I haven’t yet managed to revisit)
- Shadowed lots of talented content people working hard to keep GOV.UK content clear and simple so users can understand it and do the thing they need to do
- Been inspired and motivated by Civil Service Live — 2 days of talks, workshops and Q&As across the whole civil service (that’s about 450,000 people!)
- Had loads of 1–2–1 chats with folk in my team and beyond (inspirational)
- Been very confused about a lot of things (natural)
- Joined a plethora of slack channels (community-building)
- Asked many questions (confusion still strong but understanding on the up)
- Completed all the mandatory training (woohoo)
- Observed a few Show and tells (impressive work ongoing)
- Got my head around the content and publishing processes (very thorough)
- Failed in my resolution to minimise the number of open tabs I have at any one time (last count was 70, oops)
- Created a very long to-do list of interesting things I want to read (will I ever get around to reading them?)
- Got very distracted by 2 things in particular my new colleagues shared — Window swap (where you get to look through people’s windows around the world, with sound + occasional pets) and the chrome add-on Earth view (you get a new view when you open a new tab)
- Helped out with stuff where my limited knowledge hasn’t been an issue (like note-taking for user research sessions) — you can feel a bit useless in a new job so it feels good when you can do something helpful
- Heard more acronyms in the space of 2 months than in my entire life up until starting this new job
Focusing on people
Over the last 2 weeks I’ve been thinking a lot about relationships at work. Relationships in my team, relationships across the organisation, relationships with stakeholders. I’ve been chatting, workshopping, brainstorming with others on things like:
- How can we make sure everyone in the team feels supported, seen and known?
- How can we spend time together remotely?
- What’s our vision for how we work with others on improving content for our users?
- What are the blockers that get in the way of us achieving our vision and how can we overcome them?
Classic challenges that most organisations wrestle with. I really enjoy grappling with these though, especially with others.
I really liked this tweet from John Cutler. The wellbeing of the people I work with is something I really care about.
It’s been hard getting to know people in a new place while working remotely. The best advice from Kate (my former team-mate who joined us remotely) was to talk to as many people as possible. I’ve been trying to do that and I think it’s the only way. Our community slack channel #coffee-buddies has been a great way to meet random people — each week it pairs you with someone else from across the organisation. So far I’ve met with 3 wonderful people — all in very different disciplines to my own (data standards, technical architecture and development).
Content designing
It’s been great to start doing some real content work in recent weeks. Each piece of work I’ve picked up has been very different, very knotty, very complex. All need thorough interrogation, such as:
- What’s actually being requested here?
- Does this fit the GOV.UK proposition?
- What’s the user need?
- If there’s a clear user need, what’s the best (simplest, clearest) way we can meet it?
- Is there a wider user journey to consider?
- What detail am I missing that I need to ask the subject matter expert about?
It feels great to be content designing and solving problems.
Thinking about development
This week I started thinking about my objectives for the next year in my new role. It’s really hard writing good objectives that will support you in getting you where you want to be.
At GDS we include 1 community objective (that supports and builds your community of practice) and 1 corporate objective (that supports and builds the wider organisation). I think that’s great as it gives us an opportunity to do something a bit different outside our normal job description. The challenge I have is I want to get involved in everything. So I have more thinking to do and some ruthless prioritisation!
And on the subject of development, at work they’ve started a new sharing session where senior leaders share their career journey, offer tips and open themselves up to a Q&A. Such a good idea. From these sessions I’ve picked up the following:
- Develop your resilience before you need it
- Get mentors and coaches — keep a list of people you can ask for feedback, advice or a different perspective
- Look after your body — you need it
- Use time with your line manager to max value — for example to talk through challenges
- Develop critical thinking and analysis skills
- Read widely — including books and papers from different perspectives
- Networking is good — actively and regularly seek people out to talk to and learn from
- Understand others’ perspectives
- If there’s stuff you don’t like about the job you do, actively see how you can change it, remove it, outsource it
- Helping out with recruitment activities will help your own
- Every week ask yourself ‘what are you doing to help your career?’
That’s all I have. Until next time..