Week 5 lectures

Today we had 20 minutes of marketing followed by what appeared to be a 1 hour side track. No wonder I haven't been able to make sense of it - as one of the other students said "most of it is common sense, wrapped up in waffle" I'm sure that's not the case really but that's definitely how it seems right now. I think reading the book and working to the assignment is the only positive way forward.

Then we had MIE - I forgot the booklet (although had read the stuff) which made my life tricky. Video of MR Prof Handy (Now my recollection is his books are readable) which was useful about the 4 org cultures (glad I did the questionnaire back in PGCE days - wonder how different the results would be now I am happy at work). Glad we've lost our Dionysus today, and we are small and task oriented and likely to stay that way. Then stuff about 2 other Management theorists. Also got assessment criteria for assignment. Not like assessment criteria I've seen before but I guess I just do my best to produce something that falls in the excellent categories and hopefully I'll succeed in getting somewhere with the results.

Had the issue mentioned previously explained - basically do you have strategies to cope with negative situations that work well by the sounds of things. Best change that then - I think I do pretty well on coping strategies, and the old mood diary is definitely a constructive tool already. (who says having 3 weeks off sick because the contents of your head was so terrifying was a bad experience then? I learned! I left! I do this now, I apply some of the self help books periodically). Tutor exhibited concern about my other weakest point (no career plan) - but we will be doing a related session, and I'll see if I manage to get more constructive and directionful - in theory at least! It's hard to have a career plan when it consists of "consolidate until Mar 2006, do this course, POS 2nd year, like to stay in current post till 2008, won't settle for less than office manager somewhere", does depend on settling of restructures at LCC as that is a possible future, I like to focus on one thing and this year it's this course - it's the first one I've done that I've really been interested in!

Finally we had Data handling - not as hideous as the bus experience had lead me to believe it would be - take it easy, apply the logic and above all remember the golden rule "algebra is a tool to cut through the words to find out the bits of information you need out of all the info you are given" which lets face it I spent 2 years teaching adult numeracy on that basis.

Work stuff is bubbling up - time management still has holes by being too available but what do you do when damage limitation between colleagues is required? Firm but supportive consistent advice (talk to them now, no matter how hard it is - it's got to be better than leaving) is all I can do. That and encourage the other party to be work focused at work no matter how much the outside work stuff sucks (oh and it does - never co parent, never have kids is the lesson from that one). In the meanwhile focus on more jobs done than jobs in so I don't become like the crazy rats in maze type manager that so much of the management theory we read today was about. Tally sheets - giving a girl a great sense of freedom!

Reading on the bus - point to follow up with tutor enc

Mega bus - to catch up on all your reading needs!
I used my long bus journey well - reading several of the MIE booklets. Presentations - I wonder do the people who write these (lecturers I'm assuming) not remember that they are continually presenting? Or maybe I've just read too many of these booklets. I know lots of people have a fear of presenting but perhaps if people didn't always start giving you guidance from the "we know you hate it but you have to" stand point and took a "this is a process that it's good to learn to love no matter how you feel now" it would all be more positive. Or maybe I just like standing up and spouting off with an air of authority too much to not be properly prepared. As usual it was a valid expenditure of time as some timely reminders on "don't pack too much in" this time.
Then read the Unit 1 (well we've been told which ones to read for homework, this hadn't come up and I had forgotten to get round to it) booklet which is about - this stuff. Had an interesting time with the "what makes an effective self developer". the lowest scoring items were "Clear realistic aims and career plan" as I'm not really sure. I feel this current role has a year of development to go - along side this course, by which stage I thought I'd start looking at what is out there and in March 2006 when the funding runs out I would have an idea where to next. At them moment there is nowhere to go but consolidate and I'm restarting having given up teaching last year. Perhaps I need to do something sooner, although it does feel like a paper exercise for the purpose of this course. The other item was "Is skilled at Self protection where needed" because I don't know what this means. Nor did my companion. Must follow this up with the tutor.

I now plan to have a 6 week experiment with the personal journal layout they suggest. I think I'll use it to focus on learning around my new minion who starts next week. It'll be odd as I don't think I have a choice about doing it on paper not on a keyboard. Think I may run the structured diary in parallel and continue with this as well, presumeably the discipline of the diary will spill over into this but need to ensure I have as much as possible to draw on for the assignment.

Also did the specified homework reading about "what a manager does" - bit tricky when you have italians doing weird stuff around you - so reread and make the required notes will be necessary. Obviously the literature is talking about someone who is purely a manager not a manager of X so spends some time managing and some time at the bottom of a heap being managed by with responsibilities for other stuff. I am primarily an administrator and I would say about 50% of my time is spend in the way these theorists summarise management but I don't have a person to manage. It has scared me - how would I feel I was achieving anything if my role was like those descriped - there's so little physical output or completion of tasks which is the way I measure my sense of success currently. If I'm not cut out to become a manager does that mean I will be stuck at this level for ever?

Week 4 lessons

This week we had more crazy marketing - the video made sense however, and I think reading the book will be helpful. The lecturer gets so lost in his stories that I loose the point I think (that and not knowing what the stories are about a lot of the time, I really don't have a clue do I?)

MIE was interesting - having recovered from the trauma of Sunday/Monday ran through a bunch of the stuff on HRs slides again with a bit of extra explanation and the Kineeky book got several references again, I feel it may have to accompany the coach trip to London this weekend. Then a "when has the halo/etc etc things happened to you" think and then group discussion. I am some kind of terminal optimist despite the evidence to the contrary I think since I go for the +VA spin on all these ways of identifying with people. Not so others but they seem to have "typical"bosses - the ones that do the "fix this, do that, amend the other" with no feedback sandwiches ever (good stuff bad stuff good stuff). The mood diary is progressing - it may be a side experiment but even if it shows me anything it'll be worthwhile. The stop and think isn't doing so well. Must try harder

Post homework trauma

Hmmm Yesterdays homework is proving more destructive than initially suspected - thought that the reflection herein would have been a damage limitation but I am still suffering from the "I am worthless, I am ..." sense in the emotional part of my brain which is making a determined effort to block and undermine the logical bit (that is being constructive) which is saying "this doesn't matter as long as you get on with the tasks in hand, complete them and move forward". The biology that is reminding me that fundamentally the only purpose that our bodies are designed to have is as a baby machine, and I have yet to consider this path is for me so the monthly intrusion always causes a "$£$%$," response is a bit of bad timing too. Plus not having a task that I feel completion of which will give me a sense of work based achievement is an agravator. Sadly I have spend far too much of the last 16 hours trying to logic away the damage of 2 hours reading and doing exercises. I did read a bunch of stuff for Data handling after last nights entry that was sufficient a lift to aid untroubled sleep at least.

It would be so easy just to blame the biology for the impatience with it all, is this a cop out or is this a valid course of action? Should I become one of those people who organises themselves around their monthly cycle? Seems ridiculous when I am normally oblivious to any emotional or physical build-up like so many unfortunate people are, Oh no - I do recollect 2 years ago finding the interpersonal issues at work most tearful 4 days before I was due on (in this instance the overwhelming worthless ness starting 1/2 a day before). After 4 months of this I gave up teaching altogether (this had been my try a different type of teaching before I leave the profession I spent the last 3 years battling with so was a last ditch attempt). Something to monitor? I am wary - will I falsely anticipate and create a problem if I am investigating this idea?

Hmm feeling better already - have a potential project - I sense a mood diary coming on!

Developing self awareness homework

Well this is a sorry little can of worms to have opened. Today I worked through the homework pack for the session on Tuesday for MIE. There were little exercises that you do and one was "write down the adjectives that describe you" Then there was the question the answer to which indicated that not one of the adjectives I used described how I see me, I'd answered the question "Write down the adjectives that describe how you think other people see you". Which lead to the whole sorry rehashing of the "I feel invisible" self image thing that so much of what I am revolves around. It's not that I don't think I am visible, but that I want my impact on others to be minimal - because that would be suggesting I was actually important. Quite a quandary - of course you want to matter to people, but I don't want to be inconvenient and I only want to have positive impacts on people and ... Hmmm The down side is of course I underestimate me a lot, I probably underachieve considerably and I get wound up about things too much, the up side is I can be mediator and see both sides of an argument very easily. I had forgotten the whole invisible me thing - in my newer more shiny cheery life that I have had recently so it was a surprise to find it is still alive and well lurking in my mind. Probably aggravated by certain amounts of new people of value to my partner not appearing to have warmed to me, and me being a little not sure where I stand with them, and others who have, but my line of connection is still through partner. One of those "it's been 6 months" kind of things.

So self image - not too positive but I'm quite used to living with this - I feel it drives a lot of my thirst for knowledge, however it may block my putting that knowledge to constructive use. Therefore I think the logical thing to do is to put this exploration on the back burner until I complete my PCM otherwise the potential trauma of it's resolution could significantly block the completion of the course - which wouldn't do my self image any good at all!

The final chunk of this work was a lot more positive - it was about how groups interact - public Arena/internal stuff. That was good - could spot people in may teams I have worked in as the extremes of this. Despite my potentially destructive self image I think I have a pretty healthy public arena within the group I work in - however not convinced that the "interviewer" mode that my boss seems to fall in is the best mode for the manager of our current team in light of last weeks team day. I'm not sure that it would be wise to introduce this concept to him right now though!

Staff development day 13 October

Today was a staff development day. How could you dread such a thing when the walk there was so glorious. Always good to have a positive approach. Did this thing which facilitator called a Road map - which didn't make sense to me, but what we did was create a picture of our journey for the last year - which once they got started was OK, apart from the whole drawing thing - not so good on the pictures not words side yet. I think it was meant as a bonding exercise - I managed to get ridiculed for one piece of imagery, and 4 people managed to avoid doing much contributing. I forced one to do a bit at the end but I think the facilitators should have done a bit more prodding.

We did a SWOT on the organisation. I like that - SWOTs are so often navel gazing tools that this was good. I notice the list on a lot of peoples paper for S was a bit short... Shame, but hey that'll be why we need today! I think that is a weakness that was missed - too many people are unwilling to spend time on praising what is good. Gives more grist to AA and my plan for "Positive Wednesdays in the Admin office" We didn't get to the O and T as the rest of the day was spent looking at the W and how we could address them.
All our Ws were listed, then we all had a shot at prioritising them. The understanding of others roles came out as the one most in need of addressing (not, surprisingly, the whole thing that others called lack of communication but I still think is a lack of effective communication as we all do lots of attempts at communication). We all shared our perceptions of our own role, how others help, what could be improved, and how this could be done. I found my perception of some peoples roles was way off (I thought it was part of the tutor/organisers job to recruit students to the courses not everyone else's, she felt otherwise. This could explain a lot) this section also put a lie to the stuff from last nights case study where there had been an assumption that all extroverts were not reflectors because there was plenty indication this is not the case here. Must not forget that. Also I discovered that I need to not tell so much stuff to the boss - he does the "how can I fix this" response to what I say apparently where I have said most things in an information exchange kind of way. More venting of frustration here, less verbal expression of it may be the way forward, after all writing it down makes it as real as saying it for an Iola.

Finished with a 10 minute group work - each group had to say nice stuff about every other member of staff. Lets hope people take on board what was said. I don't think our staff absorb the complements as well as they should. I like being described as a "miracle worker" (not quite, but I try very hard), "always has time for you" (perhaps this explains my backlog, but it is the persona I have worked to have at work) and "highly organised" (there's room for improvement but I do my best). Tomorrow I will have to be assertive at JA and say "stats first newsletter 2nd" and try to start building on what we did today.

12 october

Today we had more of the marketing man who tells us stuff about slides. Hmm bit more comprehensible but definite feeling of "I will read the book enough to be able to undertake the assignment, marketing appears for people who believe consuming is a good thing". The Video was a lot more comprehensible.

Managing self was good - positive reinforcement of the "you will have done the homework so this is the next step" none of this pandering to people who aren't investing back. The case study threw up a lot of thorns, a Call centre uses personality profiles to channel it's staff's careers should this be applied elsewhere? I think I'm on the side of "personality profiles are good for people taking responsibility for their own actions but it's a bit unfair to force staff into it". One guy made a good point about money ultimately driving most employers - but if you get your profiling right then you will gain more financially so it is worth it.

Data handling - well Standard deviation makes more sense now. Lets see if I can be made to understand a purpose for it beyond "you need to know it to pass an exam" DDs explanations are entertaining, not always the clearest but sufficiently dynamic to make you want to exert yourself to fill in the gaps which is probably what is intended, afterall isn't teaching partially about creating a desire to know more, hence my departure from that profession for fear of failing on this score (the first departure, the 2nd departure from teaching being a simple loathing kind of thing).

Personality profiling

Today I completed some personality profiles. They both said stuff that made sense. Eysenck's test was nicer to do - yes no answers which aren't always possible but not too bad, rather than the "which 2 statements do you agree with more" type which is always guaranteed to irritate - lots of "hmm neither or both" gently getting more irate as the questionnaire proceeds (compounded by the irritation of poor photocopying so the beginning of every line of text on the left hand pages was missing for the whole workbook. ARRRGH so very slack). It was the potted Myers Briggs one (if only I could find my Myers Briggs stuff from the day I went to 5 years ago to compare) The outcome was fine - in a "you can see how this fits like you can see how your sun star horoscope fits" kind of a way. All very nice about your personality so you are happy... The first one had one of those grids where you mark how far along the scale you fall that I have yet to work out how to interpret, but perhaps someone will tell me on Tuesday. That kind of grid that you are generally too embarrassed to tell the teacher you don't understand... Perhaps it's time to get over that.

Anyway personality profiling - very interesting tool, always better to do when you need a bit of positive reinforcement I feel (like reading self help books) than when you are "hey lifes looking good " zone which having found a car to buy without the trauma of lots of garages is the place I'm in right now, might be a little less willing to find fault with the resources and test and more committed to why this is good. Also I fear that peoples lack of willingness to open themselves up for investigation makes it very hard to use them as a management of others building tool - very much a personal thing. Finally I feel I need to work out how to make use of the knowledge I gain from these. Now I know I'm an Extrovert whatever how will this help me? (like I didn't know I was an extrovert before? Dorothy Lowe helped me find out my external reality was more real long time ago, gave me an excuse for lots of failings!).

Also Personality profiling combined with parental intervention - great tools to avoid the reading to make sense of the lectures required for the last marketing lecture and the prep I meant to do for the next Data handling one. So words of the week are "continue to stop and think" and "make more time for study, stop giving in to the tendency to seek external social stimuli and ignore the books, you know it will get out of hand, those foundations are beginning to rock already...."

Week 2 lessons

Today was week 2 of lessons. I have absolutely no idea what the marketing person is talking about - he seems to have a set of OHPs that he puts up and talks about in no context. Of course if I concentrated harder perhaps ... spent less time wondering why he seems so scared of us...why it seems so disjointed - what I'm supposed to be thinking when he says stuff about different brands (in a "you will all know about these brands and which is supposed to be better" tone of voice. I'm going to have to surcome and ask someone which is better Soni or Amstrad) This is a new experience for me "I'm going to read the book to make sense of the lecturers" is a new thought in my head. Shows how much I've been spoon fed before I guess. Better get used to it. At least I've got the core text, best get reading.

In Managing for Improving Performance (MIP) we have been given a clear indication of how much (as a minimum) we are supposed to put in on each course outside the lectures - "spend about 2 hours reading this for next week". I guess I can infer that's the same for each module, however it does demonstrate this is a steeper learning curve than last week suggested.

Spent today discussing presentations and I had a lesson in "sharing a classroom with a tangent follower" (sub title "what it's like being with Iola when she's not practicing Stop and Think") as there was a random tangent "public v private sector consultation processes" that was persued for a little while. And did it bug me - oh yes! So we don't like being around people like me... which means we have to not be so much like me, because I doubt I'm the only one it irritates. So much better when we stop and think Iola - unlike getting tired openy gob girl in session 3. Perhaps I should apologise to tutor next week, but it just seemed that quite a few were scared by the intro to statistics we had today, so when the "read up on it" came, out the words popped - look at a GCSE level text for this NOT university level. So "Stop and Think even when tired" is to be worked on. Along with "don't get sucked into negativity" which was the lesson from today at work (oh yes and stop and think came in there too).
That and find the text books soon as next week is Standard Deviation and beyond - Standard deviation being just beyond were my stats understanding stops, and as gobby girl you may be expected to have more of a grip than you do, so look what a position you have put yourself in.

Learning styles: I clearly lie

Since we did the learning styles questionnaire (again) and I came out as an activist more than anything else (again) why is it that the preferred learning styles "when you learn best/least" suggestions for a pragmatist are the ones that fit me best (again). Am I some kind of compulsive liar on questionnaires or do I just have no idea what I really do as I go through life? However I do seem to be only just an activist, moderate theorist and pragmatist, very low reflector. This suggests to me I should just get on with embracing everything and acknowledge that learning goes on regardless of how I analyse it.

Interestingly all the activist preferred learning stuff seems to be activities I consider "demonstrating what you already know" but the tutor did say this is a common belief among activists. Hunny and Mumford. Again I wish I knew where the learning styles research I did for teaching may have gone, however this may be one of those tributaries.

But based on all the learning styles stuff I'm going to try and improve my reflector style as it's so low and my targets are to listen more and to stand back and consider more. This weeks mantra is therefore "stop and think". Could do with improving the theorist stuff but as I sort of agree (just not strongly) with most of the things I crossed I don't think I'm ready for that yet. So learning styles: action completing the questionnaire, conclusion clearly I lie, need to get a better self knowledge. I find it easier to relate to the things you can do to improve sections, (being told the answers than having to do the women's own bit) from what I have done I feel I need to focus on listening and considering: stopping and thinking. Progress report on this in one month

Why

Having been told the rationale of the "managing for individual effectiveness" module and read the introductions to the learning journal info I have decided the easiest way for me to keep a learning diary is to blog it. I may change my mind, there may be paper parts too but I think this is the way to go. Mainly because I type faster than I write, partly because I will automatically make it anonymous if its in this means partly because I can and comments later so will be able to track them (as the bumph suggests) and partly because I have discovered I'm more ready to write in this format than on a word document as I can transfer it from anywhere - so can do it at work to vent and edit later if needs be.

Today I have learned that there is a lot to do, I don't seem to have come up with much on my SWOT analysis, I wish I knew where I'd put all the other SWOT things I've done (I suspect it's all in the loft, but it may have gone in the recycling bin - is it important enough to get? May revisit at a later date), and I'm going to have to work hard at staying focused because there are an awful lot of interesting tributaries to this stream to go and explore. I seem more interested in the data handling (it has purpose to me) than the marketing (Iola instinct says convincing people to consume more is bad, Iola needs to re-educate herself as she spends half her working days connected to selling people our services, that's half of what admin in a sure start is about. Just because you wish people were sorted enough not to need our services doesn't make it worthless).