Friday 3 October
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I met my fellow Team members at Ernst & Young (near City Hall) who hosted an evening's entertainment before the Sleep-Out. Although I had met Nic Evans (Key Equipment Finance) at the CNET Awards, I hadn't yet met Steve Clarke (AOL) or Graham Benson (M&M Direct). We sent texts to arrange the meeting place. Our evening started on a high note, in the knowledge we had surpassed out £5,000 target, with the help of a late donation of £1,000 from Sybase - one of Steve' suppliers. |
The evening started with speeches from Ken Deeks (Byte Night founder), the Chief Executive of Action for Children, and others. Apparently, Byte Night is the most profitable fund-raising event in the Action for Children (formerly NCH) calendar, and the London venue (there are others) was expected to raise around £400k. There were about 350 London Sleepers - one from the Public Sector - me!
| Quite a few companies and celebrities generously supported the event. The Ernst & Young contribution , for example, was valued at £35k. They provided everyone with meals, a "chill-out zone" for those who wanted it, and there was a quiz run by BBC TV News Presenter, Emily Maitlis. I think we may have come last! We got full marks in the first round, thanks to Steve, his Smart 'Phone and the Internet (I imagine everyone else cheated, too) but our performance in the other three rounds was dismal. I insisted that the Barbi Doll and Madonna were 50, this year, which certainly didn't help; they are 40. Sorry, Madge! |
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There were also auctions; a Dr Who script signed by David Tennant and Billie Piper went for well over £2,000.
The Bar closed at 11.00 sharp, and we adjourned to Potters Field for the sleep-out. The organisers provided survival bags and brollys, there were ground sheets and refreshments (and breakfast in the morning) was provided. I'm sure you're now thinking this was all very cosy, so you will hopefully be queueing-up to form Public Sector Teams with me next year. Seriously, please let me know if you can join me next year!
A cold night was forecast but, unlike Steve's mate, Matthew Lagden, of Action for Children, who looked like Nanook of the North (as did many others) I slept in T-Shirt & underwear! I felt warm enough to start with, and dozed-off after a while, but awoke frozen, after not much sleep. I did have warm clothing with me, including a sleeping bag liner that Chris made for me when I camp at events like Le Mans, but really couldn't be bothered to clamber in to them, so concentrated on trying to close the gap at the neck of my sleeping bag where a chill draft was getting-in. I couldn't get back to sleep, 'though, so got up at 5.30, had a coffee and bacon buttie, said my goodbyes and home to a nice warm house.
Thursday 2 October
Philip Littleavon, Simon Norbury and I met in Philip's office at Richmond House to discuss my feedback from colleagues on Government Connect Code of Connection compliance progress - and to agree on the package of support to be launched at next week's Socitm Conference. I was pleased with the outcome, and I'm confident that we have a pragmatic way forward that will cement Local Government commitment to what will become a pan-Government strategy for appropriate, safe and secure data sharing.
I'm convinced that by throwing our weight behind the achievement of a secure Government infrastructure after, let's face it, years of fragmentation, procrastination and wasted effort, the public sector ICT profession can considerably extend its authority, consistent with the new agenda that Socitm will be proposing at next week's conference.
Adrian was at a meeting that lasted most of the day in detailed planning of the Society's new CRM implementation. Following which we had a long telephone conversation to bring one another up-to-date on our mutual activities. It was a week ago that Adrian asked "Will you have any gaps when we could have a catch-up call – as things continue to move at breakneck speed?" For one reason, or another, our conversation was delayed until today!
My day ended in catching-up with further correspondence that had been outstanding too long, checking the minutes of the last board meeting, preparing the agenda for the next (at Conference) - then seeing how the sponsorship for tomorrow night is going. Wow! Not too bad!
Wednesday 1 October
With Steve Ballmer in town, today, for the Microsoft "Technologies to Challenge Your Business" Launch at the Southbank Centre (I didn't attend as Geoff was covering the event) Cliff Saran, from Computer Weekly, asked me whether there was a burning question that I would have liked to ask him (SB). Part of my reply was going to be about my frustration over the long delay in launching "Photosynth" since I first saw it demonstrated. I thought I better check the situation, 'though, before I replied and discovered that it's now available to use – and free! http://photosynth.net/ So, I've opened an account, and am going to get synthing.
Much of my day was spent in 'phoning Socitm colleagues around the country to consult on Government Connect and the Code of Connection. I'm so glad I don't work in Telesales! What a thankless task it is in trying to get through to us (and I do know that applies to me as much as anyone). However I did get to speak to many of my peers, and many thanks to all those who took the trouble to call me back.
I made time to review a number of my outstanding actions and tasks – mostly work-related – but decided I should also call my car insurers about an outstanding no-fault crash claim from February 2007. I like to torture myself by going over all the details, then listening to recorded music, before being told the latest excuse for inaction, and I haven't heard from them since the 5th August. Today, a very polite sounding lady informed me, after I'd spent a while listening to music (at least they changed the Frank Sinatra – I've listened to seven complete songs from him in a previous call) they've lost my file. Hey-ho.