Went to @Lofty’s beloved Barrow In Furness yesterday for a work jolly. Christ, what a shithole.
Stopped at Ulverston on the way back which wasn’t much better, and then Preston for tea and it was like a hat-trick of places I thought would be decent but that are no better than St Helens.
Going to Blackburn next week for another, expecting more of the same.
I'm a twit
Didn't get a selfie with the Emlyn Hughes statue then?
"No better than St Helens" is maybe not the strongest brag I've heard
Lovely trip to Blackburn tomorrow. Hoping it’s nicer than Barrow.
I'm a twit
Barrow is famous for a power station (or something). Blackburn is famous for... well, just being a shithole, really.
Blackburn has never struck me as anything over than rough, as a Barrovian.
I'm officially a Chartered Manager, for whatever that's worth.
My sidekick is one lucky lady.Chartered Manager is the highest status that can be awarded in the management and leadership profession. Recognising individuals with exceptional leadership skills and dedication to their own Continuing Professional Development.
Chartered Manager status is a key differentiator, and can only be awarded by the Chartered Management Institute. To achieve Chartered Manager status individuals are assessed on:
- Personal skills
- Expertise in leading people
- Ability to manage and adapt to change
- Applying management skills to deliver positive business results
What can Chartered Managers bring to your organisation?
Chartered Managers sit in every role, sector and industry and are able to demonstrate a positive impact on their organisations. Research shows that:
- 95% say that Chartered Manager demonstrates their use of managerial skills to achieve organisational results
- Each Chartered Manager boosts their business’ revenue by £62k every year
- 78% say that since becoming Chartered, they have had a positive impact on the wider team in their organisation
I'm a twit
The people that invented that nonsense are laughing all the way to the bank
Didn't get the Specialist Applications Team job.
Stock rejection email. No feedback offered. Didn't even ring me to inform me despite me being internal.
Interview was genuinely the best I felt I'd done. I hit every box, I already know 80% of their processes and how to handle them.
Contemplating just building skills and getting the fuck out now. Five roles applied for, five rejections despite me already holding the knowledge internally to do the roles. No marks on record, my stats are all above the team average etc. Rejected for additional tasks within the CC already multiple times. Requested AL for next week fuck em.
It's good pay but mentally it's fucking exhausting. Tedious. Dull as shit. Finding any drive or desire has just fucking evaporated.
Gonna get wrecked, cannot be arsed with this bollocks. Sick of it at this point.Venting like but doing my fucking nut in now.
The two women in my office are having a conversation. One of them said to the other that she's getting her other half a Pizza Hut delivery tonight. The other one said why didn't she take him out to have a meal in the Pizza Hut, that would be much more romantic. The first one replied that she only ever eats at home, she can't eat at posh tables. Oh really, said the second, why's that? Because I eat like an animal, she said, I want to lie down and scoff, I can't eat all proper.
Either me or her needs to get fucking sacked, not sure which.
Can't handle the fine china in pizza hut.
Are you one of those twats who has his degree letters and his chartered manager ststus in his email signature, Baz?
DS, time to get back on the shagging.
I once saw a guy walk into Pizza Hut in Barrow, pay for an ice cream factory then just whip out a big plastic bag and empty all the topping sweets into it before leaving
At my spot some people have animated signatures of trains
The second oldest person in the office (man) waltzed into my sub-office today and announced that the oldest person in the office (woman) was an 'evil old cow' who wanted pushing down the stairs. All of my fellow under-forties immediately started scolding him, but I was absolutely dying. It's not simply that what he said was funny, even though it was, it was that he felt we all needed to know and lobbed it out there. Everybody was too busy seething to appreciate the bizarre nature of it.
Sounds like you need to speak to your line manager, or someone independent a bit higher up and just ask for some developmental feedback or guidance on how to progress. From what I can tell, companies know who they want in a role before that role is ever advertised, so you probably need to get onto the radar before the job exists.
Had my pay review today too, 4.44% payrise and I was one of the chosen ones to get a bonus uplift. Odds of getting sacked now plummeted for at least a year or two
Celebrated the bonus by getting some babybell from the supermarket.
Jimmy, my man, can you sort me out for some 6200LB bearings?
£5.83 plus vat with 'Spare Parts World', now there's a shady-looking operation.
Is it for your car? Go to RS UK for them. Might be few pennies more but at least you can see the certs.
It's for a bike. Might just go to a shop. Pretty sure any sort of 6200 bearings will do, but there are a lot of LB/LLB/LLU type codings which worry me. These thing must be tens of years old so, whilst the size standard still exists I don't know if the LB has been superceded. They are NTN bearings.
LB only has the rubber seal on one side, LLB/LLU on both. B is non-contact, U is contact (I think).
The ones I have extracted have the rubber seals on both sides but are marked LB.
For example, I'm pretty sure this badboy would fit, but then RS has millions that would also ostensibly do the job.
Nothing like a major trauma to make you re-evaluate your priorities.
I posted before about wanting to leave my position/teaching - it's a thing I go through with new challenges and I had ultimately decided to get my head down, put the hard yards in and suffer for a bit, knowing eventually I'd get better at being a Head of Year and it would get easier.
And then last week my mum died in a road traffic collision. She was in ICU for four days while they assessed the extent of her injuries, but it was just too much. My dad had a TIA (small stroke) on New Year's Day and was already having cognitive tests for dementia, so he's taken a big step back. He can do most things himself (except cook) but I do think he'll inevitably go down hill. Question is, how quickly. Can he stay in the house/does he want to, does he need more company, do we look at assisted living or is a cleaner and meals on wheels enough...lots of questions without clear answers.
I know that now is not the time for big decisions, but I don't think I can continue on as Head of Year. My working pattern is not sustainable, or conducive to splitting my time between my own family and my dad. I'd like to go part-time ideally, using my day off either for appointments for dad or doing work, so that my evenings are freed up. Financially it's a big hit, but one we could probably take. I've also thought about taking a break from teaching for a bit, but finding the right job is the next challenge. I'm in the process of applying for a job with a local college as Inclusion and Support Manager, which is well within my wheelhouse, but I do think I'll miss teaching/my school. Familiarity is appealing as well.
Got a call with the Head in the morning. He's been great so far, I've been off for nearly two weeks and everyone has said 'don't come back until you're ready'. Fuck knows when that will be though.
Jesus, that's awful. Sorry to hear.
Sorry to hear, brother. Chin up.
Jesus. That's rough.
My condolences.
Both of my grandads have dementia, and, based on their respective declines, if your old man can still do most things except cook then he probably has at least a year until you need to be getting more heavily involved.
Horrible news Mo. All the best.
Bad shit, Mo, sorry to hear it. I've been through some of that but I can't imagine what the suddenness of something like the road accident must be like.
Sorry for your loss, Mo.
Could you not look at some dependency leave / long term sick, rather than having to step down? Don't go doing your employer any favours at your own expense.
Thanks all, appreciate the comments.
Spikey - work have been great and they won’t want me to step down. The head said he didn’t expect to see me until after the Easter hols (15th April) which was reassuring. I just think for my sanity I might need to give up some responsibility for a bit.
The fucking useless new person has managed to delete all the training resources from the shared drive, as she 'thought she would give it a tidy-up' and there were 'too many files' on there. How do these people manage bodily functions? It's genuinely astounding.
No way to recover them?
'Have you deleted them from the recycle bin?'
(defensively) 'Yes, I'm up to speed now, we didn't need them!'
IT now trying to bring it back from the dead. I think some people have real difficulty with the distinction between tidying a computer hard drive and tidying the living room.
I like the defence resting on the idea no-one else will ever need training in the future, not least her replacement.
This takes me back to reorganising the paper file system at the adult learning college during my work experience. My incredible initiative and efficiency was there from a young age (the girth came a bit later). It was in a meaningless order so I alphabetised them and the old gammons who ran the gaff had a meltdown because they couldn't cope with the change from what they were used to.
The only other person whose job I would want in my team, is leaving. She asked for part time hours which got declined (unlike mine lol) so she’s binning it all off. I thought happy days let’s have it but she’s leaving on MARS (dunno) which apparently means it’s been decided her role doesn’t need to exist, so her job will just disappear. Absolutely diabolical decision, obviously cos I wouldn’t mind a crack at her job, but because her role is very important and the ‘finances’ part of our team will go from shit to whatever’s worst than shit.
Apparently what it means is the tasks she does will be divided between remaining staff, with no change in job title or salary. Count me out of that one, thanks.
Also got sidekick literally crying about her line manager (we both manage her but my line manager flipped a coin for who would be her official line manager and be responsible for her onboarding process, which at the time I felt I lucked out by avoiding it but in hindsight I wish I was chosen) on a regular basis because she goes to him saying he’s giving her too much to do and he plays the sympathetic nice guy and then gives her more stuff he can’t be arsed doing. But then when I’m like ‘shall I bring it up with him?’ she’s NOOOOO cos she’s worried. Think I’ll approach him with caution tomorrow and drop a few hints, cos he sent a ‘is she okay?’ Teams message today when she came out of our one to one with puffy red eyes, so the door has been opened for NO LOL STOP BEING TIGHT
I'm a twit
Giving the PA work to do. What a monster.
The mickey has undone many far better men
Thats part of the problem, she’s not a PA. And she’s not admin. But he treats her like one. It’s funny cos her job is what both of our old jobs was so you’d think he’d be considerate in giving her interesting stuff (like I do!) but he just forwards her stuff and says ‘send this out’ or ‘add the below update to the action plan’ and in the time he sends things like that, he could have just as easily done it himself (like I do!) and let her crack on with writing service specs or arranging days out. He’s got some weird superiority complex, it seems, and definitely revealed himself as an absolute jobsworth, which I never saw coming.
Maybe they’ll go back on the MARS decision thing and I can get the big contracts job and sidekick can have my gig.
I'm a twit