12 months have passed and its time to take stock. Here goes..
If you’re new to this, here’s the last update I made in May ‘08. This year I’m doing away with the Q&A bit and instead I’m going to talk a little.
So, it has been a pretty incredible year in many respects. I’m not going to look at this at a meta level blabbing on about financial systems, politics, news events. This year’s progress update has hit me hard as, looking at my priorities from last May, not a lot seems to have changed.
So, what did I want to do with myself?
More design work
Nope. Nada. Since May I managed to do a really engaging implementation role, incident management and I am now doing a defect management role. I have, as yet, failed to design anything outside of setting up processes and tools that myself and those I work with used.
RESULT: Better luck next year.
Better work <> life balance
70 hour weeks were the norm for me back in May. I am regularly doing the same now. I will likely continue to do so for at least the next few months as well.
RESULT: Suck it up, dude. The hours come with the territory. Just try not to burn out, eh?
Work outside of Financial Services
I’m beginning to sound like a broken record but I didn’t do this either. On this point, however, I’m not to disheartened. I am really enjoying the work that I’m doing in FS and, given the vast amount of change in the domain at the moment, the work is only going to get more and more interesting.
I have been lucky to work with some great people and as more work becomes available I’m hoping that will stand me in good stead. I still want to get in on a project from the beginning and get to contribute to the design of a solution. I’m especially interested in payment processing and fraud.
RESULT: You didn’t do it this time round, but you’re probably better off for the experience.
Do some translation work
Yeah, did that. Didn’t enjoy it. Stopped.
RESULT: At least you tried it.
OK, so looking back out of the way, how am I feeling? In honesty, I am feeling conflicted. On the one hand I love my job and feel that I am doing well in it. The work is diverse, the people are amazing and the hours are oh-so-long. On the other hand, I have people I care very much about and find that the time I can dedicate to them is limited.
Where I go from here, who knows. Changing direction is not likely to fix the problem of the hours I dedicate to my work life as, if I am honest, it is probably in my nature to do this. I will always be the kind of person who puts a lot into my work.
The thing I have learned, then, is that laying the blame for my work life balance squarely at the firm’s door is wrong. It is my attitude that needs to change.
In a year, what will be different? This year is a promotion year so with any luck next May I will have been promoted, but I am braced for this not happening. Given the current climate I think promotion will be difficult to come by.
Other than that, a couple of other projects and the illusive early lifecycle experience would be great.
That’s it for another year. TTFN.
Ladies and gents, I can’t stop watching these videos. Enjoy..
I *love* food. If you know me, you know this is true. Low fat? NO WAY! Use cream whenever you can in your cooking.
To that end I have decided to list my favourite food things. Indulgence. Add your own in the comments..
- Frying things in garlic
- Caramelised onions
- Chocolate rice crispie cakes
- Flake crumbled onto ice cream
- Bananas and custard
- Paratha… buttery, buttery paratha
That is all.
Anybody remember this Barclays advert from not so long ago? I got to thinking about it today, given all that is going on with in the world, and wondered how true the message is today.
The tag line for the series of adverts, of which the one above was just one, was “fluent in finance”. Of course, at the time we see this as a gimmick to get our attention, inspire trust and inevitably come to purchase products / do business with the bank.
Well, that was back in 2002 before the now infamous term credit crunch was coined. How well has Barclays done? Was it as fluent in finance as it wanted us to believe?
Background
Barclays enjoyed the economic highs in recent years as much as the next bank. With its acquisition of the Woolwich in 2000 Barclays became one of the UK’s leading providers of mortgages.
It is evident that Barclays was not without a degree of exposure to the mortgage markets, but certainly its links to the American mortgage market turned out, after much media interest, to be much less than expected.
In more recent times, when other UK banks were taking advantage of government funds to stay afloat Barclays bucked the trend and was able to raise capital itself from private sources (cancellation of dividends, private investors etc).
Fluent in Finance
So the original question was “is Barclays as fluent in finance as it wanted us to believe?”
The answer is a mixed bag, I’d say. Barclays’ exposure to the troubled markets wasn’t exactly small, but certainly it wasn’t so disastrous that the company toppled. Likewise, it didn’t need to lean on the government to keep going, and has continued to perform well as one of the UK’s high street banks given the turmoil.
That said, it did need cash. It just didn’t get it from the government.
You could say that Barclays is pretty conversant in finance, but probably more fluent in business than anything. It is doing reasonably well, still advancing with great products and services (contactless technology, faster payments, credit focus etc). Certainly, like the other banks, it wasn’t a wise place to invest your money on the stock markets, but it definitely was (and is) a half decent place to keep your money safe.
PS: This is clearly a very simplified post. I’m not trying to make in-depth analysis of Barclays’ performance. These are just a few high level, general observations. Feel free to debate in the comments 
Mathew is mighty pissed off, and that’s putting it lightly. In November last year I took out Tiscali’s TV, broadband and phone package and not a day has gone by since where there have not been issues.
I have, therefore, decided to document my experiences in the hope that others will see this and avoid like the plague.
A few comments before I begin:
» The products that Tiscali offers are actually very good. I have no quibbles with the TV, broadband or phone.
» The service that Tiscali offers is, in my opinion, terrible.
In the beginning
In November last year I moved to London and towards the end of the month I got my BT phone line sorted and then went to Tiscali to set up my package. The sales guys were very helpful and so I took out the package, with provisioning due to take a couple of weeks.
Shortly after this I received a letter advising that they would need to push back the installation date, so I called to make a new appointment. The new appointment date, a few days after the original one, came and nobody turned up. So, again I called Tiscali and they advised that they had not arranged for a visit.
Slightly annoyed at having stayed home all day to deal with this, I arranged another visit. This time I needed to work from home to enable this to happen. Again, the day came and no engineer visited. Again, I called Tiscali and was informed that the visit was not arranged because of a system issue of some kind. The agent I spoke to gave the impression this was commonplace.
Finally, with some degree of cajoling, an engineer came (!), set me up and went on his merry way. We were finally up and running.
The new site design is up and running on the site now. Hurray.
I’m working on the page load times (big images :/) but, other than that, it doesn’t seem too bad. Let me know what you think / if you have any problems!
People sometimes remark about me, sometimes to my face but often behind my back, that I am not camp. This is meant to be a compliment. I want to break this down a little.
When people say this they mean it in a nice way. They are saying that they feel it is easier to identify with me because I am more like them. I understand that completely. There is no intent to offend in what they are saying.
You know what I’m about to say, though. It does offend.
What is actually being said is this: My view of homosexuality is of a closed stereotype, where a gay man is camp and enjoys pink things, and a lesbian wears vests and has short hair. Any deviation from this view is to be commended.
Whilst I am not offended at a personal level by the intent of what is said, the subtext to this kind of comment gives away just how much work still needs to be done in addressing the perception of LGBT / queer communities in the eyes of others.
Public Perception
Things like this probably do not help. I am not the first to call it out, either.
I watched this this for the first time on Friday night with my family. What I hadn’t realised until watching it was that this is not the only character playing on the camp stereotype for comedy.
This is not comedy for subversion, to highlight our social ills and get people thinking about how they view homosexuality. Far from it. This is hopping on a growing trend that legitimises this world view.
A Little Sense
I am not a killjoy and I recognise the role of satire / irony in comedy. What I am pointing out here is that we are not in a place yet as a society to start collectively looking gay stereotypes as comedic in this sense. Why? Because the public perception is still that this is the norm in gay culture. It isn’t viewed as a bad stereotype to have.
Until we start to see a more representative, slightly more serious view of the LGBT / queer community we will not see society’s values changing. In the meantime this so-called comedy on our screens will only serve to reinforce the negatively held beliefs that people hold, whether they hold those views consciously or not.
END RANT.
It seems that MacRumours posted a rumour about new Mac Minis and linked to one of my photos on Flickr as an example of the current packaging. Cool 
This has meant I’ve had a few more visitors to this site than usual, which is pretty nice.. you caught me mid-redesign, but nice to see you here in the meantime!
Soon you can expect to see a lot more content appearing, so please check back.
Generally speaking I think I’m quite easy to get along with. I’m approachable, consider my responses, try my best not to make dumb-ass comments unless strictly required. I’m quite familiar in my approach with people, but more often than not recognise where the boundaries lie.
Thus far, this has proven to be a useful skill to have in professional circles. Building relationships quickly should never be underrated. This isn’t a post about how to be that way. Chances are you know already, and if you don’t a 5 minute pitt stop to mull it over will do.
No, instead I want to talk about the dangerous side of being the approachable one, the considered one, the wannabe non-dumb ass.. Becoming a confidant.
Finding yourself in a position of trust is great. You will find yourself being offered chances to develop yourself and you’ll pick up responsibility. Great stuff. It will also expose you to a lot more information than you were previously privy to. Becoming Mister T Worthy doesn’t sound so bad.
Not until the project goes wrong, or the person coming to you to blow off steam or get advice comes under fire. If you were there all along, you’ll come under fire too. Overnight you’ll find your ID card updated to read Mr S Goat and your trusted position will be pulled from under your feet.
My advice is simple: (1) mark the boundaries of your professional relationships well, (2) CYA, (3) don’t get pulled into a bitching session.. EVER
