S02E01 Multitudes, Complexity & Baby Yoda

Baby Yoda notebook with title “I’m all ears” on a white desk next to a blue gel pen. An aluminium laptop stand and black usb drive are in the background.

I cracked and cracked open my Christmas present! I know he’s not called Baby Yoda in cannon, but.. Baby Yoda!

I started with a plan…

Having closed out the soil data standards report with CAB International, I was free to take on a few new things. Here’s what I planned for the week:

• Fit for the future: vision, strategy, roadmap & governance for a data infrastructure product.
• Navigating data strategy: How to get to outcomes-driven data maturity from wherever you are now.
• Data, Tech & Black communities — Making data & technology a positive impact on U.K. Black communities — with Tracey Gyateng and Ade Adewunmi. Rounding out our support team is the lovely Mollie Hanley.

Keeping on top of all of that (and having a personal life in pandemic) isn’t easy but it can be doable. Many years ago Jeni Tennison recommended:

1. A method: Time Blocking
2. A book: How to have a good day by Caroline Webb

Both worked wonders for me.

For time blocking, there are lots of ways to do this but in essence: my calendar is my to-do list. If it’s not planned in there, it isn’t happening. My calendar looks something like this:

An example of time-blocking via https://productiveflourishing.com/time-blocking/

We’re all different, so you’ll likely find your “Just Organised Enough” looks different from mine. If you have the capacity, How to have a good day is a useful resource. Caroline Webb handily explains the psychology behind her recommendations.

Cover of How to have a good day by Caroline Webb.

Some things went well, others… didn’t

Things don’t always go to plan. So what went well in my week?

• Planning with clients was a breeze. More on that below.
• Refining theories of change with Ade Adewunmi and Tracey Gyateng leaves me feeling like my brain has been hugged, in a good way.
• Getting paid promptly is always nice!
• Organising all of the things — I now have media, toolkits, documents, projects, and an archive folder. I feel on top of things size I sorted out my tool stack.
• In March, I’ll be giving expert advice on “high-value” #Covid-19 data, standards, and taxonomies. Readiness, response, recovery, and reform also needs gender and race equity. Discover curated resources in my bookmarks: https://raindrop.io/collection/16264843

It wasn’t always plain sailing:

• 2021 insomnia got worse and really disruptive which meant…
• Many things cancelled for self-care..

Useful things I did this week #Productivity

That’s nice that: I’ve been getting to grips with Canva Team and it is paying off — we did a quick branding exercise to improve the image diversity. I love the illustrations from https://www.blackillustrations.com/ including the disability super pack. I highly recommend them to support Black illustrators. You can even say you’re doing it for #BlackHistoryMonth (but seriously, support them).

Data, Tech & Black Communities — Cover made in Canva

Learning is fun: You know that feeling when you get to apply something you were excited to learn? This week, I’ll be putting John Cutler’s North Star Playbook to practical use. How will it pan out for a data standard product? Guess I’ll find out!

Come back anytime: I like to dust off useful material again and again. Sometimes I learn something new, others I refine my toolkit. With 7 workshops coming up, I’m deep in planning. A Pocket Guide: Effective Workshops by Alison Coward is helping.

A pocket guide to effective workshops by Alison Coward (Author pictured)

And finally!

I love this so much, I hope you find it useful to visualise all the complex or dense things.