29 June 2015, 10 am
This morning, there is a meeting of the new Education and Professional Standards Steering Committee. I do like a good steering committee. Task forces are all very well, but they are hard work because they’re expected to get on and do things. Steering committees are gentler, and comforting to people like me who would otherwise feel disorientated a great deal of the time. This committee is steering four separate working groups. The working groups need objectives. Their first objective is to define their other objectives. Their second objective is to set the deadline by which to achieve these other objectives. Their third objective is to decide how to measure whether the other objectives have been achieved. Their fourth objective is to use the methods decided on in the third objective to measure whether the objectives defined by the first objective have been achieved by the deadline set by the second objective: if they have, then it is time to define the next set of objectives; if they have but only partly, then all the objectives must be redefined; if they have not, then the working groups must tell themselves off and work harder in future. Obviously the objectives must be SMART objectives. Any other type of objective would be basically useless, and then you would not be able to get on and actually do anything anyway. 29 June 2015, 11.30 am I am at the twice-yearly high-level IPO meeting which is affectionately known as the “Four Presidents’ meeting”. This year there will only be three Presidents and me. Plus the top IPO people, of course, but they have well got the measure of me because they read my not-so-secret diary that keeps getting laid open to the public and damaging reputations. The meeting gets off to a good start, from CIPA’s point of view. The IPO are delighted with us for sending comments about their Five-Year Plan. Turns out the other three Presidents never quite got round to it, so CIPA is the IPO’s Best Friend Forever and I am showered with praise. I accept graciously on CIPA’s behalf. Though it does feel uncomfortably like those days back at school when I got singled out for being the only person in the class who thought it might be useful to learn stuff before an exam. The IPO tell us about all the exciting things they are doing, and then we tell the IPO about all the exciting things we are doing, a lot of which involve sending comments about the exciting things the IPO are doing. And the IPO ask us what they can do to help with our exciting things and we ask what we can do to help with their exciting things, other than sending in comments about them of course. And we all leave with a very warm feeling inside, not to mention some excellent sandwiches.
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