This post is based on an article I wrote for the 2021 Q1 edition of the Institute of Water magazine When I was doing my A levels, Chemistry, Physics and Pure Maths, I had to know and be able to answer questions about electronic orbitals configurations and the order they were filled in, the equations […]
How to build the great future that you want
It’s the gift that keeps giving Organisations need high-performing employees and high performing employees want satisfying jobs. In this piece I will discuss how what I learned from racing superbikes can help both get what they want. My early career with Anglian Water was not great, my youthful self-confidence running into organisational inertia and coming […]
Disinfection: Improving the odds
Abstract As operational scientists the authors know well from experience that apparently well-run treatment works can have the occasional coliform failure but all the resamples are compliant. This paper explores why, in the authors’ opinion, this is a consequence of the underpinning disinfection kinetics and two major operational factors, pH and actual retention times. In […]
TEE-Shaped Learning – The gift that keeps giving
This post is based on an article I wrote for the Q3 edition of the Institute of Water magazine Background Over the last ten years I’ve done a fair bit of interim management, doing nominally full-time roles on a three-day a week contract. And, yes, I had days off, worked on other projects and had […]
Money Laundering, without getting arrested
I’m sorry if you have arrived here expecting to find ways of recycling some ill-gotten gains. You will have to look elsewhere This post is about something a little more useful to most of the population: how to keep your coins clean and COVID-free with the minimum of fuss. Yes, i know about contactless payments […]
Gifts that keep giving
Repositioning a curtain rail the other day, it struck me that most of the tools I was using were many years old. Everything was at least five years old, and the drill was, at over 20, the granddaddy. The tools are an example of Gifts That Keep Giving. Originally used as an advertising slogan in […]
Managing remote teams
A big deal or just business as usual? Over the last 40 odd years I’ve gained lots of experience of running local and remote teams, often by finding out by what didn’t work first, then learning how to fix it. One of my best discoveries, and yes I learned this the hard way, was that […]
What Will My Successor be doing on Thursdays and Fridays?
A Lighthearted but potentially serious question This post is based on an editorial piece I wrote for the Q4 2019 Institute of Water Journal which was focused on leadership and management Would you like your managers to be looking for work to do, rather than struggling to meet objectives? And having time to develop their […]
Ransomware? No problem
A cheap and effective way of beating the ransomware bandits let’s look at this from the other end first. Imagine you run a small business , like I do. The phone rings. It one of your people telling you that they can’t access any billing or client order information because all your files have been […]
Mining Rough Diamonds
Or why the best candidate may not be the obvious one This post is based on an article I wrote for the spring 2019 edition of the Institute of Water’s magazine The problem What do you do with a team member best described as a rough diamond, technically brilliant but a challenge to work with? […]