Pain in the neck

Busy day I planned for today. Having been not too successful in finishing what I meant to finish yesterday, today I intended to:

• go to the market
• write up yesterday's notes
• prepare a paper for the afternoon tutorial
  
• get to work in time for group photos for the web site
• attend the systems seminar
• be at the B852 business research methods tutorial
• Tae Kwondo this evening.

Then daughter got up for breakfast. She came down complaining about a pain in her neck. "How long will it last, Mum?" "Oh, until about bed-time!" I cheerily assured her. "Ow!" She got herself some milk, and sat down for her porridge. "Ow!" I decided I didn't want to listen so left the table and went to the sink. "Ow!" and then, "Help, Mum!", and she collapsed side ways, breathing stentoriously, which kind of scared me. I thought of meningitis, and rushed over to her. Her eyes were open but odd, and her body twitched as I pulled her up, banging her head on something. "Ow!" she complained again. We had some discussion about whether she had fainted, blacked out, knew what she was doing, and then she lay down on the floor and refused to get up. Mind you, she was as white as this page, so that fainting bit was quite genuine.

We couldn't move her with the stiff neck, she wouldn't get up, I couldn't get her to the doctor, or in my car, so we called an ambulance. The paramedics and nurses checked her (pulse, blood sugar, eyes, nerves) and found nothing. When we saw the doctor, he was concerned when we mentioned that she had fainted before at Tae Kwondo, so he ran hemoglobin tests (ok) and ECG (ok) on her, and said that she's got to come into cardiology clinic sometime to test her on a running machine.

She's sort of all right now, back from A&E, a bit pale and had the rest of the day off school.

Consequently, I didn't get to work till lunch time. Off now to kick someone at Tae Kwondo, without daughter.

Proud to do what I do

Yesterday's experience made me proud of being a mother, a step mother, a twice happily married woman. I think I'll rewrite my business cards to announce these as my qualifications, along with my voluntary unpaid experience in the public sector. There were a couple of women yesterday who were a bit diffident about what they did. Unlike the majority they were not bankers or involved in finance. One insisted sternly "I don't do anything". With patience I found out that one had left banking and now runs her own bespoke jewellers, and another not only has raised a family but has worked as a magistrate for so long that she is on the advisory panel for recruiting new magistrates. And I met another recently through the schools appeal panel, who has been a local councillor for over twenty years, but insists "I do nothing." It is a sort of contrast with those who identify themselves by their career experience. I think I'll create a scrap book or a web pages of such women who do nothing.

E J H

mother, step-mother, wife

ex-Community Health Council member, school governor ..

Clay pigeon shooting

I've had a fantastic day. I occasionally tend to write to or talk to interesting people but people I've not been introduced to. About a month ago, I cheekily wrote to just such an Interesting Woman and she unexpectedly invited me to go clay pigeon shooting with 75 other women, and I have loved the experience.

The format of the day was:

• train from London
• arrival, coffee and bacon rolls
• lessons in groups
• coffee
• competition
• lunch and fashion show
• carriages

Walking along the platform to the train at ten to eight in the monring, I knew that I'd find other women who were going, and around the middle carriages of the train, I spotted a lively group. I got into the carriage and turned right, with the lively group on the left, and heard chatter, chatter, chatter for the whole of the journey. Later someone mentioned St Trinians schoolgirls.

On the train, over breakfast, on the ranges, during coffee and lunch people chatted, shared information and interests, usually starting with a question about how we came to be there, and what our connection was with IW. Some knew her through work, one has a child in the same school as one of hers, someone else edits on the paper she writes a column for and her sister was there. Sister doesn't shoot much, unlike our host, but I think everyone enjoyed the experience.

Out on the ranges, despite the sleet and hail, I learned to shoot a little, though I mostly missed. I must put my feet in a short L stance, weight almost all on the left and front foot, leaning forward into the position with my right check on the cheek of the gun. It seems that men and women see in different ways and that women should perhaps close their left eye if they shoot with their right hand.. Certainly, I did better when I close it. I kept the gun close into my shoulder but still bruised it from the recoil. The technique seemed to vary depending on what I ws trying to hit: a "rabbit" bouncing along the ground or a bird flying across, towards or way or into the sun. they all seemed to need something slightly different.

At lunch we were asked to donate to a charity, which Sarah Brown came to speak about and ask us for donations. I am very happy to donate to any charity that supports children.

As for our host, I'm most impressed because she seems to be one of the nicest people around. I'm honoured that she invited me. Such pleasant experiences encourage me to keep talking to interesting strangers.

Where I’m up to in my research

In my non-domestic, other life, I’m researching public accountability for the use of external consultants. That is, I want to know something about how public services use, justify and account for employment of consultants that are bought in from outside. They could be independent consultants, or people from a big consultancy company.

This research follows from my study 14 years ago of the use of consultants and the market for consultancy services in the NHS. Since the 1990s, consultancy services have boomed from £3.7 billion in 1998 to £8.7 billion in 2005 (MCA) and the UK market is the largest outside the US. In 2005-6, central government spent £1.8 billion on consulting (NAO). Yet there is little obvious explanation or public justification for this use. After the event, if something has gone wrong, then the newspapers publish how much was spent, how over budget a project is or what a new system can’t do that it should have been able to do. There may be a public enquiry (e.g. tax credits) and perhaps a government department will write some new guidelines, but it seems government ministers and managers will still be able to ignore those guidelines. At least, that is what the media seem to say, at for example the transcript of a File on 4 programme on management consultants in 2006. It’s a problem because if it cannot be justified, then more money will worthlessly.

However, I want to find out if at least some public sectors have managers who are able to account for their use of consultants.

So what I am doing is:

1. Reading up the literature on accountability and consultants to make sure that I know what is already known and discussed
2. Looking for managers in UK public services (e.g. councils, fire services, NHS) who are willing to share their experience of using and working with external consultants.

I don’t know what uses will emerge. There may be several findings:

1. Evidence that accountability does exist for such use of consultants, so there’s no story
2. Evidence in some form of accountability but not specifically for the use of consultants
3. No evidence of any sort of any accountability.

These findings could mean:

1. that my volunteer managers are a self picked bunch who want to prove that they’re good, and to justify their decision making
2. the lines of accountability don’t cater for use of consultants
3. there is some accountability but I just haven’t found it.

So there may be few lessons from all this effort and it’s a waste of time.

No - I remember: "Never ever give up". I'm writing this now because I'm half way through writing the literature review and finding it difficult, so on the basis that any writing is better than none, I'm telling you (family and friends) what I'm doing and where I'm up to, even if I'm not up to where I want to be. Yet.

Affy's first visit

Africa Elizabeth is to be baptised in a couple of weeks and we have a lot of champagne suitable for wetting her head so her parents are visiting tomorrow to collect it. It will be the first time she'll have been here. I'd put up photos but they are so much better on her own web site.