Reflection Time and Future Planning

 3 Months On & time to assess What that has meant.

So here are the pro's & con's about no longer working----

Pro's

- Not getting up at 04.30 on a Monday morning.
- Not being away from Lynda and home for min 3 days a week.
- Not producing information that people at the top ignore
- Not having to watch huge mistakes being made in the company.
- Not having to work with people who are incompetent.
- Not trying day in day out to solve other peoples problems.
- Not having to live out of a suitcase or staying in the Purple Palace

Cons

- Well actually after time to reflect , there are not too many Con's at all. Yes ok I could say---
- Miss the cut & thrust
- Miss the mentoring of teams and individuals.
- Miss the interactive relationship with work Colleagues
- Miss the salary
- Miss the ability to problem solve
- Miss the sense of achievement
- Miss the interaction with others in the industry

OK. That was easy - probably what anyone would expect to see, but there were all manner of stuff spinning round in my head for the first week or so before Easter in Greece.

For a start I had this notion that I needed to do this ----

- So with the help of my accountant I rushed about like a mad thing , trying to write a prospectus , an updated CV , getting info onto LinkedIn and circulating everything to agencies that there was this old fella now available as some kind of Super expert , Consultant but only going to be available now and then -- well we have Greece in the summer don't we.

 

Anyway I did it and produced this logo for my brochure with a view and idea that everyone was gonna fall over themselves to get me signed up , but the reality is that if I only wanted to do occasional consulting or site management then it is clearly going to be at someone else's discretion and not to suit my availability-----

 

Not sure the M+W Directors were ever that impressed as it doesn't mention profitability , but my logic is that if you capture all of those on my logo and achieve High Performance then it is automatic that you will be profitable.

 

Anyway, the thing is , it wasn't until we got back from Greece having had such a great time ---

 

I mean , it would be easy to wallow in being feed up and disappointed that your not thought or valued enough to be kept on when others were leaving in the reshuffles but the reality is that I have worked for 53 years -- am 3 years past the retirement age - and have managed to get to this point in time , having managed to deliver ( as the Project Director ) some of the most challenging / expensive / quickest time/ highest Quality projects which led the company to go from that first project to multiple repeat business and am pretty proud of this --- see below---

 

 

 

This is the AMD campus in Dresden, with the 2 nd phase on the left which was done later but this was a 2.5 year - 1.8 Billion dollar micro processing factory , which at the time was the largest construction project in Europe. I met some of the most amazing people on that project that I was drafted in at the 11th hour but am so proud of the things I learnt and what we -- the team -- managed to achieve despite there being plenty out there who would love to see you fail.

Highlight for me was not completing this on time and in budget -- as well as successfully defending a substantial claim for additional monies -- but for this -------------

 

 Gianfranco who scored the winning goal for my Chelsea beating Stuttgart FB in the European cup winners cup final in Denmark, on the 13th May 1998. Bearing in mind that Stuttgart is the home of my then company M+W and if you don't already know people from the Stuttgart region of Schwabia are actually tighter than the Scots, so it was no surprise to me to see the M+W Director sneaking out of the live football night we had in a hotel where the loser between him and me were due to pay for the evenings bill depending on who won and lost. A great night all round and for our American Client , an eye opener to English - German football rivalry.

So for me now as I sit writing this Blog, and doing a bit of Reflecting, I would say that I am very content with the fact that even since returning from Greece Lynda and I are aligned in the recognition that timing is likely to mean that I am hardly ever going to get a commission of any kind that meets dates that I am available .

And I also have to say that I am not sure that I am in any way bothered as there has been work around the apartment , work around the House and a few trips like these-----

-- Visits to Hever Castle with a picnic and canel boating with great friends

 and a day out to Brighton to meet up for lunch with friends that was long overdue.

Oh and we had a great week with the wonderful Georgina Besis with us in London to share with her some of our favourite places ---

So part of me is just wondering -- HOW THE HELL DID I EVER FIT IN WORK ---

My final reflection is that in work and play I have tried to stick by a Philosophy that I plagiarised from  a very clever man called Henry Ford who had some amazing quotes like ---

My quote is an adjusted one from the first -- Always try to do the right thing, even if no-one is watching.

I may not always get it right but I have always tried.

So with my plane trip to Greece looming, am I unhappy at not working any more -- absolutely not -- because at the end of the day , I am now getting  the opportunity to spend 100% of my time with my amazing wife - Lynda - ( and I am not speaking for her ) - but it is time now for me to be taking the opportunity to come up with things to do together that we may have thought about but never had time due to work getting in the way.

So more of this---------------

and less of this ---------

 

And of course having the ability to try to do more on the blogging malarkey -- sorry but it's gonna happen.

 

So for me , no regrets, some incredible memories, some great opportunities and leaving with my head held high and huge amounts to look forward to -- just need to try to stay healthy and Lynda and I might even be able to achieve those.

 

HAPPY DAYS.