This week I was excited and honoured to be asked by LGCommunications to be part of a small group involved in a knowledge exchange with a delegation visiting from Telemark Fylkeskommune, Norway to share the work I’m doing at Nottinghamshire County Council and with LocalGov Digital.

First, I think we should all have a look at Telemark:

Looks amazing, right? Right.

So, things which I learnt this week about Norwegian local government were:

• local government is organised in a fairly similar way to the UK with Fylkes (county councils) and municipalities, sharing responsibility for services in a certain area
• this structure is being reviewed and may be re-organised to join councils up over bigger areas
• a lot of the challenges and opportunities around communications and digital are the same as we’re facing, or have faced, here in the UK.

This last point was re-inforced throughout the day and it was astonishing how much of the work, approaches, culture and ethos was shared between the two countries public sector. There were, of course, differences too (Norway has an exciting transparency system where all emails and mail in and out of the council are published as a default) but it was the amount of similarities which made this a vibrant knowledge exchange.

I spoke about the Digital First work at Nottinghamshire County Council (you can read more about this here) including the work we’re doing across the project; specific outputs like personas, content standard and our global experience language tools; as well as the intended outcomes for better user experience and channel shift on appropriate transactions.

As part of this I spoke about social media, as did others throughout the day, and this threw up another difference between our countries, in terms of the networks which enjoy popularity. Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat all do well with Norwegians but Twitter is less well used. As the platform which has played a major part in my professional network and development, as well as a significant role in the formation of LocalGov Digital, this was really interesting to learn. We didn’t really get time to explore why preference was for different platforms but it would be interesting to do this sometime.

And I also spoke about LocalGov Digital and had a couple of reflections on this. First, a personal one, that relates to the coaching conversations I’ve been having with Carl Haggerty. This is the first time I’ve presented LocalGov Digital where I haven’t felt strange about calling myself a co-founder or fully owning the part I’ve played in building the network alongside the rest of the group. While I’ve always been proud of the network and those working around it I haven’t always felt able to comfortably accept that I made some of this happen. So, that’s a pretty big thing for me and something I’ll probably reflect on more deeply in another post.

Secondly, it was interesting to consider whether the informal model of LocalGov Digital would work in Norway and whether the practitioner-led collaboration and change would be relevant to the sector over there. Again, time didn’t allow us to fully explore this but I would be interested to. In the meantime the resources we’ve put out there for the UK we’re more than happy for colleagues in other countries to make use of too. So, world, help yourself to our content standard, usability dashboard, style guide and the rest. Feel free to pick up Pipeline, digital democracy days, UnMentoring and event ideas. Just one condition – whatever you take, however you adapt it, let us know so we can share that back. Think. Do. Share. But, JFDI.

I really got a lot of out hearing from others at the meeting too. I was fascinated to hear from Emma Rodgers on the behaviour change and insight work her team are doing at Stoke City Council. And the design thinking approach being tried out with Birmingham City Council by Spaghetti Labs (also, reminded how much I love academia and how much the sector benefits from active research – more of this please). The overview of where the sector is at, and possibly headed was sobering from the LGA but some good ideas coming from them to try and communicate on behalf of the sector as well as work with them to innovate in tough times. Then some great internal comms and employee engagement stuff shared by Natalie Corney at Brent Council.

There were lots of great tips but I was interested to hear how they run a random conversations scheme internally to help staff meet and understand the diversity of service within the organisation. This is a macro of the UnMentoring scheme LocalGov Digital are currently running and again I wondered whether, as successful as it is on a council and national level whether this could be taken internationally too? I need to find time to blog about my recent UnMentoring conversations so this is something I’ll probably come back to then.

Overall, it was a pleasure to meet with colleagues from Norway and share with them and peers from the UK the work we’re all doing. I hope it will be the start of many more conversations and possibly even collaborations.

Thanks to Darren Caveney and Emma Rodgers of LG Communications for organising the event and inviting me to take part.

At the last LocalGov Digital steering group meeting Carl Haggerty introduced his idea of an UnMentoring scheme to the group as part of his work on skills and capacity in the sector.

The idea was a little like ChatRoulette (or maybe, as Phil Rumens pointed out, this from Father Ted) in that those who signed up would be paired randomly with each other and agree to have a conversation sometime during the next month. It was based on a model used by Nesta around institutionalised serendipity but there were no rules around what the conversation should cover or achieve.

Of course, it’s not fully random as the people signing up all feel they are aligned with LocalGov Digital and doing things better together for the sector but there’s still a fair amount of variation in how each one engages with this ethos.

I had my first conversation with one of Devon County Council’s content designers. This meant there was common ground as content is my background too, and we both happen to be working on the Care Act at the moment.

We covered how we’d both ended up where were and what attracted us to working in local government and then our conversation was very much of a practical nature and sharing the approach to Care Act compliance in each of our councils. It was fascinating to hear that cultures, perceived risks and attitudes were similar across both organisations but that there had been different work done to come to the same compliance. I was particularly interested in hearing about the user research Devon has been carrying out with different groups in order to understand needs at a high level but also things like language at a more detailed level. I was really inspired by the work the content designer had done (I’m not naming her as I didn’t discuss whether she’d be happy for me to do so. Internet mentions aren’t for everyone) and we’ve agreed to have more conversations between both teams to see what we can share and learn from each other.

My second conversation, earlier this week, was very different but no less interesting. This time I spoke with someone working within a service and not a ‘digital’ worker directly, just very interested in how he could digitise his service (again, not naming as didn’t discuss whether this would be something they were happy with). It was fascinating to hear a frontline view and about channel shift of a service I don’t have direct experience of (because it’s handled by another tier of local government). I think I was able to give some helpful ‘digital’ professional advice but probably most usefully, suggest a couple of people I thought could be of more help because they have shared experience and have progressed on some of the issues being faced.

This conversation particularly, and UnMentoring as a whole, have crossed here with some of the things I spoke about in my first coaching session, where I discussed what my role and value are within (online and offline, professional and personal) networks.

Through those conversations, my own reflections and a few recent experiences (including UnMentoring) I’ve come to realise that my role is mainly that of ‘connector’. And that far from meaning this makes me the Littlest Hobo (matching things and people up then moving on, making new friends but mostly feeling alone) this is a pretty vital role within a network. This article, which pulls on points in Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, has been particularly useful in my thinking about connectors. While I’m not sure I am the uber-connector the article / Gladwell describes (or as cool as London in The Littlest Hobo) I do recognise some of those qualities in the way I act within a network, which is really interesting and helping me to understand my value. I want to think about this a bit more, and possibly use my next coaching conversation with Carl to explore further, but feel it’s something I’ll blog on again.

For now, my main reflection on taking part in UnMentoring is that it’s aligned with my love of possibilities, people and shared passion while also leading to practical actions in the work I’m currently undertaking. The more people involved the higher the value to all – so sign up here and maybe I’ll talk to you soon?

~

Find me on Twitter or leave a comment below. And if you’d rather read an overthought pop music review including the word ‘panopticon’ you can find my words about music on Louder Than War.

I’m not a big fan of June.

I went off it three years ago when my mum died. The sadness that comes with that anniversary is failing to dissipate, even three years on. Grief doesn’t go away, you just learn to live through it while acting as if nothing is wrong.

I’ve written about my mum before but this post isn’t really about her (although I could write lots about her because I realise more each day exactly how brilliant she was); it’s about something that changed in me when she died.

I didn’t really plan this but it happens that each year in June I have taken on something that scares me, something that challenges me. These things have been a distraction from that grief but have also helped me to honour all the things my fantastic mum taught me, while learning more about myself too.

As we get to the third anniversary I look back to the year she died (when I happened to join the editorial team at Louder Than War just before her passing), at 2013 (when I launched Noble and Wild and put on my first Chris Helme gig), and at last year (when I organised and ran the two-day LocalGovCamp event and got myself shortlisted in the Digital Leaders awards).

I wondered what I could possibly do this year that would push me to the limits of stress and joy in the same way these did? What could make me feel so very alive and connected in the same way these things did?

So, here is that thing. I’ve taken the big, big step to start speaking openly about something that has been in my head for a long, long time and has been my main (non-work) project for the last couple of months – my debut novel.

Riley Reynolds has been born and you can follow her on Twitter.

I’ve taken on a new name to write under – mainly because my identity is already pulled in so many different ways it helps me to have a separate place to talk about the fiction coming out of my head.

The book – The Winter Passing – is currently in its second draft and I’m planning to publish later in 2015. The idea of it has been floating around my head for many years and I’ve sketched out bits of it at various points. I’ve never sat down and really committed to writing it though.

And then I found myself in a remote part of Scotland for a week at the end of March and the fancy took me to pick it up again. I’ve shown up every night to write a bit of it since (and that accidental commitment means I feel I can legitimately call myself a writer!) and eight weeks and 115,000 words later the story is told.

I’m really grateful to my first two readers – Kelly and Lauren – for putting our friendship on the line by reading the first draft. I’m thrilled they have fallen in love with the characters and that they love me enough to be honest about the bits that aren’t working (and tolerant enough to ignore the many misplaced apostrophes). Their feedback has pushed me that extra step to putting in more hours on fixing it up, getting ready to publish it for all and owning this part of my identity.

Although I’ve never hidden that I write bits of fiction this is the first significant piece I’ve completed so it feels big, scary and wonderful to properly give it a focus this way. It is exactly the right thing to do to get through this year’s anniversary – my mum always told me I could be whatever I wanted to be and what I’ve learnt about myself is that doesn’t mean I have to be just one thing.

Life is short, and sudden, and often dark. It’s not perfect but for me living is about never putting off anything (apart from the ironing), being reckless in the things you love and passionate about the people and possibilities. Maybe some of that comes across in my writing as well as my outlook.

Inevitably someone will ask how I find the time to do all the stuff I do. The answer, as always, is because my husband is amazing and supportive and practical (as well as wonderful in many other ways). And because I don’t watch telly or sleep as much as I used to. Please don’t ask me how I do so much stuff *and* have kids – unless you would ask me the same if I was a man.

If you want to do something, you find the way. You live life as fully as you can at any given moment.

And what’s The Winter Passing about? Oh you know – love, loss, music and magic. The usual stuff.

~

Find me (as me) on Twitter or find Riley Reynolds on Twitter here. If you want words about music (rather than just the made up stuff that falls out of my head) check me out on Louder Than War.

And if none of that works out for me I’ve started bothering brilliant musicians about letting me do their PR or put their records out. Check out Noble and Wild in case anything happens on that score.

Noble and Wild, my music promotion and PR identity (and aspiring record label), has been a little quiet for a while but I made a very exciting announcement from it yesterday.

After working with him on a couple of Noble and Wild promoted shows in Derby and covering him for Louder Than War several times I’m really happy to announce that I’ll be working with Chris Helme on his digital PR.

It’s been a pleasure to get to know Chris through show promotion and interviews and I couldn’t be more excited about working with him during an exciting time in his career.

Chris is a singer songwriter currently recording and touring as a solo artist. His 2012 album The Rookery was critically acclaimed for the layered and intricate indie-folk and he has a new album due later this year.

If you haven’t already I strongly recommend you get your ears around The Rookery and get yourself along to a show.

~

You can find more on Chris Helme’s website, like him on Facebook and follow him on Twitter. For management enquiries contact Kate at Magnificent Artists. For live bookings contact Leila at Adastra.

You can find Noble and Wild on Facebook and Twitter. We’re currently re-vamping our website.

You can find me on Twitter and you can read my words about music (including past reviews of Chris’ live shows and albums as well as a couple of interviews with him) over on Louder Than War. I’ve also written a book and you can find me in my author guise on Twitter as Riley Reynolds.

“Can’t you see what I’ve done? Can’t you see what I do? It’s not really unique, and it’s hopelessly crude. But these are my decisions, these are my mistakes. And I’ll fall down again, if that’s what it takes.” – The Bluetones – The Fountainhead

This afternoon was my fourth coaching conversation with Carl Haggerty and I felt really, really ready for it.

There was a purely selfish reason – it’s been a tough week personally and I know that talking to Carl always brings my energy up, makes me think differently and invigorates me. I needed that today.

And there was the coaching reason – there was definite stuff I wanted to talk through and I value the opportunity to do this openly, and honestly, in this process.

I definitely got both of those areas covered off in today’s conversation but I also got my mind blown a little by the way things were reflected back at me. These are a few of the thoughts coming out of that.

I am a working prototype 

It doesn’t sound much but this was probably the most profound thing that came out of my head today. An almost throwaway comment about the way I approach life, and why I struggle to articulate a singular ambition (across all the things I do or in any one of them).

Not because I don’t have ambition, or aspiration, but because I’m more about the journey than I am the destination. That I am in love with possibilities. That I like to experiment and be open to whatever results may come. That I don’t see something not working as failure but as helpful evidence toward future choices.

It’s because I am a working prototype: functional but not yet complete.

And knowing this starts to make sense of why I insist on doing so many different things at once (my work in local government, my work with LocalGov Digital, my work with Noble and Wild, my work with Louder Than War, my author persona and novel). I’m too interested in all of them – the mind-blowing beyond exciting possibilities of them – to stop now.

(It’s also because my brain runs quite fast and so I need lots of input. Just call me Johnny Five).

Disrupting practice, disrupting leadership

Another revelation for me came around the way I think about leadership, or more specifically being a senior leader (of some sort). I don’t want to cover too much of this here (maybe in some other post, some other time) but I want to reflect on a realisation.

I’d put a line between practice, which I actively seek to disrupt and innovate; and leadership, which I’d scoped out of any such thing. Why? Well, there’s no real answer to that.

In the same way I’ve shaped my delivery and experience to reflect my values and beliefs I should approach any sort of leadership opportunity in the same way. Any such senior role (and I’ve no clear idea whether that will be my path to walk or not) is not a costume to be put on, or a role to be played. Which makes me feel a lot better about the whole thing (not least because I’m scared of masks).

An open and honest telling of my story

I’ve thought about why I blog over the years I’ve been doing it (nearly 20 now, in various forms, and around seven for this blog) but I’d not thought about in the way I ended up doing today; as an open and honest telling of my story.

I blog mainly for myself, rather than for an audience (sorry guys). I remember things better when I write them down, and the things I only half remember I can handily come back to. Do I sometimes write things that are useful to other people? It’s only fairly recently I’ve known that yes, somethings I write help or set thoughts running in others. And that’s great – because it leads to possibilities (did I mention I love them?) and also more evidence for me in rebuilding my professional confidence.

I’ve worried in the past that maybe writing so openly is giving away the goods too soon, or that I’d be judged poorly for ‘over-sharing’. Do you know what? It doesn’t matter. Writing makes sense to me, that’s what matters.

A few final thoughts on this conversation…

There were other bits of today’s conversation’s I really valued – the ability to just say ‘how mad is this thing that’s happening to me’ and have someone be excited and encouraging about it (lots of people around me are but don’t think you can get enough of that stuff); to explore some options for the future that I’ve not really vocalised anywhere and to feel safe and unjudged for doing so; and being able to read out a list of things I’ve personally achieved in the last five years and to not feel like I was bragging.

It’s all good for the soul and it’s definitely helpful for professional and personal development. So my final reflection on this coaching conversation, and the process overall, is that it has triggered long overdue healing and growth. It’s given me the confidence to go after those possibilities I love.

And because the process has given me so much, I owe it to the process to give back by being the best me I can be in all that I do.

(Much thanks to Carl as always for his time, sharing a journey with me and for being an all round nice person).

~

You can find me on Twitter. I like to chat about local government, digital, music and random things that go through my head.

Or you can read my words about music on Louder Than War (recent stuff include an Indietracks interview and a Take That live review. Coming this week Blur and Taylor Swift live reviews, hopefully Mammoth Penguin and Haiku Salut album reviews).

Or you can find me doing digital PR for music types over at Noble and Wild, and on Twitter too. My album of the half-year list will be up there shortly!

Or you can find me in my author identity talking about my debut novel on Twitter or on my other blog. It’s called The Winter Passing and it’ll probably be out later this year.

Here’s the scene. It’s a hot summer Thursday and you’ve just made yourself really popular by navigating rush hour on the train while carrying a precious load of home-baked cake.

You’ve joined a walking bus and made your way through the streets of Birmingham to arrive, excited and in need of coffee, at CommsCamp 2015.

What you want now is to hear Communication by Spandau Ballet through the PA as you get your name badge and boggle at the Kate Bentham‘s cake table of delights. Or would you rather hum along to Hanging on the Telephone by Blondie, or Speakeasy by Shed Seven, or go new wave with Wordy Rappinghood by Tom Tom Club (that last one goes out to a colleague of mine)?

Well, whatever you want to get in your ears as you psych yourself up for a day of thinking and doing with other comms professionals now is your chance to get your request in.

That’s right the CommsCamp Collaborative Communication-themed Playlist is back, Back, BACK and I, ladies and gentlemen, will be your DJ once again.

I’ll be spinning a selection of songs explicitly (or tenuously!) linked to all things communication on the virtual wheels of steel this Thursday (9 July) at CommsCamp 2015 (yes, I’ll be pressing play on a Spotify playlist and then making a beeline for a breakfast cake).

Music at unconferences works really well, adding to the creative and informal nature of the event, and I love being able to contribute in this way.  Last year we all collaborated on a playlist and I’ve taken some of those suggestions and added some new tracks too – already giving us 37 tracks and a massive 2 hours 16 minutes of tunes!

Over the next few days you have your chance to add more songs to the list. If you’re on Spotify you can find the collaborative playlist here and if you’re not you can add your suggestions in the comments below.

Keep it comms, get ready to pull shapes and I’ll see you all at the breakfast disco this Thursday!

~

Find me on Twitter.

Read my words about music over on Louder Than War (recent articles are live reviews of Taylor Swift and Blur). I do music PR over at Noble and Wild too.

Check out EpicMixtape – a collaborative project which sprang from a conversation on Twitter about the magic of mix tapes.

I spent today in Birmingham with a load of comms, digital, marketing and generally interesting people at CommsCamp15. It seems to be the done thing now to jot down a list of quick reflections on the and that seems like the perfect way to capture my busy thoughts right now.

Before that though – a big thanks to Darren Caveney, Dan Slee, Emma Rodgers and the sponsors for making the event possible. It takes a ton of work to pull together an event and I’m always grateful when there are people who put in the effort (and/or the cash) to make stuff like today happen.

Here’s some thoughts on how CommsCamp15 was for me:

• Building a collaborative playlist is a really nice way to get into the spirit of the event and I loved hosting it, and playing from it on Spotify. I’m going to leave the list open so if a communications-themed song pops into your head add it to the playlist, or listen to the 6 hours and 57 minutes of music already in there!
• Likewise, having people bring cakes and then share in the bounty (for charity) is a great way to build community and break the ice (also, encourage early onset diabetes).
• Kate Bentham should definitely consider changing her name to Cake Bentham for her excellent hosting of the cake table.
• Unconferences are still as much (or possibly more) about the corridor conversations and catch ups as they are about the sessions.
• That said, the dichotomy of choice is a real one at unconferences and there were times when I wished I could be in two places at once.
• A few women took up Emma Rodger’s rally cry for more women to pitch sessions – not sure what the gender split was today but her post encouraging more women to make suggestions and facilitate discussions is well worth a read.
• My session was a shameless misappropriation of a Batman quote: ‘Your intranet could be the hero your organisation deserves, but it’s not the one it needs right now’. I have seen a lot of chatter around intranets recently (including internally as we continue through our own discovery phase). Most of it is focused on delivery of a ‘thing’, or seems to start with the solution (‘let’s build a shinier intranet’) and doesn’t acknowledge that success is going to come down to deep understanding of your organisation’s culture (good and bad bits) and building something that fits with it, or is a step on that way to the culture your organisation wants.
• It was great to do this as a co-host session with Dan Slee who pitched ‘my intranet is worse than yours’. There were some really quite remarkable examples, not least because the delivery and approach was likely speaking of that organisation’s culture too.
• It was even better that culture was a natural part of the discussion in the session. Things I took away were:
  • that ‘intranet’ is a self-limiting and misleading term – we’re probably talking about digital workspaces or gateways to tools, rather than an internal website built around corporate communication
  • that gathering data on current usage of internal touch points (could be a current intranet but also your HR help line and your IT service desk) doesn’t seem so widespread in intranet projects. Nor does really getting to grips with user needs and then building to meet those needs. The approach to intranets generally seems to differ from that taken with a public-facing build
  • in the public sector we should really think about intranets being out in the open
  • that there is no one size fits all delivery for intranets because each organisation is different. And in something the size of a council you may have more than one culture (departmental, service, team) and this expands your range of user needs. Personalisation, curation or opt-in by subject may be the way to go with intranets as workplace tools rather than saying ‘we need a social intranet’ (because maybe that only reflects some of your culture, or cultural aspirations)
  • always start with a problem looking for a solution, rather than the other way around.
• The Future Comms Team discussion was really interesting and seems to be something lots of us are actively thinking about at the moment:
  • First up – when I said ‘I’m a digital person, so not really comms’ I think it came out a bit wrong. The word digital means a great many things, and only one of them is about a communications channel. The way I self-identify what I do isn’t restricted to that definition. My digital is as much customer service, service delivery, service design and user experience – all of that involves communication, but isn’t Communications (subtle but important difference to me).
  • I tweeted loads of of this session as I got quite passionate about the discussions on leadership and self-directed leadership. Most of what people were talking about as qualities for future leaders fit the systems leaders behaviour model from the Local Leadership Centre. We’ve been looking at this at LocalGov Digital and I’ve been talking to Carl Haggerty about it in my coaching too.  It talks about the leaders being committed to making positive and lasting change across public services, having empathy with others, inspiring others and leading by doing, having an openness to new approaches and to feedback, creating structures to support devolved leadership and using reflective practice to improve individually. For me these are qualities and approaches I would respond really well to in a leader, and would aspire to demonstrate myself
  • Leadership isn’t about individuals, it’s a team sport (as I’ve blogged before) and it requires bravery, conviction, kindness and the ability to build not just networks but relationships that lead to commitment and the influence to motivate or convene those networks on shared purpose
  • Leadership doesn’t have to come down a hierarchy, it doesn’t even have to come from within your own organisation. You can choose who you allow to lead you. You are a leader yourself. Find who inspires you. Can’t find anyone? Inspire yourself.
  • The future is uncertain – digital is massively disrupting established models all over the place as well as all the other budgets, reorganisations etc that are going on. To get us to a new future (or move us along in this change) someone has to be first, and they have to be brave and accept that means there won’t be the comfort of someone already having scouted ahead or checked out the potential pitfalls.
  • It’s still red pill / blue pill time for a lot of people.
  • The strategy *is* delivery. Show, don’t tell. Don’t wait for permission
  • And don’t think that because you lose a battle there isn’t a longer war to be won. Procurement comes in cycles, contracts renew. Be positive and proactive when you are defeated and prototype and find evidence for the future decision to be a better one.
• I’m still really excited about delivering Digital First at Nottinghamshire County Council. It’s all about seeing the opportunity that is hidden within each challenge and making the right choices (even when these aren’t the easy ones).
• I’m still in love with possibilities and all about the people, not the tech.
• Great conversations with @lilac_lou, @joomoohoo, @albfreeman and @x333xxx. Thought provoking, motivating and generally lovely.
• My favourite cake was the Pimms cup cake by Kelly Quigley-Hicks. Deliciously genius.
• Eddie Coates-Madden and Nick Hill are heroes for taking on the organisation of LocalGovCamp for this year – I have every faith that it will be superb! It was great to do a speedy handover and checklist of what’s to do – the baton passes and there is something rather nice about it happening while we were all at another grassroots unconference.

~

You can find me on Twitter.

The Digital First blog is here and the beta site is here.

“I don’t understand how the last card is played, But somehow the vital connection is made”
Elastica – Connection

In my last post, reflecting on the value I’d found in LocalGov Digital’s UnMentoring, I started to explore the role of a ‘connector’ within (human/social) networks and ahead of my next coaching conversation with Carl Haggerty, I wanted to think a little bit more about this.

In my early conversations with Carl I talked about how I perceived myself as a connector within the network, but talked about this in quite a negative way. At the time I was pretty unaware of the way Malcolm Gladwell talked about the role of connector in his book, The Tipping Point. Had I read it then my feeling around the role may have started to change a lot sooner!

I don’t want to go into too much detail about where my negativity came from (because I’m actively letting go of that stuff and moving on) but it’s interesting that alongside that a number of experiences have cast a different light on ‘connector’ for me. Not only am I now thinking more positively about it, and able to not just accept but embrace this role for myself, but actually aspire to build upon it, and align it with my other skills – empathy and hive mind storage.

Let’s just go over what I mean when I talk about a ‘connector’ in a network. From my view this is someone who sees links between people in the network and joins those people and ideas up. I really like the way it summarised in this article by Charlie Gilkey:

Connectors make change happen through people. They galvanize people. They’re natural hubs. That’s just the way they’re oriented to the world. These are people who, every time you ask a question, start flipping a Rolodex in the back of their mind, saying, “Who do I know who knows this? Who do I know who has done this? Who do I know that I need to connect you with?” They love connecting you with people, because they’re all about the people. You might be a connector if:
 – You are constantly referring people to the right expert or service to solve their problem
– You love networking and talking with people, just for the sake of doing it.
– When you’re talking to people, they say, “Wow – you know everyone!”
– The stories you tell always focus on the people, not the ideas or the sizzle.

This description, of the Roladex, really resonated with me and something I actively recognised myself doing during a recent UnMentoring conversation. I knew I had some ideas around the issue my conversation partner described, but I also knew that despite these I wasn’t best placed to directly help. This was a positive thing because I knew that I did know people who probably were and that my value, my role, was in joining those people together.

How does this fit with the other skills I’ve recognised and begun to more actively nurture in myself? First, let’s talk about accessing the hive mind.

In The Tipping Point Gladwell states that ‘we store information in other people’, Twitter and Google are regularly addressed as ‘the hive mind’ and it is this concept also which feeds into my view as a connector. That there is power in people, in possibilities, in individual experience but a shared knowledge or memory of it. But just like in the old world where you needed to be able to find the right section and shelf in the library to access the knowledge you needed now I need to know who in my network has the information or experience to move my ideas and understanding forwards. I have to be able to see the nodes in the network as much as the connections between them, I need to have the relationships with each person for them to allow me to access their knowledge.

Which brings me to the last skill set I’m thinking about at the moment – empathy. I’m still thinking about this skill set, how to develop and manage it well and how it fits into my professional life.

Overall, I’m starting to think about my own skill set / nature as being strong on:

• connecting people and ideas in a single or across dispersed networks
• creating individual and team strength through encouraging knowledge to be held by different people, but shared openly
• empathy.

Having recognised these I now need to actively practice and improve upon them, learn how to best use them (and how to avoid using them badly) for the benefit of all. And what I need to protect against anyone trying again to diminish the power in my skills or to stop me from using them at all.

I am part of the network. I am an empath. I am a connector.

And those qualities are what give me my value and allow me to be a catalyst.

~

Here’s Elastica’s Connection because, why not…

You can find me on Twitter or writing words about music as Features Editor for Louder Than War.

“My life didn’t please me, so I created my life”
Coco Chanel

Today was, at it turns out, my last formal coaching conversation with Carl Haggerty.

We’ve been going through a coaching process since around the end of January this year, and six months on it feels as if it’s fulfilled its purpose of supporting me on a part of my journey and I can move on from it. That’s not to say my conversations with Carl are over, but more of that later.

First, it seems like a good point to sum up the trip (and it was a trip) I’ve had through this process. My blogged reflections in order are here:

• Being Better in 2015
• Try Again Today
• Superheroes and symbols
• Connection made (I didn’t publish this straight away, but now feels better to share this bit of thinking)
• I’m a working prototype.

Let me summarise for those of you who don’t want to read through all of that:

• coaching has supported me transition to a new stage in my career
• helped me let go of some stuff that I didn’t need to keep carrying around
• aided me in being open and proactive about my own potential
• and it has helped me recognise my value professionally and start to think openly about qualities I’d like to develop for the future.

From the first conversation where I curled up in an armchair next to my phone and stumbled over words about who I was, to today where I looked out at the farmer bailing hay in the field behind our house and happily chatted about how coaching and recent opportunities have been the conduit to me being confident in living and telling my own story.

That is a powerful thing. It was a necessary thing. Most definitely, for me, right now, a good thing.

What now?

The formal part of our coaching arrangement has naturally reached its end. The actions it was helping me navigate toward have all been reached (although, like I said in my last post, I’m a working prototype so only reached in the sense of first iteration).

The themes and actions were:

• courage and catalysts
• visibility and resilience
• self-limiting beliefs and challenge
• self-awareness and regulation
• focus.

The last conversation (before today) started us on the path back to mentoring, to mutual peer support and challenge. Carl and I have both found value in this and so we’re now going to find time every couple of months to have a new type of conversation with each other, moving away from the formal coaching arrangement. We’ll probably both blog about it when we get there!

I’d like to thank…

Of course I would like to thank Carl – for the offer of coaching through to the time he’s given to me over the last six months. The open and honest space we went into with coaching was exactly the right place for me to explore. Not all coaching needs for there to be an existing relationship (in some cases that might actually be detrimental) but for me the shared journey Carl and I have had over the last decade, as well as our friendship, was necessary to how I needed to think about things and the trust I needed to be able to say some things out loud. So – THANK YOU CARL

And there is also thanks to my managers and colleagues too – this was exactly the professional development I needed at this point so I am hugely appreciative that I have been supported and encouraged to do it.

There is also thanks for the people around me who have been open to me and the possibilities I’m enamoured with as coaching has bought parts of me, bits of thinking, back to life.

Last but not least I’d like to thank those of you who have commented on the posts I’ve shared or tweeted me. It’s been encouraging to hear other perspectives on my thinking as well as hear about people’s own journeys through coaching and mentoring.

Final thought

Coaching, alongside the professional opportunities that have come along in the last six months, has helped me to understand where my strengths are, to challenge myself on my weaknesses, to take responsibility for my own choices and development and have the confidence to pursue my own potential.

While tied to the local government part of my life the changes in my mindset it unlocked has undoubtedly allowed me to fall in love with and put myself in the way of the possibilities in the other bits too (like firing up Noble and Wild in a pretty full on way, and writing my first novel).

It has been a gift. It has been the bridge that has helped me get from one part of my professional life to another. It has been a rehabilitation away from remembered pain. It has been an upgrade in my thinking. It has helped me get back to the place where even when I’m scared of opportunities I’m not so scared I say no.

Coaching has been the challenge that will lead to future opportunities.

In the reflection on my first session I referenced The Charlatans’ song Try Again Today. It seems fitting to quote it again, although picking slightly different lines, to complete the cycle:

“Make a brand new start, I’m telling everybody to turn it up again, Something’s gotta change, Good bye yesterday, Try again today”

~

You can find me on Twitter.

I write about music for Louder Than War – in the next few weeks I’ll be covering Indietracks and interviewing Mark Morriss.

I run Noble and Wild. In a really small, but really lovely (for me) way, I’m doing digital PR type stuff for Chris Helme (well, we’re on the starting line with it anyway). You should buy his album, I think you’d like it.

And I just finished my first novel. It’s called The Winter Passing. I blog about writing here and am on Twitter in my author identity – Riley Reynolds.

It’s my birthday today and it’s been an absolute beauty. I’ve been lucky enough to be spoilt by my family and friends as well as be able to hang out doing a few of my favourite things, with a few of  my favourite people.

On top of all that it was the inaugural Geek Girl Brunch Nottingham today.

Geek Girl Brunch is an international network of in real life meet ups that “hope to create a safe environment where identifying geek girls can be themselves to give voice, network, create friendships, inspire each other and hang out!” They say Geek Girl Brunches begin with  “kindness, tolerance, acceptance and empathy” – something we could all always have more of in our lives! I’d be wanting to go along anyway but add to the mix that the founder of the Nottingham chapter is my good friend and ultra-geeky-girl Kelly Race and it was an event I was pretty much bound to be at.

Am I a geek? I’ve never really been sure but today gave me a couple of reasons to reflect and think about whether I self-identify this way, and whether it’s a positive thing (spoilers sweetie – I conclude I am, I do and it is).

So – what is a geek? Let us turn to Wikipedia for a definition:

The word geek is a slang term originally used to describe eccentric or non-mainstream people; in current use, the word typically connotes an expert or enthusiast or a person obsessed with a hobby or intellectual pursuit, with a general pejorative meaning of a “peculiar or otherwise dislikable person, esp[ecially] one who is perceived to be overly intellectual”.^[1] Although often considered as a pejorative, the term is also used self-referentially without malice or as a source of pride. Its meaning has evolved to connote “someone who is interested in a subject (usually intellectual or complex) for its own sake”.

So it can be an insult, or a pigeonhole or it can be a self-awarded badge of honour. For me it can only be a positive thing (whether reclaimed or attempted as an insult) because it’s essentially identifying someone who has passion, who loves the possibilities of a thing.

And in the internet age where a million flowers have blossomed and niches have become the mainstream geek is now essentially becoming a synonym for ‘people’. 

Am I a geek? Yes, totally. But only on the edges of the way it might traditionally be thought of. I like comics, and superheroes and there are a few shows / books I am infinitely interested and love the fandoms of (Firefly, Harry Potter, Doctor Who, most things contemporary fantasy and dystopian future).  But my real deep geek tendencies are saved for music (and yes, the medium of vinyl) and digital stuff in local government.

Would I be the right kind of geek for the Geek Girl Brunch? There is no ‘right kind’ – we’re all just passionate people who want to share our love of something and have another love shared in return.

It’s actually not the ‘geek’ bit but the ‘girl’ bit that caused a pause – I find gender a hindrance when used this way, as an exclusion as much as an inclusion. For me we’re all just folk and should rub along that way. However, I’m not so naive that I don’t realise that some women are more in need / want of a single-sex space to speak freely. I’m good with that.

I’m even better that actually this is a fairly fluid label for this network anyway – they describe it as including “Identifying women (which includes transgender women), gender fluid and non-binary people as long as they are comfortable with the “geek girl” label. All gender events do occur, but they are scheduled at the discretion of each chapter.”

I’d love to think that as we head toward equality that we’d move to ‘geek brunch’ and then just ‘brunch’ (because we’re all just folk who want to get together to eat and chat). That’s not where we’re at though and so Geek Girl Brunch seems like a pretty perfect starting point.

It was an absolute pleasure to be at the inaugural event in Nottingham and I’m already excited for the next meet-up and chatting with more people about the things they love (and eating another delicious brunch, obviously). It was an amazing way to spend my birthday – and gave me a great excuse to mooch around the corner and indulge my geeky tendencies at Mondo Comico, Music Exchange and Rough Trade.

So self-ideintifying geek girls of the Nottingham / East Midlands area – next meet-up is muted for October, see you there, yeah?

~

You can sign up for Geek Girl Brunch Nottingham here and you can also follow them on Twitter. You can check out the hashtag #GGBNotts on Twitter and Instagram.

Thanks to Kelly, Anna and Emma for organising and thanks to those that donated goodies for the give-away today – I won some amazing jewellery from Sugar & Vice and Down the Rabbit Hole.

You can find me on Twitter or read my words about music on Louder Than War and even more music stuff over at Noble and Wild. And because I hadn’t found the story I wanted to read I wrote it – follow me at Riley Reynolds for the little ‘verse I’ve created for my first novel, The Winter Passing.

Another year, another LocalGovCamp and, as ever, it re-affirmed knowledge that there are good people passionate about making public services better willing to get together on a weekend and think, share and do.

For the second year LocalGov Digital took on organisation of the event and following on from last year’s successful fringe format went with the Friday Makers and Leaders / Saturday Unconference line-up. Unlike last year I didn’t do huge amounts of the organising but handed over to a local team after gathering the sponsorship and setting the date. Some thanks to those that did take on organisation a little further down!

As always LocalGovCamp has provoked my thinking, challenged some ideas and confirmed others, been full of conversation, been a fantastic opportunity to meet new people and catch up with those I’ve had the pleasure of knowing for a while.

It is the end of a long day (at the end of a long week!) and my brain is tired in the best possible way so in order to get some thoughts (any thoughts) out here’s the now semi-traditional LocalGovCamp listicle:

• LocalGovCamp 2015 nearly didn’t happen. The words ‘Cancel it. JFDI’ were emailed. I’m really glad that a way was found and the event went ahead. That it did is down to a few people who deserve huge thanks for taking on the task as my diary filled up – Nick Hill, Phil Rumens, Diane Sims and Eddie Coates-Madden. Of course it is also thanks to the sponsors. And to Dave Briggs for compere duties. Although among one of the easier types of event to organise the effort of creating an open space event shouldn’t be under-estimated or left under-praised. So thank you LocalGovCamp 2015 organisers, each and every one!
• I enjoyed being interviewed by Nigel Bishop and reflecting on what has changed between the first LocalGovCamp in 2009 and today. To begin with, everything. The sector is changing, politics and budgets are very different from six years ago. At that first one there was a lot of practical ‘how to’ type sessions whereas a lot more ‘shared thinking’ seems to happen now. The topics too have changed – back then it was all about the emerging social networks to a few years where it was all open data to now where sessions run on these and everything in, between and around. Other things never change – the corridor conversations are still the most surprising bit, you can never get to everything you want to and the very nature of open space events is empowering. LocalGovCamp is, and I hope always will be, an exhilarating, thought-provoking wonderment of possibilities. I hope it continues to evolve and be the event the sector needs and deserves, without losing the things that have made it that very thing for the last six years.
• I said the phrases ‘knowledge pollinator’ and ‘social engagement contagion’ and I’m only a little bit sorry. We were in a session about intranets and my question, as always, was ‘is an intranet the solution to the problem you’re trying to solve?’ The session was really thought provoking and lots of experience and thinking was shared. I loved that it didn’t get stuck on ‘what tech?’ but was a discussion about organisational maturity; the value of community management; and what a misleading and all-encompassing phrase ‘intranet’ is (document store, comms channel, gateway to systems, engagement tool and more).
• I drew a pyramid of needs on a flip chart. It isn’t so much a Maslow hierarchy but more showing how organisations can categorise incoming enquiries and filter them through the most appropriate channel for both the org and the customer. I’m pretty sure that I was inspired by something Bristol had done on this. It was part of a session that started out being about website navigation and again, spun off in a fantastic way to be about natural language, search, homepage design, user research and testing and challenging culture. I later exchanged a few tweets about ‘digital by design vs digital by default’ and whether one provided a more exact phrase about ‘choosing the right channel for the customer, service and organisation’ than the other. We didn’t really get to a conclusion but it was great to have some healthy, constructive debate online and off.
• I shared A LOT of stuff about what we are doing at Nottinghamshire. I hope other people found it interesting and useful. I found it useful to reflect on what we’ve done so far in Digital First and talk about what we intend still to come. I shared our beta site again – it’s here http://beta.nottinghamshire.gov.uk and in just over a week it will become the official website of the county council. We’ll always be in beta, making it live is a starting point, not the end – feedback is really welcomed! We’ve blogged bits of our journey here.
• There were some interesting online and offline discussions about whether council websites should carry advertising. We did a little user research on this at Notts and found a split between people who would be ok with ‘ethical’ (and we didn’t delve deeper to understand what this might mean or who would decide) advertising if it was making money to protect services, and those who felt they’d already paid into local government through council tax and therefore we shouldn’t be seeking additional revenue through ads (unless we would cut their tax as a result). While the income generation potential is attractive to councils in current budget situation the ethical question is important. As is (I think) understanding how ads fit into the user experience, and if they have a detrimental impact would you be gaining revenue in one hand but losing it in the other through people abandoning the digital channel for a more expensive (to the org) but ad-free one?
• Great conversations outside of sessions with – among others – Nick Hill, Phil Rumens, Ben Cheetham, Dave Briggs, Dan Slee, Albert Freeman, Helen Valentine, Gavin Beckett, Helen Adams, Diane Sims, Ali Hook, Dave Worsell and Carl Whistlecraft. And fantastic to welcome my Nottinghamshire colleague Natalie Grimshaw to her first unconference
• LocalGovCamp reminds me how much I really like using my brain to think about this stuff and gives me time to reflect on my experiences of working in local government and digital. Today I was really grateful for the coaching (missed you today Carl!) I did this year and a bit more aware of where my own development might need to go next.
• And finally, and on a side note, I don’t think I would ever get bored of someone approaching me, holding out some music and saying ‘I heard you are a music writer – would you listen to this?’. I find that a huge privilege and compliment, and I can’t wait to listen to the CD I was given today!

There are Google Docs’ here for all the sessions and people added notes throughout the day. Any blog posts and links to outputs will be added to the LocalGov Digital website at some point (probably).

Follow @localgovcamp for news about LocalGovCamp 2016 and get involved in LocalGov Digital –  a grassroots movement of those in and around local government who as passionate and proactive about making public services better. There’ll be a Google Hangout soon if you’d like to join the discussion about getting involved and growing into our possibilities.

~

Find me on Twitter – talk to me!

I write about music for Louder Than War. I’m features editor on the website and an associate editor for the print version (issue one out 17 September – buy it in WH Smiths, independent newsagents or order online). My words about music are here.

I also do music PR and promotion and occasionally share music-related things over at my little agency, Noble and Wild. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

And because so many people asked me about it today – yes, I’ve written a couple of novels this year and yes, my pen name is Riley Reynolds. You can catch up on where that is all at on my other blog or (you knows it) on Twitter.

Print is dead.
Dr. Egon Spengler

Or, to put it another way:

The first rule of this write club is that there are no rules.
Louder Than War manifesto

Today marks a big change in the UK music press. A seismic shift in the way you can get your hands on music journalism printed on actual pages. No, not the NME going free…I’m talking about something much more interesting.

For today a new publication will hit the shelves of newsagents across the country and will be pushed through letterboxes across the land. And I’m terribly excited to get my hands on it, to take a deep breath of that heady news print.

Today, the first issue of Louder Than War is out in print.

Louder Than War has been online for a few years now, a fast-growing site that is infused with DIY spirit.  I’m the sole sister in the editorial brotherhood and it is, for the most part, a position of joy and wonder. Yeah, it’s also laborious and annoying at times but that is more than balanced by the pleasures of being able to write about music, to live and love music so wildly as I do on that site. It’s an honour to be part of the tribe of writers, editors and photographers that make up Louder Than War and to feel the passion for the music, the devotion to the counter-culture, jump from every post.

And now, while the traditional music press decides survival lies in becoming free at point of pick up, we’re experimenting with print in a different way.

Louder Than War magazine will be a quarterly publication and operationally, sits slightly to one side of the website. We’ve teamed up with the publisher of Big Cheese and Vive Le Rock and this has meant offline a new tribe has formed to produce the editorial. But John Robb is chief of the LTW tribes whether they are online or offline and the love of music feeds them both.

My part? Being Features Editor online keeps me plenty busy but I’m really pleased to say I’m also an Associate Editor in the offline tribe. It was a pleasure, and once again an honour, to be able to write some reviews for issue one too – I got some amazing records to listen to including The Bluetones, The Winter Passing, The Leaf Library, Nicolas Godin, Blank Realm, The British IBM and We Hunt Buffalo.

What did I learn from working on the first issue? Well…

• writing to a word count and to a tight deadline is a skill that never leaves you but sure is a painful constriction after years of the liberal infinity of writing for the web
• change is exciting, change is painful
• Louder Than War relies on love – the love of music is what bands us together and also what sets us apart. The love of sharing that love is what keeps the posts flowing online and what has held us together as we worked out how to get the magazine working alongside the website
• print may be about nostalgia but it may also be a part of the future. That’s what we’re trying to find out
• the smudged ink of making fanzines never really washes off. That culture is my culture
• there is still a *really* long way to go on kicking down the walls of equality in music and music journalism. I’m beyond ready to take that battle on.

I haven’t yet seen a full copy of the magazine and for the first time in nearly two decades I am impatient to get the newsagents and get my hands on some music press.

I really hope you’ll pick up a copy and enjoy how we’ve carried the spirit of the website into print. I really, really hope we get to carry this fun forward and bring you an issue two.

See you tomorrow at the news stand, yeah?

You can buy Louder Than War in WHSmith and independent newsagents. If you need to find your nearest WHSmith you can do so here or you can just order the magazine online and have the postie bring it to you. Follow the magazine on Facebook for the latest news and to let us know what you think.

I’m sure y’all already know where the good stuff is at – but if we’ve passed you by then check out the best music website around: Louder Than War. We’re on Twitter and Facebook too.

~

You can find me on Twitter.

I write about music for Louder Than War. I’m features editor on the website and an associate editor for the print version (issue one out 17 September – buy it in WH Smiths, independent newsagents or order online). My words about music are here.

I also do music PR and promotion and occasionally share music-related things over at my little agency, Noble and Wild. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

And because so many people asked me about it today – yes, I’ve written a couple of novels this year and yes, my pen name is Riley Reynolds. You can catch up on where that is all at on my other blog or (you knows it) on Twitter.

The last day of September is here and it’s a time for me to slow the spin of the whirlwind and reflect on what has been quite the month for me personally and professionally.

It’s seen a trip to LocalGovCamp; the launch of Louder Than War magazine; the launches of a new website and a school’s extranet from the Digital First project at Nottinghamshire County Council; and my first outing on the international conference circuit with a trip to Stockholm to deliver a keynote for the WEBBOS event.

And my Noble and Wild side got a look in too as I topped and tailed the month with trips up to York for some Ruby Tuesdays magic with Chris Helme.

It’s been exciting, challenging, tiring and utterly wonderful in so many, many ways!

Louder Than War – proving that print’s not dead

I blogged earlier in the month about launching Louder Than War as a magazine focused on classic indie and alternative music (available through WH Smith, independent newsagents or order online).

It’s a pleasure to say that the first issue has sold well and excited a lot of people (not all the people mind) about the possibilities of offline music journalism again.

This means it’s just the start – there’s lots of things we want to build on in future issues of the magazine, bringing more of the Louder Than War ethos and spirit to the printed page. For me this particularly means actively working toward a better gender balance, greater diversity and championing new bands as well as celebrating more established artists – all key parts of the Louder Than War manifesto.

We’ve already started work on issue two and I’m excited to be working on some interviews for the magazine as well as spending some more time over the next couple of months on reviews and features for the website.

I’d love to hear what you think of Louder Than War – online and in print. You can email me at sarahlay@louderthanwar.com.

Digital First deliverables

It’s also been great to see a couple of key milestones with the Digital First project I lead at Nottinghamshire County Council. I’ll blog about them more over on the Digital First blog as soon as I get a chance!

I want to just mention them here briefly though – the transition from beta to live of the new nottinghamshire.gov.uk and the launch of a new schools portal. Early days for both but we’re pleased with how the launch phases for both have gone and to see the work done under Digital First in a live environment.

For me it’s been a pleasure to work with the delivery team and to see individuals brings experience and skills to the project, but also to grow as we discovered and developed the discovery. I’m really proud of the team at Nottinghamshire right now and have every faith that they’ll continuously improve through the rest of the Digital First, just as our sites will do now they’re live!

LocalGovCamp 2015

I blogged about LocalGovCamp after attending in early September but just wanted to give another quick mention here.

Organising an event of this size shouldn’t be underestimated and after handling it on behalf of LocalGov Digital in 2014 and raising the sponsorship for this year’s event it was with only a little sadness and a fair amount of relief I handed over into the capable hands of local event team. All power to Nick Hill, Phil Rumens, Diane Sims and others who kept the event on track so it actually happened and ran it brilliantly on the day.

I still believe that LocalGovCamp is a vital event for the sector, just as LocalGov Digital (in some form) is a vital network. I hope that we’ll be able to take the event forward in 2016 and that the network come together to make that happen – many hands make light work and I think this is what LocalGovCamp needs. For the community, by the community.

Hello Stockholm! 

The last couple of days have been an adventure. After not flying anywhere in a decade, mainly because of a fear of flying, I made it over to Stockholm in order to deliver a keynote at the WEBBOS conference. I’m massively pleased that I did!

Hopefully the Digital First story I shared was useful to the delegates at the conference and although I was sad I didn’t speak Swedish so I could understand the other speakers (totally a failing on my part, no-one else’s!) I learnt loads through going on the trip.

I learnt that fear isn’t insurmountable, that previous experiences can shape you but it doesn’t have to define you, and that a terrifying yes is much more rewarding than a resigned no.

I also found out that Stockholm is an absolutely beautiful city – I had a wonderful walk at dusk around Gamla Stan (the Old Town) enjoying the narrow medieval streets and ornate buildings. As my first time in a Scandinavian country the one thing it left me sure of is that it won’t be my last.

It’s with massive thanks to Nina Eriksson and the Web Ability team for inviting me to speak and organising my stay, but it’s also with thanks to Carl Haggerty for suggesting WEBBOS may enjoy the Digital First story and for coaching me over the last few months (a massive part of me saying yes to the trip!).

What next?

As mentioned we’re already working on issue two of Louder Than War magazine, and work for the website continues as always. Digital First is moving forward with the next phase on the website project but also with other work streams. I’m scheming trips overseas next year now I know I can make myself get on a plane.

But October will also see some more work with Noble and Wild (well, that’s the vague intention anyway) but also on the authoring side.

I’m really excited that I’ll be reading a chapter from The Winter Passing at the literary-themed second meeting of the Geek Girl Brunch in Nottingham. I’m terrified too, obviously! I hope that others will enjoy what they hear as my first novel moves along its journey to publication.

September was the start of lots of things, and the exciting thing about that is it means there is still lots more to come!

~

Find me on Twitter.

Read more about Digital First.

Find my words about music on Louder Than War or more about Noble and Wild here.

For more about my novels check the Riley Reynolds blog.

Get involved in LocalGov Digital and LocalGovCamp 2016 here.

Like a reality TV star who releases an auto-biography before they hit 21 there seems something premature about my shortlisting in the Lifetime Achievement Award category at the Comms2Point0 UnAwards at the age of 36.

That doesn’t make it any less of an honour to be nominated and then shortlisted with three great, talented and inspirational comms professionals (Cormac Smith, John Fox and Matt Johnson), or any less likely that I’m going to spend the next week shamelessly shilling for votes.

• If you’re really keen to just post your vote online you can do that here, now.

My nomination covers all the areas of communications I work across and my 15 years of experience, and success, in journalism, PR, promotion and digital strategy and delivery.

It’s really nice to see all the areas of my professional life represented as often they’re kept separate but for me there is lots of cross-overs and lots of transferable skills and experience. It means I’ve not really taken my career in a linear fashion but run it altogether so at any given time I’m working at a high level in digital, online and print music journalism, leadership in local government, as an editor in music and on PR and promotions both online, in print and live.

As a bit of a summary my main roles at the moment are:

• Senior Digital Officer / Digital Team Leader at Nottinghamshire County Council. I’m leading the delivery team and worked on the strategy for the Digital First project. We’ve just delivered a new website for the council but are also working on a more strategic yet human approach to social media, a number of micro sites and an intranet / employee engagement work stream. It follows on from my work at Derbyshire County Council where I introduced social media and designed and delivered the award winning Local Elections 2009 campaign. Further back I worked as an intranet manager, a community manager, an online journalist and writer for the BAFTA winning Headline History project at Northcliffe Electronic Publishing.
• Co-founder / Communications Lead LocalGov Digital. I co-founded this growing network with Carl Haggerty and my contributions have included creating the Voice network to bring together conversation from across the sector, running LocalGovCamp in 2014 and helping to organise in 2015 and providing systems leadership across the sector. Last year we were co-winners in the Best Collaboration category at Comms2Point0.
• Editor and journalist at Louder Than War. I’ve been writing about music since I was about 14, mostly for my own fanzines and blogs but also as a freelancer. I joined John Robb’s Louder Than War in 2012 as reviews editor, becoming features editor in 2014 and editor in 2015. I’ve had the pleasure of writing about lots of new and grassroots music but also artists such as The Charlatans, Inspiral Carpets, Stone Roses, The Anchoress, Mark Morriss, and Chris Helme.
• Associate editor and journalist at Louder Than War magazine. We launched in print in September 2015 in partnership with Big Cheese publishing and I’m thrilled the first issue was so well received. I write reviews and features at the magazine as well as working with the print editorial team to co-ordinate coverage with the website and grow both areas of Louder Than War.
• Boss at Noble and Wild. A little agency I set up in 2013 through which I’ve done music promotion around Derby for bands including Hope and Social and Evans the Death as well as working with the wonderful Phil Burgess at the Hairy Dog on running Bank Holiday All Dayers for local bands throughout 2013. I also provide online and print PR for Chris Helme and am working with Team Love Records on an album launch campaign for early 2016.

I’m really lucky to have the opportunity to do all this at the same time (even more lucky to have a husband who supports me in a very practical way as well as emotionally).

I’m hugely honoured to be shortlisted in these awards and if you’ve worked with me or liked anything I’ve produced then I’d also be honoured if you would give me your vote. You can vote online here until 17 December.

~

Online voting is open until 17 November and the winner will be announced at the UnAwards ceremony in Birmingham on 3 December. VOTE HERE!

You can find me on Twitter, read my words about music on Louder Than War, check out some cool clients at Noble and Wild or follow my words of fiction.

If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. – Isaac Newton

I am absolutely thrilled, if slightly shocked, to announce that I won the Lifetime Achievement accolade at the Comms2Point0 UnAwards 2015.

The shortlist was open to public vote so this is a huge thank you to all who voted for me, and have supported me across the strands of my communications career.

The other nominees in this category – John Fox, Cormac Smith and Matt Johnson – were all worthy of winning the accolade. I certainly wasn’t expecting to hear my name called when against communications professionals of this calibre and I am sure the vote was close as we’ve all done work more than worthy of recognition. I look forward to continuing to be inspired by the work each of you do in the future.

As I said in my previous post it does feel faintly ridiculous to be nominated for a Lifetime Achievement at the age of 36 but once I’d stopped shaking from the shock, grinning about my walk-on music (Take That FTW) and admiring my medal I did reflect on the journey that got me here. There were no acceptance speeches yesterday but here, without fear of being tearfully removed from a podium, I’m going to thank people who have supported and encouraged me along the way. I suspect it will be a long post and that I won’t be able to individually namecheck everyone – and I’d prefer to talk to people too, rather than only list them out.

Generally:

• If you have supported me personally or professionally – thank you.
• If you have encouraged me, given me tough love, rational walk-throughs or coaching – thank you.
• If you’ve trusted me, been connected to a Reckless Yes or ever said ‘Oh God, ok, do it’ despite it being against your better judgement – thank you.
• If you’ve hoovered around me while I faffed about with Oxford commas, or fetched me cups of tea while I moaned about gritting update duty – thank you.
• And if you have screwed something up, shown me how not to do something or taught me things the hard way – thank you too.

This is the first time I’ve been nominated for an award that has taken account of the different careers I run concurrently and so it means I have so many more people to thank.

There is a saying that it takes a village to raise a child and while I can’t mention everyone individually these are the people who deserve extra thanks, who have been my tribe while I have grown. Especially these are the people that have been there over the last 18 months as all three strands of my professional life started to go stratospheric (and while I wrote my first two novels also).

Here we go…

Those closest to me

My mum – even though she’s not here she’s a massive influence on me still. And my dad for always supporting me no matter how bonkers my idea or next move seems.

My darling husband Michael and our two boys, Prentice and Tristan – not only do you all encourage me but you’ve all done practical things to support me too. I am grateful and love you entirely and for always.

My Thumbs Up Girls (Kelly, Vena, Lauren and Sarah) and Frankie, for listening to me whinge and doubt myself but also getting excited about the things I am excited about. And also for reading my books and fully embracing the role of my fangirl army.

Local government and LocalGov Digital

The team at Nottinghamshire County Council – conceiving and delivering Digital First has been a huge thing for each of us individually, as a team and as a leader in what the sector can do. There is far still to go but we’ve come a long way in a short time and I am immensely proud to be part of such a talented, enthusiastic and hard-working team.

The Coaching Carls – Haggerty and Bembridge – you two have probably put up with more of my self-doubt, determination, thinking aloud and self-prototyping than most. And you both inspire me a lot and give me hope that the sector does have some of the people it needs in and around it to truly transform.

That also goes for the LocalGov Digital crew – informally, voluntarily you are leading the sector and providing practical transformation in and across organisations. You’re all rather marvellous humans.

Thanks also to Dan Slee and Darren Caveney at Comms2Point0 – a fine event, a GREAT choice of film but also over the years huge enthusiasts and supporters of my work. Thank you both!

Louder Than War

It’s a big family at Louder Than War but at the heart of it is my Editor in Chief John Robb. Growing up he was a writer I loved to read and so to now work alongside him to manage Louder Than War and support our family of contributors is still pinch-myself amazing.

It’s even better that we can share music we love with each other and our readers and that we’re now also doing that in print. Thank you for seeing something in my writing, trusting me as an editor and reminding me that we are punk.

Noble and Wild

It started as a bit of fun to put on a few gigs and now I’m doing real PR work for real musicians. It’s a proper thing. It is the centre of the venn of my career – it’s where the music, writing, communications and digital all come into play. I love Noble and Wild dearly.

There’s a big thank you owed to people who have believed in me enough to work with me through Noble and Wild – Phil Burgess and The Hairy Dog (support the venue here), all the bands that have played a gig under this banner and the longest standing member of this tribe – Chris Helme.

He’ll probably tell me to give over but this summer he’s been incredibly important in helping me believe in myself as a writer (as a journalist but also as an author), who has tolerated me sniffing his record sleeves (not a euphemism) and has generally been a good friend, especially that time in Carlisle he gave me a Curly Wurly from his rider and the time he introduced me to what became of my favourite albums of 2015 (The Smoking Trees – check it out!). Thank you Chris – looking forward to more of this stuff in 2016!

So…

I don’t know whether my work in any of these areas has been helpful to people or inspiring in some way. I don’t know that it matters that I’m a successful female in both digital and journalism or whether that visibility is helpful or inspiring either. I hope that the things that I enjoy doing are useful to others and that I am spending my time well.

This award does come at a point where it feels like a good time to reflect on that a little more – I don’t know what 2016 and beyond have in store but it feels like time for a few more Reckless Yes’s and to embrace even more opportunities.

Thank you to everyone once more – thank you, thank you, thank YOU!

~

You can find me on Twitter – please come and chat!

I am editor of Louder Than War – find my words about music on the site here. We have launched as a magazine and you can find us in WHSmiths – next issue out 7 December – or order online here.

I offer music PR, live promotion and digital communications at Noble and Wild – our website, on Twitter and on Facebook.

I also write fiction under the name Riley Reynolds – find out more about my books or chat to me on Twitter.

At the end of every year I used to write a list of all the things – good and bad – that had happened during the preceding 12 months.

It was a test of memory, some years, to scrawl that list in the back of a journal, on Open Diary or a blog. But I found it a good way to reflect in a quick way on how things had changed.

In the last couple of years I seem to have fallen out of the habit and going with it was any attempt at making resolutions. Realising that the same ones kept recurring I figured trying to live consistently well rather than a once-yearly push might be the way to go.

Last year for me was a year where weird became normal, things I’d been working toward for a long time started to come to fruition and where beautiful possibilities seemed to bloom on every branch. I was very lucky in 2015. It was also a year of healing for me and so I end it feeling pretty happy with what happened personally and professionally and really, REALLY, excited for 2016.

As a bit of reflection and as a way of capturing some aspirations (silly and serious) for the year ahead, here’s my looking back list – I’ll publish a looking forward list of aspirations in a bit. This is a self-indulgent post but I’m making no apologies for that today.

I hope your year is happy and bright, full of good health, love, laughter and success of your own defining. I hope you hear music that makes your insides flutter, read books that make your brain turn cartwheels and that you get to stand under beautiful skies. All the best for 2016 whatever you hope it brings.

My highlights of 2015:

• Leading the Digital First team for Nottinghamshire County Council. It has been an absolute pleasure and honour to help build the team and then lead them through the first delivery phases of Digital First for the Council. This time last year the team didn’t fully exist and so it’s a real joy to me that we came together, gelled well and worked hard and fast to deliver a new public website, a new schools portal and a few microsites too. I’m really proud of my team as individuals and grateful to them as a group for all they’ve achieved – the awards we won at UXUK and Digital Experience UK were well-deserved. I can’t wait to see what we can deliver in 2016 before the project ends in May.
• Digital First also gave the opportunity to work with the Insight Lab, Shake Social and the inspirational Ann Kempster. It’s been a privilege to have learnt more user experience techniques and discover possibilities through the work they did.
• A massively important thing was undertaking formal coaching with Carl Haggerty. I won’t ever be able to thank him enough for going on that journey with me. It in a space of months healed some old wounds and (I think) let me be in a place to allow all the other opportunities to come my way in the rest of the year. The hardest but most worthwhile of  conversations.
• There’s been a lot of highlights with Louder Than War in 2015 – at the start of the year we launched the new website and finally fixed a load of problems we’d been struggling with (thanks Include Creative for work on this) and then in September I became Editor. This came on the back of a sad farewell to Guy Manchester but I’m looking forward to seeing what he has planned in 2016. We also launched as a magazine and it’s been thrilling to see the first two issues (circulation of 25,000) sell out and reinvigorate people about a passionate and in-depth music press. Big love to John Robb and the whole LTW family who continue to make the website exist day after day and to the band’s, PRs, labels and readers who give us a reason to keep doing that.
• Noble and Wild had a funny old year. I put on just one show – Chris Helme, Liam Walker and Paul Tabor at the Hairy Dog – then had a summer of occasional, hilarious and random conversations with Chris before ending the year warming up to work with Team Love in the first bit of 2016. I think next year might be a bigger year for N&W!
• I wrote my first novel, The Winter Passing and as a result also did my first reading as an author at the wonderful Geek Girl Brunch in Nottingham. I hadn’t planned to write a book in 2015 so it was a beautiful surprise. Followed by an even bigger one when I completed the first draft of my second novel also. I’m looking forward to setting my first book off on a big journey in 2016 but also tidying up that second novel and drafting a third.
• Events wise it was great (but full on) to do the early work for LocalGovCamp but the real praise goes to the team who picked it up from me and made it into a great day – well done again to Phil Rumens, Nick Hill, Diane Sim and others. I was also thrilled to present the keynote at WEBBOS in Stockholm – not least because it made me face a fear and get on a plane for the first time in a decade. A wonderful event in a gorgeous city that has made me remember there’s a big world to put under my feet.
• I won a Lifetime Achievement Award! I am still a bit gobsmacked about this but delighted to have my work across all areas of my life honoured in this way.
• At home I celebrated 10 years of marriage to my absolute soulmate Michael and saw my youngest son start school. We started making some big changes to our homelife in 2016 and we’re happier for it, phase two of the plan looks likely for 2016.
• I’ve laughed until I’ve cried with my girl gang, made some new friends and re-acquainted with some old ones too. I am very lucky.
• I also had dinner at the House of Lords; lost at tattoo roulette and got inked again as a result; went to some amazing gigs; spoken to some wonderful humans; listened to some amazing albums and found at least two new favourite record shops (Vinyl Tap and Inkwell) and one new favourite open mic (Ruby Tuesdays). And while I still panicked about a load of things and people that didn’t need panicking about but generally felt less anxious than previous years.

But the biggest thing that happened in 2015 was that I really started to discover and live by the power of the Reckless Yes. It made a lot of these opportunities happen, it led to the thrill of a billion more possibilities around them. Saying YES is scary and often shadowed in self-doubt but I haven’t regretted a single Reckless Yes in 2015.

This morning I posted a self-indulgent review of my 2015 and this is the companion piece; a look forward to what I hope for 2016.

I’m not making resolutions – the same ones just get listed every year so I’m aiming to live well more consistently no matter where the planet is relative to the sun. But the new calendar year does draw me into thinking about possibilities; a blank page upon which some wishes can be scrawled.

This then is my list of general aspirations for 2016 but that probably stand for all years:

• Keep embracing the power and the possibility that comes from a Reckless Yes
• Live more collaboratively and compassionately
• Be less self-indulgent yet kinder to myself
• Spend more time looking people in the eye and meeting up in person
• Let go of things that need to pass and launch myself into those still to come
• Spend more time on Scottish beaches and less time sat in traffic
• Think deeply, share widely
• Remember there is no spoon but the answer *is* in the network
• Don’t just listen, hear
• generally, in all things, JFDI.

There are a few aspirations that are forming into goals in different areas of my life but there are more things which are still waiting to become clear. A few things I’m already working on:

• Do at least two Noble and Wild shows in 2016
• More music. More words. Enjoy seeing Louder Than War grow – love what you do
• Write more, write better – as a journalist, blogger and author
• Read more. Start with that pile of books by the bed
• Let others read you – get The Winter Passing out there
• Live the good life – patch, pantry and parenting are more important than ever this year
• Relight the fire under something from years ago and reveal Gneiss Gneiss
• Start something new, make it ridiculous, drag other people along with you
• Travel (or at least don’t stand still)
• Spend more time on Scottish beaches (did I say that already? No matter. It’s important)
• Damn The Man, Save The Empire!

Let’s do this…bring on 2016!

~

You can find me on Twitter – please come and chat!

I am editor of Louder Than War – find my words about music on the site here. We have launched as a magazine and you can find us in WHSmiths – issue 2 out now – or order online here.

I offer music PR, live promotion and digital communications at Noble and Wild – our website,on Twitter and on Facebook.

I also write fiction under the name Riley Reynolds – find out more about my books or chat to me on Twitter.

A couple of weeks ago I was invited to take part in an event for managers from three Nottinghamshire district councils. It was one part of a longer programme of talks and workshops for them as they explored different areas of organisational process and strategic direction.

Hosted by Dr Stephen Jeffares, a Lecturer in Public Policy at the University of Birmingham my part was to be interviewed about all things digital and share some of my experience and thoughts with the group.

I really enjoyed the chat and talking not only about my most recent work at Nottinghamshire County Council on Digital First but further back over the 12 years I’ve been in local government, further back to the other experience of working online in private sector and as a regular user, and also to the founding and growth of LocalGov Digital.

There were lots of good questions from the group about situations they could see or had experienced in their own organisations and there was one question which really got me thinking: if back in 2008/2009 I was working at getting local authorities to recognise they should and could use social media and that’s now happening, what is it I’m tell councils they should be doing next, digitally?

There was a slightly flippant reply from me that councils while better at social media (and I include other areas of digital engagement in this term, such as email and text message) still weren’t making the most of it, generally, and certainly not keeping pace with the expectations of the public in this area. If they had started using it, they were still falling back to broadcast mode on many occasions, and it was a rare example indeed that had moved toward an fully integrated use of social media; in my view they are often using the technology as an informing tool but were not valuing the conversation for intelligence and influence. And just for clarity – when I talk of intelligence and influence I mean not manipulation but rather then leaving ego and ‘authority’ at the log-in and taking the relevant and appropriate place in online communities.

In terms of what I thought they should be looking to next – well, again, a lot of the ideas and statements of the last 12 years still stand summarised as: build better public services, stop doing the wrong digital things in a fairly average way.

But, again, this is flippant of me. What does that really mean? Well, at the time I said something about how councils need to stop thinking of digital as a presentation layer and move toward service design where digital is one, albeit quite powerful, means of delivery. I think local government needs to stop seeing digital as a prettier web page that will magically mean channel shift occurs and start to understand something more fundamental, more difficult – that harsh times and a changed world need radical redesign of services. They need to challenge themselves, or be challenged, to design better public services from the inside out.

So, that’s the what I think. The how?  Well it starts with not containing digital to a ‘digital team’ but seeing service design as a wider activity. It’s something that needs to take in procurement, and contracting, and IT, and HR, and leadership, and the community, and the service. It needs to be co-produced – not just tested with real users. We need to learn that services built in silos are experienced in bits – and this is never going to be best for the user, and if it’s not best for them it won’t unlock the things the organisation wants; savings and satisfaction.

There is no ‘quick win’, or silver bullet, or any of those other buzz words for short cut.

What do I think council’s need to do next? Arguably what they should have long ago done – stop thinking about ‘doing digital’ and start thinking about ‘better services first, better digital delivery as an outcome.’

Much thanks to Dr Stephen Jeffares for inviting me to be interviewed and to the group for their time and questions!

~

You can find me on Twitter and find out more about the recent work I’ve done with Nottinghamshire County Council on their blog. I’m the co-founder of LocalGov Digital.

For music writing you can find me at Louder Than War, for music PR I’m at Noble and Wild, while live music promotion and DJing is over at Reckless Yes. I also write fiction as Riley Reynolds.

Last year I wrote a blog post on ‘Doing Something That Scares You’, and shared how mid-June had become a date that over the last four years has taken on significance for me in my personal challenges. It’s time for the 2016 update.

This year I’ve gone with the classic bait and switch approach. On the surface it looks like I’ll be marking the anniversary by putting on the hometown comeback show for a band called Bivouac and releasing the first record from my co-owned label, Reckless Yes Records.

There are many reasons why this show, this venture, is a great fit for my annual push. Firstly, the band themselves. I’ve loved Bivouac’s albums for a long time; they were one of the local bands that made me start seeing that no town is a total cultural trap, that led me to discover other local bands. They mean something in my personal history and they mean something to a lot of people I really admire. On that level alone I’m thrilled to be helping to put on one of their first shows in twenty years.

And I’m doing that as half of Reckless Yes, as we put out our first record, turning this from a good thing to a great thing. As an entity Reckless Yes wasn’t even a twinkle in my eye six months ago. A chance conversation with Pete Darrington led to a whimsical domain name purchase which led to making something from nothing. It led to a renewed energy for the music scene in Derby and the part I can play it that. More surprisingly (and to be honest the best bit about the whole thing) is it led to a brilliant and unexpected friendship.

Reckless Yes has been one of the absolute joys of the first half of 2016…and it’s about to get an even bigger role in the future. We’re keeping a few secrets as ideas become plans but alongside it I’ve been keeping a secret of my own too.

Because while this would be a tremendous way to mark the anniversary it’s not The Big Thing. That would be the announcement that after 12 years I’m leaving Local Government.

I joined the public sector in 2004 as an enthusiastic and somewhat naive digital content strategist (although we weren’t called that then). I found myself at Derbyshire County Council in a sea of eGovernment money being used as binds to enterprise level tech. It became pretty apparent to me (and I’m sure to those around me) that I was a disruptor, not because I wanted to make things difficult for me or anyone else but because when something seems to be contrary to common sense you question it; when something is broken you look for the fix.

Over the following decade there have been the best of times and the worst. I’ve had some amazing colleagues at both Derbyshire and then Nottinghamshire County Council, I’ve been honoured that my team have allowed me to lead them. I’ve also grown an utterly mind-blowing wider network and gained virtual colleagues and friends. Just like with Reckless Yes I’ve been blessed to work directly and virtually with people who can balance shared passion and constructive challenge and who know that success is the product of relentless hard work.

And I’ve worked on things that have interested and delighted me. From using the local elections to showcase the potential of social media to the organisation in 2009, to delivering a sector-leading set of digital platforms with Digital First. I’ve done my fair share of gritting duties, despaired at third-party systems, shouted into the void on the ‘single Local Government website’ debate, given side-eye to services wed to their jargon. I’ve discovered my voice through blogging, and several tribes through being part of unconferences, co-founding LocalGov Digital and joining that elite bunch of LocalGovCamp organisers. I’ve won some awards and had people ask to listen to my ideas about things. I’ve been GritGirl and CitizenSarah; I’ve been the lone wolf, a Wild Thing and an Epic Visionary. I’ve spoken at events in Glasgow, Exeter, Birmingham, Leeds and Stockholm. I’m part of the DL100 for my digital leadership and I won a Lifetime Achievement UnAward. I’ve shed tears of frustration and joy during my time and I’ve met some really, really wonderful clever, funny and lovely people.

It’s been, on balance, a blast.

But, all things must pass.

We all know the sector is changing and the pressures it is under are many. I have not lost heart or interest, I’d happily continue living my double life of local government and music. But sometimes circumstance makes a choice for you, even when you don’t want to choose.

I’ll be leaving as we close the Digital First project at Nottinghamshire County Council at the end of May. This two-year acceleration project was an unexpected journey for me, but has ended up being a great note on which to take my bow. It’s work which is incomplete but I’ve no doubt that the talented team that remain could do an awesome job of moving this on to the next phase. I’m looking forward to watching from a distance at what this Council does, but also what happens elsewhere in the sector as Carl Haggerty, Phil Rumens and others take LocalGov Digital forwards too.

What will I be doing? I’m not entirely sure. Having managed two careers for the last four years I’ll still be busy…

I’ll be remaining as editor of Louder Than War and working with the team at Big Cheese on the now bi-monthly Louder Than War magazine; I’ll probably pick up a bit more freelance music writing too, maybe even get round to writing up the couple of non-fiction music journalism books I’ve got on my list.

And I’ll be doing more with Noble and Wild. Music PR mainly but helping folk with their digital communications too. Reckless Yes we’ve already talked about but I think it’s fair to say we’re only getting started with where this is really going.

Other than that I’ll be hanging out on a lot of Scottish beaches with my kids this summer and getting my head back down into my fiction writing. I’m looking forward to having more time at home with my family, to living a life which doesn’t fully revolve around the construct of office hours and commutes, to being free from political restriction. I’ll probably continue blogging here but maybe more about music and other stuff as much as local government and digital.

So, that’s it, it’s time to take on this year’s challenge – self-employment and a more complex-to-organise but simpler life. Who knows what life has in store – maybe this is more of a see you later than a goodbye to local government – I never rule any possibility out.

Thank you to everyone who has been on my local gov journey with me, especially to my digital colleagues at Derbyshire, my AMAZING team at Nottinghamshire and to my LocalGov Digital tribe. You’ve made the tough times bearable and the good times great and for that I will always be thankful.

~

I’m really bad at approving and replying to comments on here but you can find me on Twitter.

Come to the Bivouac show in Derby – it’ll be ace! Or come to our DIY night – Six Impossible Things – there is free cake! You can also hear me and Pete on the radio each week – The Rumble is on Radio Andra every Tuesday from 8pm.

Noble and Wild has a website and is on Twitter and Facebook.

Reckless Yes also has a website and is on Twitter and Facebook.

You can keep up with my writing (music journalism, freelance writing and authoring) here and find my author archive on Louder Than War here.

It was my pleasure to be part of a panel in Liverpool on Thursday night on ‘You Can’t Be What You Can’t See: The mis- and under-representation of women in music’, in my capacity as editor of Louder Than War. 

Hosted by Liverpool music paper Bido Lito as part of the city’s Writing On The Wall Festival, alongside me on the panel were Laura Snapes (contributing editor to Pitchfork, former editor at the NME and writer for publications including Uncut, the Guardian, Wire and more); Lorna Gray, music journalist and founder of intersectional feminist girl gang Fierce Babe Network; and we were chaired by Amy Roberts, co-founder and editor at feminist pop culture blog Clarissa Explains Fuck All.

The bistro underneath the Everyman theatre was packed and it was a great discussion covering whether blogging is important or helpful to getting started in music journalism; how we support and champion female voices in music writing; how we cover the female experience of music without reducing or limiting; and how we can challenge publications and editors who favour male writers (and indeed, male music).

I really enjoyed the discussion and hearing the experiences of the other panellists, so similar to some of my own and yet very much individual to us all too. There were some great and challenging questions too which got me thinking deeper into my own situation, but also about privilege and societal systems. A worthy discussion and one which I hope continues beyond this panel, event and festival.

It was the question about how we challenge publications and editors on equality and diversity of coverage and contribution that has stuck with me and turned over in my mind in the last couple of days. This is perhaps because it’s something I experience from both sides – as a female writer, but also as a editor.

Listen for the small voices

There is a responsibility on both sides to challenge and change the status quo with this. As a writer I must keep pitching and improving my craft, calling out unfair treatment where it exists.

As an editor the responsibility is even greater, and more challenging simply because of the volume of the world we’re operating in now: I must listen for the small voices.

Those will privilege have the confidence of ingrained social structures to raise their voice above the melee, to keep knocking on a door which perhaps isn’t fully open. They find opportunities at publications where the door isn’t just closed but locked and barred to others. This is not to discriminate against good work but rather to curate a space where more can add their voices to those writing about music and culture.

This is to listen not just for female voices but for those from all sorts of different backgrounds, from all people, all places. It’s to make the profession and the canon stronger through positively supporting diversity.

It sounds so obvious, right? Perhaps, but if it really were, and it were also easy then we’d be making much better progress toward this than we are.

Louder Than War is listening

I’ve discussed this many times with Louder Than War’s editor John Robb and have done so again in the last few days.

Our manifesto still screams for young talent to sit alongside our more experienced writers and for the pieces we carry to be informative, informed but also emotional – an element missing in much of a field of journalism covering an art form which elicits emotion. While not explicitly stated we actively want writers from different backgrounds – gender, class, race, and more – as we believe diversity makes us all better.

While we’re not taking on new writers at the moment we are accepting individual commissions – particularly for features. So if there is an artist you want to cover, pitch to me.  If you don’t want to contribute but there is an artist you think we should be covering, pitch to me. My contact details are on this page.

Very little will change without continuous challenge. As a woman in the music industry, as a female writer and as editor of music publication it’s time to commit to further, focused, action to really start to see those changes.

~

There’s a good overview of the whole You Can’t Be What You Can’t See event on GetIntoThis.

I’m rubbish at approving and replying to comment on here but do leave one, or come and find me on Twitter.

You can read my words about music on Louder Than War here. You can hear me on the radio every Tuesday night as part of The Rumble with Pete Darrington – Tuesdays 8pm on Radio Andra.

I also run music PR agency Noble and Wild; and co-run Reckless Yes – a record label and live music promoter.