David Gutteridge

I have now completed the VU Leadership Program after the week in Torquay.

I also recently found out that I had gained a distinction in my final workplace project in the PSMP! This means that I have finished and can graduate in July this year.

A big thank you to my mentor/sponsor Laurie Miller.

I am getting ready for the next VU Leadership workshop in Torquay and found all my notes from last year. I’ve also updated my IPDP to reflect my progress to date. Flights are booked and I’ll also take advantage of the weekend after the workshop to go to Hamilton and Warnambool… Looking forward to the pool at Torquay for swimming and finishing up the program.

This is a book by the author of the Tipping Point which was a book that I borrowed from Maree. My sister bought it for me for Xmas as she knew that I had read the Tipping Point and enjoyed it. The book is about how humans make decisions and that fact that good and bad decision making don’t really rely on how much information you have, but on the ability to focus on the right details. An interesting Dutch study on shopping showed that people were happier when they made trivial decisions (eg buying something cheap) and really thought about is, but big decisions (eg buying a bed) were better made on gut instinct. The book discussed conscious and unconscious decision making and what it means in life and business. I enjoyed the book and found it an easy read, so check it out if you have time!

Today I have started in my new role of Operations Manager in the Government Education and Training International unit – I am still based within the Polytechnic, but we also look after International students in the Tasmanian Academy and at Department of Education Schools.

I have a team of 10 – three main areas, Homestay, English Language Support and Student Advisors.

There are people based in the South and also in Launceston. I will need to spend some time in the North to better understand our operations there. The first day has been spent getting the basics organised – I will then start planning how I will interact with the rest of the team and preparing for our registration audit in March.

I was able to finish my PSM project before I left the Quality Assurance Team at the end of the year. I am now in the process of writing up the results – this has to be done by early April 2010 to meet the deadlines. I was hoping to get some of this done over the Christmas break, but time seemed to fly by so quickly…

The project was a success overall and I was able to present a report to my manager with some clear recommendations on the way forward.

I have started work on my project for the final unit of the Public Sector Management Program (PSM). As part of the academic process, I have submitted a “proposal” – I am waiting for assessor comments on this before I can lodge the project plan…

The actual project is working on a new staff, student and employer feedback system for the Polytechnic. This involves a manadated set of questionnaires that need to be rolled out to all teaching staff and a more informal system for general use throughout the year.

I have started work on the actual project itself – the first part has been the issue of an all staff online survey seeking opinions. This was posted in our Quality Assurance newsletter a few weeks ago and another reminder sent out this week – so far we have had 60 responses which is pretty good, but I would like to get it closer to 100…

I also sent out the link to the Learner Questionnaire that our students will use to provide feedback to the Polytechnic on their training and assessment. I have also organised some PD sessions for next week at all the major campuses.

I had one issue with technology where a teacher reported that he could not access the survey – this caused some panic, but it seemed to just be a one off issue…

Also the process of publicising the sessions has reminded me of the importance of networks in getting infomation out and acted upon. People may not respond to an email invitation, but they will attend a session if a person of influence suggests that it would be a good idea to go.