I think I have had a pretty interesting and busy week. I also think perhaps I am a bit nutty and have too many “balls in the air” or “ pots on the stove”. Anyway this is just a bit of a rant to help me figure out what I should drop, where I should cut back or whether I’m crazy enough just to keep it all going.

Let me fill you in on what it is I do. My primary job…the one I get paid for on a regular basis and spend the most time at (30hrs/wk) … has the title of “Coordinator” for a small community organisation which could be best described as a “self help clearing house” come “business centre/info and resource centre” for self help/support groups and their members.(Health and disability related)

In this position I have the role of financial manager/strategic manager/IT manager/HR manager/ project manager and whatever else manager there is. Don’t be too impressed, this organisation covers a relatively small geographic area and a very small population. The organisation has a Board of Management who has the legal responsibility for the management of the organisation, they volunteer to do this.

Anyway..back to my week…………..I was asked to participate in a research project about the use of ICT in small community health organisations and to also be on the steering committee for the project. We met to review a list of interview questions for participants and also for me to provide contacts in a couple of small groups who the organisation I work for supports. I’m quite excited with this project as there could be some interesting information come out of it which would be very useful for planning the activities of another organisation that I am the new vice president of….more about that later…

My next meeting was with partner organisations who are involved with delivering to the community of the “Living a Healthy Life with Chronic Conditions “ course. (a course developed by Stanford University which is used all over the world to help people learn to participate in the self management of their health conditions) We worked on scheduling courses for next year and also a course to train leaders for future courses. I am trained as a leader of this course and run 1 each school term (as a volunteer). I quite enjoy them, I have met some lovely people and find it quite satisfying to see people gain some control over their life.

This week was also the week for the monthly Management Board meeting. I sent the agenda, last meetings minutes and various other papers and financial reports out last week for the Board members to read and emailed my report to them last Friday. I took the minutes and said my various bits, gained approval for expenditure on some IT upgrades and by the time I had packed up and closed the office etc got home just after 7.00pm.

Our Health Care Consumers Association also had a meeting to solicit feedback from organisations on the local Health Departments latest Strategy on Chronic Disease Management, so I was asked to attend that and also to give feedback from the perspective of those providing education/information on self management. I think all that attended were disappointed in the Departments lack of understanding, lack of commitment of resources to any of the vague strategies that they proposed. (all BS really).

I have an assistant normally who takes care of the routine tasks, the phone answering, data base updating, invoicing and receipting for the organisation, but she is taking some leave at the moment and I have 2 temps filling in……it helps but, yeah, it’s not the same.

So that’s my main job………

As I mentioned I am also the vice president (newly elected) of another community organisation. Again, don’t be overly impressed…we are quite small. This organisation provides IT support, advocacy, information and education to community development organisations (that’s out brief anyway). Well, this week we are recruiting Technical support staff (we want 2-3 on a casual basis) I posted an Ad on a local recruitment type website a few days ago and have 16 applications so far. I will spend a little time this weekend to assess those applications and short list some for interview…hopefully in a week.

I also have another 8 hrs a week paid work now. This is a recent commitment. I was approached by someone who is involved in one of the organisations that is supported by my primary workplace. I am providing book keeping services to a newly launched Mining company. It’s done with the aid of book keeping software that I use in my main employment. I really enjoy doing the book keeping..odd as that may sound. And I find this business quite exciting, this company has 8 different projects running, they are mining minerals in the local area as well interstate…their primary focus, I think, is gold deposits. Gold prices are very good currently and they are hoping to do well in the present market. The company has recently gone public on the stock exchange and are looking for investors….quite exciting…..and quite new to me, I am learning all sorts of new things here, although I just record payments and draw up cheques for payment of all the expenses. They have just leased office space near by so I have been asked to get the power connected and we will meet next week to discuss how this office is going to be set up. So that’s a bit of a diversion from all the Health and Disability stuff.

Also this week I organised an information session on Insurance options for our self help groups. The volunteering peek body is setting up a group insurance scheme for small non profits that will hopefully attract a 20% discount in the cost of premiums to groups.

So I’m not sure how this is all going to work out in the future….. I have fun with most of it….. a bit of frustration with some things….. but most of the people are great…

Yesterday was the Parkinson’s associations monthly meeti
ng (they are my favourite group of people) some of them I have known for as many as 10 years now. I could hear laughter from their meeting and they had a good crowd as they do each month. It’s probably those moments that counteract the other frustrations of working where i do.

Hopefully this Sunday, if the weather is good, I will go for a drive to the coast for the day. Saturday I will have to get some house work done and my tax return…as well as mums.

Fun huh……….