Weeknotes E39
Each week I’m going to keep a running update of the work I’ve done & things I’ve learned along the way.
My current priority:
Supporting the Healthy Start private beta
Some interesting and shareable things that happened this week. Other more mundane things also happened…
Blog administering event
Went over to GDS for the morning and get a mandatory refresher on what blogs on GOV.UK should look, feel and contain. Lots of advice I’d been following already but you know what, it was quite good.
The morning consisted of a lot of shaming by the host - going through lots of naughty blogs and blog posts. Our humble digital health blog got a mention. It was well worth it though to drive home the point that we need better consistency. It also made me run off and fix a couple of issues I noticed on our own blog. I also got a nice sticker and some bits and bobs of new knowledge to improve future blog posts.
Side note: is that for everyone else in the room running/editing their blog is their job. Their full-time job. I get value out of being transparent by blogging, editing/improving copy and learning about good content design so I think it’s worthwhile overall but it does eat time out of my “day job”.
Best image I saw on the web this week…
Show and tell away day
Been given a morning slot to share what we’ve been up to in Healthy Start land at a future away day with directorate. Did a first version of it, got feedback, iterated and then did more updates and changes.
Worked with colleague and added some videos and audio clips from real users for extra punch. Delivering it tomorrow morning.
Crit-ing
I am occasionally a service assessor. Sometimes I need to wear that hat and see what things could be iffy in a service or product. This week I got my hands on something the department is about to release due to time demands. Unsurprisingly it’s not the best thing it could be.
I spent some time crit-ing, then feeding back to the team on how to make things better and what we need to do next. All good constructive stuff. Lots to do but we can celebrate by making one immediate accessibility improvement before the release date and nudged towards better ordering of content. More evidence to be gathered, more iterations but we made it ever so slightly better than it was originally.
Side note: I sent this page on checking accessibility in spreadsheets to team which is quite useful for those who are living in a world of spreadsheets.
Coffee club
I am the ringleader of our teams coffee club. An offshoot of the very popular tea club and new for 2019. We are now into our third month and are ever growing. I’m keeping a record, as I have done in other jobs. It’s not quite Dan-level cake open data but it is a start.
The digital health and care crew have consumed about 3.5kg of ground coffee thus far, which is £33.73 worth of coffee (I have been choosing mostly the affordable stuff). Next time you see me give me some tips on what coffee to buy next for the gang.
What I’ve been reading
- Uplifting article on Africa’s tech entrepreneurs.
- I think i’m late to the party but this Greenpeace #clickclean campaign is right up my street. A report on how committed large tech companies are committed to renewable energy.
- Advertising boards used for good and helping homeless people find shelter on dangerously cold nights.
- Menstrual health to be taught in school by 2020 - it’s crazy it’s taken this long for it to happen.
- Bit late but here is a list of Valentine’s day gifts for those that care about their privacy from Mozilla.
- Say goodbye to junk-food ads on London public transport.
- How Brexit is creating 4 blocs in Parliament. Beautiful use of data as storytelling.
- I can sympathise with this list of what tensions product managers face