Girl's Night - February

Thank you Carrie!  I just love that she hosts this.  I know we would not get together otherwise.  We would all have good intentions but get caught up in the things that occupy our lives.  This is a moment each month when we celebrate friends, the good in our lives and good food!  This week I actually planned ahead and made something I was happy with: Chicken Blue Cheese Bacon sliders on Hawaiian rolls....yum :)

We also had Mac N Cheese which I was craving all month; coconut banana bread, tuscan soup, loaded chip cookies, 4 cup cake (or something like that); See's candy, and my favorite BBQ beans. Good food night...not so good waistline night. 

I am alone a lot

I love my life; I am content, but sometimes I realize I am alone a lot and it surprises me. 

What I learned from work this week

I am the project manager for business process improvement (reengineering) at work.  We just started the 2nd review.  This means we selected the review team; recruited a core team member who will help me when the two guys who started this effort retire (sadness); conducted an orientation;  and observed the process (error suspense) throughout the organization - seven different areas. 

In the middle of this week, Wednesday, I attended a Strategic Planning meeting with the Senior Management Team to revisit our vision and mission.  This is the first time I have been part of the team doing the revisiting.  At least over the last decade I have been the facilitator for these types of meetings.  It was weird but in a very good way. 

What I learned this week:

1. I am not pretending, I am really part of the senior management team with valuable and meaningful things to contribute.  I could run a program and I understand what it takes to be a manager and I am good at it. 
2. I love process improvement.  I love what it means to organizations.  I beleive it is only way to get out of the messes in government at all levels.  I know that capacity is the only real problem in government (well aside from the politicians).  Government will be better stewards of public funds, will provide better customer service and have employees who care about what they do if they can increase capacity by fixing their systems.  As Ken Miller says: The work of goverment is noble; the people of goverment are amazing; the systems of government are a mess.