How did I get here?

My first entry set out my vision and what this blog is about. Now I want to give you some idea of where I’ve come from and how I came to be where I am today.

I never really knew what I wanted to do while I was at school. I was always really good at English and Art, found History and Geography interesting and everything else barely tolerable. Still, I kept my head down and did OK at most things without too much effort. As exams approached, thoughts of, and indeed lessons in, careers began to come into view. I still had no idea. I had ideas that something involving Art might be good – maybe graphic design, but the pragmatist in me said that maybe telecommunications were the future, even though I had little interest in that area.

One thing I vividly remember though was telling people that I didn’t want to work in an office – no way.

All through my childhood I had been in the Cubs, then the Scouts and in my teens I was in the Air Training Corps (ATC). I went on great school trips to the Vosges Mountains in France and Duke of Edinburgh’s expeditions in Wales. The ATC regularly took me off on adventurous activities, often in the relative wilderness and I enjoyed it all. I was pretty convinced that office life was not what I wanted, so I started to look at the Royal Air Force as something to aspire to. Family links and my time in the ATC also pushed me in this direction and I thought it must be the sort of job that isn’t 9-5 grind and had a fair chance of being outside at least some of the time.

Even with this general direction, I still didn’t really know what I wanted to do – being a pilot never really interested me, and besides, my Maths was so poor I doubted I’d ever make the cut. Engineering held no interest and the RAF Regiment looked pretty tough (it’s good to know your limits!). I decided that the best strategy was to sit tight and wait to see if something would reveal itself and in the meantime, increase my chances of a better life. So A’ Levels and subsequently University beckoned.

Still none the wiser, I bummed around for a year after graduating, working in a bookshop, during which time I formulated some kind of grand idea that Personnel/HR/Training would be a good area to get into – seeing some of the poor treatment and utilisation of staff in the company I worked for, led me to think that by working in this field I could influence this and make a difference – idealistic tripe as it turns out!. Given that my degree course in English Language was heavily geared towards moving into education, I decide to specialise in Training & Development. Lo and behold, the RAF had a commissioned branch called “Admin: Training” which was Officer entry, graduates only. “Result!” I thought – it was all coming together. Off I went for Selection and was eventually told (more or less) “you’re a bit green” come and see us again in a year or so”.

Fed up with working for a pittance, I decided to move back South and pursue the Training & Development agenda from there. Back to college to get a professional qualification, temping in what HR jobs I could get on my CV, I eventually landed my first professional training role with a large aviation engineering company. “Perfect” I thought with my next RAF application in mind. The second RAF application was thrown into jeopardy by a Rugby accident, but after a couple of years and an eventual operation and recovery I was back in a position to apply again. This time round, I was ultimately successful. By my point of entry to the RAF as a Flying Officer I was 27.

Ultimately, it wasn’t to be. The RAF wasn’t for me…I think it was a case of the right place at the wrong time. Had I been younger and less experienced I might well have been more able to put up with the more mundane aspects of service life, less questioning of practices that I knew professionally were wrong or out of date. I left the RAF having had a difficult, but useful experience. One of the main things I really enjoyed was the outdoors stuff during my Initial Officer Training. One stint was a ten day exercise on Otterburn Training Area during November. Otterburn’s a barren, yet beautiful place and even when it was blowing a gale and lashing down with rain, I was still happy. Life was simple. It was just you and the elements. It felt like that’s how life should be. It’s hard not to feel inspired and tranquil all at once when surrounded by beauty on such an awesome scale.

Later, during an almost three year stint commuting in and out of London, including the Tube, I would return to that place in my mind’s eye, trying to escape the fact that I was crammed into a metal tube with equally miserable strangers on my way to a job that I hated.

Despite hating what I was doing I fell into the socially conditioned trap of trying to further my “career” by doing more professional qualifications and striving for “better” jobs. Both endeavours that I was successful in and a few job moves later I find myself in a senior Training & Development role in a large and successful insurance company. Don’t get me wrong, in less than a decade I’ve achieved a lot and have a CV that many would envy. Just think what I could have achieved if I was really trying…if I was doing something that I really enjoyed?!

Where has the childhood interest in art and creativity gone? What happened to the assertion that I didn’t want to work in an office?

I’m 34 now and I figure I have around 30 years of good work left (assuming I don’t win the lottery!), possibly more looking at the way pensions seem to be working out.

I want to spend that time doing something I enjoy, something that sustains me and my family alone. I want something physical and creative and ultimately, something that I can be proud to tell people about…something that gives my children cause to be proud of who their father is. I want to be more than just another manager in another dull office.

So, how did I get here…? I’m really not sure. I know I directed my career to date, but it feels like I accidentally drifted into mediocrity. So now it’s time to muster my efforts in a very conscious effort to do something that I really want.

This could be it. I hope it is.