grumbledook.org

Category: IT Management

  • BETT 2010

    It isn’t that long until BETT 2010 and I am in the fairly novel position for me of having some time on my hands. In previous years I have been running the EduGeek Technical Help Point, been assisting on stand such as the ICT Register or Lapsafe … or had a steady stream of suppliers…

  • Innovation Management

    After my last blog post I have a few emails and messages pointing out that Change Management was often the blocker in teachers and techies trying new things out, that BSF used Change Management and contracts to stifle innovation, that red tape is the bane of education as it is and that we have to…

  • FITS will fit all your needs!

    What a wonderful week it has been. After a chance to catch up with schools involved in a local Apple RTC project (lovely to see and hear of teachers and pupils excited and engaged by the chance to try something different) we had the first piece of training for our new Technical Champions. The course…

  • Technical Champions

    I have a reputation now for being a bit of an independently minded person … having worked in independently minded schools has helped this view. Some might call me bloody awkward, even troll-like at times, but I do think that it pays off to think slightly differently and to try something different too. Take the…

  • Standing in the shoulders of giants

    There are times when you just know that a day is going to be a wonderful one, that no matter how nervous you are about presenting, no matter how tired you may or how much work you have to do for the next day… You just get a tingle. And that is what I had…

  • So you want to be a strategic leader?

    A recent discussion on EduGeek.net was about the introduction of someone above the Network Manager, but line managed by the Bursar / School Business Manager. Full details can be found here. Since I have just come from a similar role (actually part of SLT and line managed by the Head) I thought I would give…

  • The Brave New World

    For those that may not be aware I have recently made a permanent change of role. I have been on secondment for a year with the LA and over the summer my job became a full time position so I had to decide whether to apply for it or not … I was a harder…

  • How do you share the joy and share the pain?

    A thread has popped up over on EduGeek.net about setting up user groups in schools … quite a step forward to have more input into how IT is set up at your school, but it is more than just about sharing a few ideas. This isn’t too disimilar to one of the learning conversations at…

  • “But no-one ever listens to me!”

    A comment that you can frequently hear in some schools when you talk to IT technicians or Network Managers… usually not long after someone else at the school has made a decision about kit being purchased, new IT suites, programmes involving laptops and students, or policy decisions involving scrapping a heap of security protections. Often…