The Only Thing I Have In Common With Madonna

Hi everyone.

What is it about September which creates that “Start of a New School Year” feeling, even though as in my case, I left school almost 50 years ago? Well, I don’t really know either but what I do know is that it’s the time of year when I like to review what I’ve achieved career and work-wise over the last 12 months.

So it’s when I fill in my annual profit/loss sheet (very variable), see how much time I’ve spent on training and development (too much) or marketing and networking (not nearly enough), as well as writing an End of Year Report even though no one but me ever reads it.

This September though, I’ve decided to use the month to make a bigger work-related change and have reorganised my “portfolio career”. The term “portfolio career” is really just a grand name for having more than one job but it’s a useful way of defining what I do which over the last twelve years has been a combination of “creative” jobs including writer, designer, crafter, artist and even a musical entertainer.

As I sometimes say, the only thing I have in common with Madonna (and it's not the pointy bra) is that I keep reinventing myself, so over the years I’ve added some of these jobs, taken others away and frequently reorganised their order of importance to me. Now, as I approach the official age for retirement, I’ve decided its time for another reinvention.

So out goes art and crafting which is now officially a “hobby” and in comes “voluntary work.” But I’m not going to be removing old mattresses from canals or picking up bin bags of litter any time soon. Instead I’ll be putting my journalistic, research, organisational and “soft” skills such as empathy to good use. It’s something I’ve been doing for a long time now but never really thought of as “work” before.

Most of it has entailed fighting against some form of perceived injustice either on behalf of myself or others but which has a wider context. For example, at the moment I’m working (pro bono) on behalf of a group of ex-care home employees who were made redundant without pay or proper notice and in my opinion, treated appalling by their employer who happens to be a neighbour of mine and who owes me a considerable amount of money too.

And although the new regime has only been in place for a couple of weeks, it feels much better already. I’m really enjoying doing my art and craft much more now that I’m doing it purely for pleasure and can dip in and out of it as I wish. Also, the fact that what used to be “home admin” is now part of work has made it feel much more manageable and easier to deal with.

So if your mind goes back at this time of year to the anticipation of shopping for a new pencil case or the anxiety of what that new teacher will be like, then maybe September is a good month to take stock and think about where you want to be by the time it comes round again.