It’s now more than a fortnight since I officially retired. So far I have managed to avoid going back to work (OK, I did help out a friend with some BSides stuff) and the odds of me returning by Christmas are lengthening. The first few days were a bit of a mare, with a small flood on day one and a power cut on day two. Since then, all has been good and I must say I am enjoying the experience.
Clearly, I have had time to reflect on my final days, especially around the amazing effort the team put in to make my retirement memorable. It was two years in the making and the celebrations seemed to last for a fortnight. It was lovely being able to see a lot of the people that I had worked with over the years, to say goodbye, or is it adieu as I hope to see many of them in the months and years to come. Many of the people I have worked with I count as friends.
What has taken me back though is the number of people who have thanked me for everything I had done for them. In my mind, it was the other way around. I had asked a lot of people to do things for CyberNorth, pulling in a lot of favours and, no doubt, inconveniencing some people some of the time. The help I offered was usually the ‘price’ for what I had asked them to do. I have used inverted commas as, in the main, no money changed hands, with the vast majority of work done as a favour or as goodwill.
I’m thanking them and they are thanking me. This is a nice position to have been in with each of us having some mutuality to create a win-win situation. Collaboration has been a major driver in my work and I still believe it is key to the region’s commercial future.
To sum up then, I would like to thank everyone who has been involved in my work, especially with CyberNorth over the last eight years. If I have helped some of these people along the way then that is even better.
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 