Feeling mellow..

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Yesterday was a great day.

I got to see two Universities in South Yorkshire, one because I'd tweeted with someone (@nethergreen) and one because I was offered an interview.

The contrast was pretty startling. Hallam was buzzing and vibrant, and the Adsetts Centre looked like it was doing a perfect job of welcoming students and getting them to behave whilst in there. A great mix of 'social learning' spaces, bookstock and technology.

University of Sheffield was also buzzing and vibrant with RAG week in full progress, with the Western Bank library being a completely different kettle of fish. Still very busy, but a 1950's grade 2 listed building that couldn't have been more traditional if it tried.

The interview went very well, much better than I'd anticipated really, and I really enjoyed it. People often think I'm quite strange when I talk about enjoying normally stressful situations, but an interview is just like a bit of a big chat, and people are asking questions, like they're interested (even if they're not) so that's all good, right? They did a great job of giving me context about the role, what would be expected in the short term and longer term, and what the key priorities where before the interview started which was really good (and not often done).

I didn't get the job 'on this occasion' but did get some excellent feedback which was gratefully received, and I did make the panel think, which is always in my plan somewhere.

This was my first external interview in 10 years - wow. 10 years at Edge Hill College of Higher Education/University this year, blimey.

4 restructures, 3 name changes, 8 or 9 different roles in different teams and a library management system implementation.

Think it's time to do something different.