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The moving to Australia plan has really taken shape this month – meaning we now have a clearer plan of what to do and have started ticking some of it off. So here’s the monthly update (and in months to come, hopefully I can look back on this with a big sigh of relief that its all done!).
In the past month, I’ve:
- sold our house (hopefully)
- resigned from work (unofficially)
- brought our flights forward (now, 6th July – or 128 days from today)
- arranged with my friend David to kindly take us in his black cab to the airport (its the details that matter!)
- learnt more about the FTSE and economics than I ever ever ever wanted to (sadly)
We’ve also decided on our plan for the time between leaving our lovely house in London (gulp, sniff sniff) and buying what sdf calls her dream house in Oz.
Basically, we will be having a holiday – holidaying in a short let apartment in London on the riverfront for a few weeks before we fly over, and holidaying in my apartment on the Sunshine Coast when we arrive in Oz. One long, long holiday – oh yes.
Things will probably become even more frantic over the next month as we start selling stuff, cancelling stuff and arranging to ship stuff. But its all exciting!
The only downside is of course the exchange rate, abysmal for the Aussie dollar. But you know, I came over here with bugger all and even if I leave with less money than I’d have had a few years ago, it will still have been the best spent 21 years of my life.
And we’ll make do with what we take – after all, its only money. I have a million memories to take back with me, loads of lovely friends and contacts to keep in touch with across the miles and a lovely family. Much more important.
Right, better get on with selling stuff ……… oops, there’s the doorbell again…
We leave London in 205 days on one way tickets to Sydney. After spending nearly 7,500 days in this wonderful city (yes, I cheated by using this site), there’s not a lot I haven’t done that I still want to do.
But there are a few things.
- watch the Aussie cricket team play England live (I am holding out for tickets for the Oval ODI in June, fingers crossed!)
- re-visit some of my favourite museums, such as the Imperial War Museum and the British Museum
- update some of my London walks
- check out the i-Max cinema at the South Bank
- see a couple more west end shows
- try and fit in as many Saturday morning trips to Borough market as possible!
We were also hoping to do a couple more trips to Europe before we left for Oz, but given everything we have to do to organise for the big move, this may not now be possible. Oh well, places like Greece should hopefully still be around for a while yet.
On the subject of London, I’m not quite sure what I will miss about the place and maybe I’ll only realise it once I am back in Oz. I know already that I will miss my friends and my house and the feeling of being in the midst of history as I walk London’s streets. But life goes on. And its time for another big change. (They seem to happen around every 20 years for me.) I’m quite looking forward to not living in a big city, and to working for myself.
And in “never say never” style, who knows, we might come back to London one day for a visit. After all, its “only” a day away! So I guess there’s no harm in leaving a few things unchecked on the list.
I thought I’d use my final blog post for 2009, and in fact for the first decade of the twenty first century, to reflect on what I think has been the best of the last 10 years.
Happy new year, happy new decade and happy rest-of-your-lives to all my friends and family across the world.
To paraphrase Quentin Crisp, think how you’d be – how you’d behave, how you’d dress, who you’d love – if there was no one in the world watching you – and JFDI.
SG’s 10 best bits of the last 10 years
Best sportsperson – Ricky Ponting (Australian cricket captain)
Best album – Hairspray the soundtrack
Best book – Shantaram
Best pub – Hermits Cave, Camberwell
Best film – The Boat that Rocked
Best holiday – Kangaroo Island, Australia
Best web things – BBC, Facebook, any of the google sites and apps, spotify
Best tv series – 24
Best purchase – Trixie, my BMW. She stood the test of time and served me well for most of this decade.
Best gadget – its a toss up between skyplus and the creative range of mp3 players
remember, be nice to one another and kinder to animals, children and those less fortunate than you.
happy new year
sg x
Gosh, haven’t blogged since the end of August! No particular reason – just been busy, busy, busy. Since I last visited, Wordpress has gone through 2 new releases.
I’ve even turned a year older.
S’pose I’ve been busy mulling over loads of ideas for self learning. Thinking about trying my hand at wordpress theme design (but I haven’t got a creative bone in my body……), creating a site using html 5 (but on what exactly?), getting the hang of Aptana Studio (for building the html 5 site, maybe) and learning a little Jquery coding.
You see, there’s always something to learn about, the pleasure and pain of life I guess. My brain never really rests; if only my body was the same.
Then there’s work.
Absolutely thrilled with how well the recent project went, the team were indeed fabulous – those Amazonians, those MandSers, those designers, creatives and testers. All worked their socks / heels off and did brilliantly.
Me – I talked a lot, planned a lot, browsed a lot, drank a lot of starbucks, stressed loads and probably drove folks mad… but we did it! And now we are going to do it more….. soon.
And then there’s the Australia thing. Sadly, still waiting….. and waiting …….. and waiting. We’ve done all we can and just need to …..
Currently loving Spotify, and House, riding my vespa, reading a couple of good books, and planning for Rome next week.
Oh, and looking for a new wordpress theme for this blog. And fixing it, the tagging is broken somehow.
<end of brain dump>
Finally, on Wednesday we submitted SDF’s migration visa application for Australia. I say finally because it took us ages to pull together all the supporting evidence needed – official documents, statements from friends, certified evidence of our relationship, copies of bills and so on.
Now the waiting starts. No idea how long it will take until we hear from the Australian High Commission in London, who apparently will do the application processing. We might also need to go in and have an interview with them. Some say it takes weeks, some say months. Still, we’re in no major hurry.
In the meantime, I have started simplifying my life here. Am stepping down from the TandRA after the fete in September, and after the big project goes live at work in Oct, SDF and I will be having a mega sale on eBay  Time to seriously declutter.
Am also showing more interest in the property markets and currency markets lately. Sad, I know, something I really don’t like doing. I’ve never wanted to know the value of my house – its just my home and all that – but needs must if I am going to sell it in a year or less. And if we can get a place in Sydney – inner west – without needing a mortgage, that will be ideal. Hence, trying to see what places are selling for on both sides of the world.
I’ve also discovered a great FX company called UKforex (aka Ozforex) – no transaction fees and better rates than banks. Now I’m waiting for the currency to hit the heady heights of 1.97 (those days of a pound being worth 2.32 are sadly a pipe dream for a while, I fear.) 1.97 and I’m happy…..
So I feel we are slowly making steps towards the big move. The next things to do will be to start the ball rolling with the cats moving over and getting estimates for our stuff to be shipped. But not until SDF gets the go ahead to have her medicals and police checks. It will happen soon enough – hopefully!
Within a couple of days of arriving in Sydney, I’d decided that for so many reasons it was probably time to move back permanently.
What I hadn’t done after 20 years in London I was probably never going to do – and I was torn between my dislike of corporate life generally and my desire to do something more challenging, which for me meant having to try and continue the corporate ladder climb. Hardly the most interesting or exciting future, no wonder I was getting rather depressed about it all.
And then my father gave me a wonderful opportunity. He asked me to take over the running of his company when I return to Sydney.
No bosses to report to, no corporate processes or politics, being in sole charge of decision-making (after initially working alongside him while I learn the ropes), deciding my own hours and just making things happen in order to continue to grow the business.
For the first week or so after we discussed it, I think I was wandering around stunned, overwhelmed by all the possibilities and opportunities it offered. I’m now slowly getting my head around it all and just can’t wait!
Now its hardly BHP but its a good, solid and profitable business with low debt and an established operating model and customer base. It also has a reliable supply chain and a growing distribution network across eastern Australia. And its got loads of opportunities for further growth across the rest of Australia and into NZ.
I’m no expert in the stuff it makes and sells – which currently includes fire pumps, pressure cleaners, generators, compressers, plate compactors and so on – but there are plenty of technical guys there who know loads about it.
My job will be to steer the business, steadily expand into new markets, continue the development of new products and ensure we continue to build on the brand values of low price and high quality and after-sales service.
There’s also loads of warehouse and office space which I can use to run an internet business – which opens up even more opportunities. haven’t even started to get my head around this bit yet.
So the first thing I’ve got to do is unpick my life in London and then hopefully we will move back in the next 12 – 18 months, depending on visas and so on.
Meanwhile, since returning to London I now have a whole new attitude to work. It’s simply a job, not a career, just something fun to get me through until we are organised to leave.
And I feel so much better. Thanks Hector.
As the song goes, “I’m coming home, I’ve done my time”.
Unbelievable that next week it will have been twenty years ago that I left Sydney for London. A 6 month trip soon became a year, then 2, then 5, and now 20. But the time is right for me to bring my family to Australia to live – yes, sdf, I can hear you saying “its about bloody time” as you start packing.
I’d been thinking about it for a few months but as soon as I drove past the Sydney Cricket Ground this morning in the beautiful Sydney winter sunshine, I knew in my heart this was where I now need to be – I just knew. It has to be done.
Its going to be scary. I’ve got a load more to think about than I did when I left Sydney with a backpack and £200 in my pocket. But I’ll do it – and I will use this part of my blog to write about the fun and games I have in unpicking my life in London and resettling somewhere in Oz (probably, but not necessarily, Sydney).
I will be inspired by the beauty and simplicity of inner Sydney, the classic Aussie pubs, the ease of buying decent fresh food, the wonderful outdoor places and the friendly locals. It doesn’t mean I have become tired of living in London – London is a wonderful place too – I just know that its time to come home.
So this trip is a reckie mission. Checking out what I need to think about, talking to people, making sure its the right decision, creating a plan and so on. Had a great chat with Kimberly today about it and I reckon Hector will be delighted to help me when I see him on Sunday.
I reckon there are 3 key things that I need to sort out when I get back to London:
1 – figure out the best way of getting sdf over
2 – start getting pet passports for the girls
3 – sell my house and get rid of / prepare to ship my stuff
No definite timing yet but hopefully within the next 12 – 18 months. Which also puts all my work stuff into perspective, finally, as it now becomes a case of getting whatever experience I can which is likely to be of use to me when I get to Oz.
I can’t wait to tell sdf. Its going to be a great adventure!
So we went live as planned on Friday, on the date we decided back in December and only 2% over budget. This was the first phase of a major site refresh project, and I also believe we will go live with the second phase as planned in early October.
I see no reason why we won’t so long as we follow a similar approach.
Its a credit not to the project management process but to the team of talented and committed individuals involved in project delivery – the Customer Experience team, the design agency, the Amazon developers and advisors, our external testing team and more.
The approach basically boiled down to:
1 – having a committed team of talented people from across different organisations, empowered to work together and JFDI in order to get their areas of work completed to time and quality, and supported by myself and others to quickly resolve any blockages where needed. Its amazing what empowerment can do for motivation.
2 – top-down planning – a simple high level plan (more like a roadmap) with key milestone dates supported by more detailed plans for certain activities and deliverables where needed. Plans that the whole team understood and bought into, with dates they signed up to and were willing to go for.
3 – a good set of working relationships across the teams, lots of open communication – phone calls, face to face meetings, etc – and people being prepared to give and take around their roles and responsibilities, being flexible where needed to get the job done. Jobsworths were frowned upon – if someone had the time to do it, or it made more sense for them to do it because of their background knowledge, they got on with it and did it if it resulted in a better quality product or us remaining on track.
4 – everyone wanting success – Everyone wanted to deliver the project on time and within every team, people worked ridiculous hours, weekends and so on if it meant we kept on track. It probably helped that with each new milestone, I reminded the team responsible that we were on track to date (green) and that they might not want to be the one to turn us amber.
Fear of failure also does wonders for motivation!
So what did I personally do?
1 – Fortunately I have what I think are very good working relationships with the others in the “project management team” – both the head of CX and the Amazon Dev manager. Between us, we helped keep the project on track by reaching decisions quickly, being pragmatic and having open, regular communication.
Having good relationships with each of them helped me to try and build trust between the different organisations, reducing the pressure on teams from others and giving them a little flexibility and space to get their work done.
2 – I kept my nose out of the detail unless necessary to keep the project on track. We had people on point for certain deliverables or milestones and the extent of my involvement was to get weekly status updates from them and have chats with them on an ad hoc basis to get a feel of how things were going. But I also encouraged them to raise things with me quickly if they had a blockage that needed clearing.
3 – I pulled together a high level plan (more like a roadmap really) and ensured that everyone involved bought into it. Once work was underway on one set of deliverables I let the teams get on with it and looked ahead to the next set, ensuring we were ready for work to kick off, again looking for risks and issues and working to remove blockages in advance of when work was due to start.
4 – I kept asking myself what could go wrong with a certain milestone or set of activity, and then worked to guard against it. Whether it meant getting more closely involved, producing a detailed plan with the team concerned, chewing it over with the management team, whatever.
5 – I talked a lot. I played diplomat in encouraging individuals to trust, I played referee in disputes between organisations, I played taskmaster when it came to getting work completed on time, I played leader where needed to motivate the team and help them see the way forward and I played watchful observer when someone else stepped forward to sort something out.
In many respects I felt more like a sports coach than a project manager – prepare and empower the team and let them get on with playing while I look ahead to the next game – with a focus not on winning just the game but on winning the competition.
So roll on phase 2 – it might not be green all the way but we will deliver on time! Let’s JFDI, team.
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