Formula 1 WDC

JENSON BUTTON 2009.

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Working with MS Dynamics 4.0

Good evening.

The last two days have been rather frustrating. At work I am overseeing the deployment of CRM, the solution is run on a server at the head office of MML and I am doing research to manage the upload and maintenance of contacts, running marketing campaigns, etc.

Yesterday and today have revealed no end of issues. I have had trouble creating emails from a quick campaign (they just aren't generated but the campaign is), uploading data that remains on submitted and is 'waiting' in system jobs and data updates in excel where I cannot find the 'hidden' column.

Eventually, and typically, when I worked with my boss to resolve the mail issue the mail merge for a campaign suddenly began to send emails. This allowed me to run and finish todays campaigns by 7ish this evening.

Though CRM does come with some great and powerful features, I have had nothing but frustration this past couple of days. We were successful in getting in Outlook CRM integration running last week and I can only assume this must be some sort of weird 'payback'- ha.


May the week go on, I have a way to go with getting Dynamics CRM 4.0 to be smooth for our company processes yet.

Steve

A new journey

I don't usually find myself working a Saturday, not since the days of being a university finalist anyway. So I guess today comes as an exception but in a funny way it's a delight to me that I'm enjoying my work enough that I have the motivation to progress over a weekend.

The first 6-7 weeks at MML have brought some interesting times and I already have a range of tasks to complete. I've moved away from any development work but I don't consider that bad, more of a refreshing change because the work is still varied and sufficiently challenging.

The last month or so has been quite uninteresting socially, I've just been plodding along - other than a trip to Windsor which was great. I went to an Indian restaurant with great food followed by the theatre production 'fatal encounter'. It was my first theatre experience and spurs me to want to see another one!

The first few weeks in Reading were difficult. I found it tough moving away from everything I knew, working in an environment where were all dependant on electronic communication with few meetings. However, I'm starting to feel more like part of the team now as other consultants come to depend on my work as well as going out more.

Next week is my birthday, looking forward to the festivities.

Have a good weekend.

A professional.

I have confidence I am now back onto a path that fits into where my interests lie. I finally have the feeling that I'm where I want to be professionally, which I didn’t have in July with Cirrus. I think that’s very important. As ridiculous as it sounds I take a good feeling from walking through London smartly dressed in a suit. It’s like I’ve jumped and reached the goal I’ve been aspiring to throughout my entire education- giving me the full right to mix with other professionals that have worked just as hard. It must have been something I subconsciously aspired to a while back.

It’s been a tough start actually. The reading has been heavy, though I’m not falling over backwards as university was just as tough – especially the research required for the health informatics modules in the final year. The other factor has been working from home, which I really like in some cases but it’s easy to sometimes feel isolated and/or distracted. Though I couldn’t have survived without working independently in the past I have always had the option to physically change my work location. I am starting to use starbucks once a week and I’m thinking of getting into a pattern of using different rooms of the house to work in- just to help me get acclimatised.

Anyway. Back to Lean, Six Sigma, and CRM for now. I have a lot of different aspects of work to get going with and I’m sure I’ll be blogging more about great days and frustrating days as I start to use these tools more. I’d love to become specialist enough to have the confidence to apply such tools independently with professionals in the future.

Have a good evening, I hope you enjoyed the summer. By the looks of today we’ve had the last of it.

Until next time..

Catch up.

Good evening. I hope you enjoyed the bank holiday weekend. I didn't have any specific plans for this one, just relaxing and catching up on some things I needed to do for work.

Quite a lot has happened since my last blog- it’s been a busy month has August. The end of last month saw me take a big risk by leaving my old job and the following week saw me in interview for my current role. The interview was quite lengthy but it gave Medical Mosaic (MML) a good insight into what I was about and I was pleased with how I put myself across, especially as it gave me the chance to elaborate on some of the hard work and targets met during the early stages of my life. I chose not to sit back and just do my degree but to put a lot of effort in ensuring I gained some valuable experience outside, which I’m more than pleased with.

Before starting with MML I spent some time in the Caribbean as it was my Dads wedding. I was there a week on the lovely island of Antigua. The weather was beautiful, it was a place where I was able to finally indulge in some real relaxation, with my only worry being where I was going to get my next beverage from! Here are some pictures, though more can be found at : click here

No longer graduand, but graduate!!!!

Good evening.

Today was brilliant, I had such a good time. It was an early one- even being in a B&B in Leeds because the ceremony started at 9.45am.

By far the best moment was walking up those steps though. My

Mum got a great pic at the right moment..

The ceremony finished about 11 ish when we had a group photo and reception with drinks. TO be honest it was great to use this time just catching up with everyone and saying goodbyes because I had to head back home this evening.

I want to say a huge congratulations to everyone I've ever worked with at university. Its been a life experience that is unforgettable, something which is only made possible by some of the great people who I've been around for the past 3 years. I hope I get to see you soon and I know we can all live prosperous lives from now and into the future. I think we bloody deserve it.

Cheers! I'll leave it with a couple more photos...

New job

Its a nice evening. Nice enough to head to the local for a beer.

After what was a relaxing weekend I have made up my mind to start looking around for an alternative position. I am just not happy where I am because of the type of job not being in the healthcare sector and on top of that the commuting- which was supposed to be countered by job satisfaction which isn't there really.

I'm going to move on.

Can't wait for graduation next Monday now!

World of work

Good evening.

I've not long walked in from work. Been in my new role for two weeks tomorrow and all is going quite well so far.

Had my Dads stag do in Nottingham last weekend. Go-karting and jongleurs- good fun. I can't wait to head to the Caribbean to be best man in early Aug.

Looking forward to graduation and my first paycheck now.

S.

Degree classification

2i

Final marks

My last semester grades were:

59, 62 and 64

So overall:

Project:61

First year average: 67

Second year average: 65

Third year average: 64

My tutor didn't tell me my classification over email but its obvious I guess. I think I'm at least pleased with my consistency in my results, though year 3 should have been better.

Looking forward to July 20!

Starting work tomorrow. WoO!

Job Offer

Hey.

Well I've been in Reading for 10 days- I don't think that's too bad going.

The company is Cirrus Software based in Marlow, Buckinghamshire. A very nice part of the world.

They're paying 18.5 and they are offering training, bonuses and the opportunity to go to Sydney for 2-3 weeks in the next year and a half!

I'll put up my classification next week.

Enjoy the weekend!

Exams are over. Uni is over.

Good morning.

This morning I woke up to the (extremely) weird feeling of not feeling guilty for taking the night off after a few cheeky ones in the faversham followed by spending the evening in the terrace. It was good to relax after my last exam.

As for my project I am going to try and get more extensive feedback from Kevin and Derek. However, my grades were mainly 11s and 12s with a 15 for the quality of report write up/reflection.

Mainly marks were lost for evaluation which apparently didn't flow to recommendations. The other problem was not investigating a complex range of solutions as I apparently selected what was convenient (I think was the comment), which is disappointing because I felt I was very restricted in choice. The evaluation consisted of three elements and I had to go and interview about 7-8 different people followed by hours of analysis and write up trying to contain it in 6-8 pages (so 11 is slightly annoying not even reaching the 2.1 bracket).

Anyway- I needed 50 on the remaining exams to score 60.7 for the year. I hope I've done that.

I'm going to catch up with family for the rest of this week then the job hunt starts next Monday when I get to Reading.

Have a good week and enjoy the weather!

Steve

Final Year Project Mark

61

Slightly dissapointed, but think a disaster is required to lose the upper second class now.

I'm going to talk about it later.

S.

A new phase of my life.

Good evening, or morning as the time is now 1.40am.

It's now Tuesday and my next exam is Wednesday afternoon. I finish next Monday - 1st June, which is really when life can begin again. Final year project marks come back on Friday- I've no idea what to expect- I hope Kevin and Derek 'cut me some slack' so to speak.

I guess the big question is where from here. Ya' know, 12 months ago I was awaiting to start one of the best opportunities in my life- to spend 3 months on the west side of North America. Now I'm about to graduate from one of the countries 'better' universities with an upper second class honours, but I have no money, no job, I don't have anything really. I'm moving down to Reading with my flatmate who I cannot be thankful enough to for giving me the opportunity to find my feet.

Not quite the storybook ending to university life that one would hope for. I'm hoping that when the recession clears up I can make my way back to the US of A on a permanent basis. For now though I must wait, and maybe holidaying in Seattle is my best shot at getting back there. I read today that you're apparently better off going to work abroad right now as a graduate, but for those of us only capable of the Queens English that's a steep request really- were talking US, Oz, etc. Countries thousands of miles away that are expensive to travel to and probably experiencing their own economic issues.

So what now? Good question. I am thinking I will leave Leeds on June 8. I will then spend 2 days in Nottingham to see family before making my way to Reading. Once in Reading I will proceed to look for jobs if I haven't already got an interview lined up. At the moment I'm think developer- just until i can re-enter the graduate processes and give them all a real shot this time.

I'm looking forward to being best man at my Dad's wedding in the Carribean soon. A break that will hopefully give me the fresh start and fresh thoughts that I need.

Anyway- enjoy the summer sunshine and lots of bbqs I think. I love this time of year..

Where is matt?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlfKdbWwruY

In case you haven't already seen it. I've watched this video one too many times.

Jealous. Big time. How much I'd pay.

The F1 budget cap

The meeting took place today: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/motorsport/formula_one/8049816.stm

No surprise there is no agreement yet. I am unsure about whether the ferrari threat to leave is real still. Guess we will  see.. I hope their is a full grid next year and we'll know within a month.

Politics is putting a great racing season into the shadows

I find this is frustrating as a fan of the sport for the past 14 years, that sometimes the opportunity to put the sport back 'on the map' and to bring more fans in with some great motor racing that is unpredictable from race to race - there is too much politics. 

Of the big stories. The first was Mclaren 'lying' and then there was the diffuser row which seem to split the sport in two. Now it's the Ferrari threat to pull out on the 40mill budget cap. I do wonder how many articles one can write about Ferrari pulling out. I think it would be devastating for the sport, agreed, but i'd like to think this can be resolved in future FIA meetings with team managers. 

It's difficult to know which side to take. I personally don't want to see a budget cap because Formula 1 is the pinnacle of motorsport that should come with great new technology and the very best of engineering, however in times like these it could be a great temporary solution to surviving the current climate. Then there is also the added bonus of seeing new drivers entering 'back of the grid' teams and actually getting an opportunity, one talent I think we missed out on this year is Bruno Senna and all because the Brawn team couldn't 'take a risk' showing the sheer competitiveness of the sport due to the costs.

All in all I just wish this could be resolved properly in the first place because this season is probably going to be one of the best, especially getting the chance to watch Ferrari, Mclaren and Renault fighting their way to the front while great talents like Vettel and Button are finally getting the chance to show their worth.

Final Year Project- Finished

Freedom is a step closer. Just three exams now.

Submitted at 2.30pm yesterday. Grade comes back on May 29.

Now I have a headache from too much alcohol last night.

Have a good weekend.

S

Two final stages

I found out today that Accenture have accepted me to the final stage of their assessment after a grilling 1 hour telephone interview. The final stage will be a tough 1/2 day in London by the looks of things but looking forward to it.

Also have an interview with CSE-Global Healthcare on Friday, so a trip to Sheffield for the day.

Oh and you might want to look at : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gHvATmUsSg&feature=related

Pretty amusing.

Plus I enjoyed this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixo4Acajx4E

S

FYP solution

My FYP solution is now complete, as it should be at this stage.

The RESTful web service can be found at: 

http://www.ychi.leeds.ac.uk/TestReqService/TestRequest.svc

The API design support documentation can be found at:
http://www.ychi.leeds.ac.uk/TestReqService/help_guide.aspx

An example of a query on the second level of the service is below:

http://www.ychi.leeds.ac.uk/TestReqService/TestRequest.svc/search/?query=disease=addison,specimen=urine

If you had the time you might like to use the methods as though they're local ones in your application. Though not the most exciting thing in the world for you. My solution may be used to the pathology handbook though!

Cheers..
S

Easter.

Good afternoon.

Hope you enjoyed the easter break. I went to see family for two seperate weekends, well I actually spent 5-6 days with my day and did very little work but I feel so much better for getting out of Leeds (the first time since Dec 27, sadly). I spent the time gardening with my Dad and helping to organise his wedding and stag do while relaxing with a cold one in the garden too. I love where his house is in the countryside- the relaxation was great.

Well had better get on with report writing. Oh and I have two job interviews approaching- Accenture is a first round one on Monday morning and CSE-Global UK is a final round one next Friday. The second looks good as it's in their healthcare systems dept.

Hope you enjoyed Easter as much as I did.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Almost at the final hurdle

Good afternoon.

I can't say there's a lot of news since my last blog. I had a good progress meeting for the FYP, I've spent the majority of my time working towards that and courseworks. It seems I'm close to a completed solution and I've got some great scope for evaluation because the project has so many angles to it.

Not much success yet with the job hunt but I've got about 6-7 pending applications, so it's not all doom and gloom just yet.

Looking forward now to seeing family in Notts and Worcester, whilst preparing for the FYP hand in.

Bring on May 1st.

Have a good weekend.

Just another week.

For the last 5 minutes I've sat looking at this blank page. I can actually think of nothing to update you on over the course of the past week, without talking about uni work. 

I've been filling in every job applications form possible and I've sent my CV to a number of different companies and recruitment agencies. Nothing much as of yet but this was late last week so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I may hear something.

Other than that my FYP solution is getting there. I feel like I have the direction and enough scope to write a 50 page report, which is good. I still feel behind but no where near how behind I felt a couple of weeks ago so progress has been positive.

Hope you had a better weekend. x

PATH grades

Got my last 2 grades today. They were;

PATH3004(Owen) - 70

PATH3001(Rick) - 76

That gives me 57, 66, 70, 71 and 76 = 68 for the semester.

Slightly frustrating about DB32, I didn't quite do enough to get in the first bracket (to recover from 57).

No news on the job front yet by the way.

Back to FYP work, I guess.

Grades.

Got my COMP grades today, 3 out of 5 of the exams I sat in January.

DB32-57, PD31-66 and SY33-71.

Considering that healthcare exams usually go pretty well I am hoping for a high end 2.1 average which will set me good for any lapses that could occur with the FYP and second semester exams.

Hopefully I'll have my health grades by next Wednesday.

Have a good weekend. x

Can you communicate?

I'd like to think I didn't have any problems socially, or with presenting myself professionally. Last week there was an FYP meeting in which the student NSS questions were put to us. Mr Clarke seemed confused as to why 'communication skills' and 'presenting yourself with confidence' were marked low.

In my opinion, throughout my university life I haven't done enough presentations. I have done one for PD15 which, lets be honest here, how many people put the effort in (it was first year, after all). The same goes for communicating with people in other disciplines about technical issues. I think it is pivotal that someone at the 'computing' level can at least bring there knowledge down to a level that presumes the person listening knows a thing or two about 'IT'. 

The problem is that these two things aren't pushed. No one is taken out of their comfort zone in the final year. Why not make 5% of distributed systems a team task. Force people to work together and perhaps create a small solution working with people from other departments? Yes that sounds difficult but if the school isn't prepared to try it why do they deserve 5/5. They don't in my opinion.

The same goes for presentation skills. Apparently one of PD31s complaints from the previous year was no presentations. So they removed it, due to it being convenient that web science would take up half of the module in our year. I believe the only reason people complained was due to them being put in a position that wasn't quite comforting. But really it's what they needed for the big wide world out there.

I personally have no issue communicating with someone or presenting. In industry ive presented to CEOs at board level for around an hour. So ten minutes is too little if anything.

I would have give them 3/5 for bother criteria. I just think for a perfect mark they could do more. And Compsoc is optional, I don't think it counts.

On the job front

Last Wednesday I spoke to my old boss in America. He seemed pleased to hear from me and may have some work in project management of health systems implementation. I also expressed an interest in test engineering, as the position seemed to have a small amount of coding along with many different tasks as well as being able to communicate with the people that needed the system. Something I think I could do very well.

I have another call with him on Wednesday, which may be a big step in determining my future.

Fingers crossed.

Exams are over. Let the next phase begin

Reading my last blog I realise how bad it was in terms of how much of a rant I was having. I guess Christmas was so dissapointing because of the pressure ahead. 

I'm so glad to know that for the last time, I am through the January exams. Four of them went well and it would have been five had not been for that ridiculous time limit on the joint professional development and web science module. Something I think Roger and Pete badly midjudged, and I hope it will be rectified considering that my post morterm gave me the confidence to say I had scored 30/100. O dear. It's a good job those coursework marks were 80% combined.

My favourite module last semester was certainly distributed systems. Karim had not only the theortical but also practical knowledge (you knew he had written code, unlike lecturers such as Lydia). It made me think about distributed systems and the way the industry is going today, something I find very interesting is cloud computing and the possibility of operating systems themselves exisiting in the 'cloud'.

On from them. I'm also happy that this Wednesday I will be speaking with Sonny. My old boss at Pathology Associates Medical Laboratories (PAML) in Spokane, USA. I am hoping he has some good news for me.

Today I have been lazy and nursing a hangover. Tomorrow I plan on putting in a few job applications with small health IT companies and catching up on reading. Especially my Obama book that I have barely touched since Christmas due to the constant revision. I also want to really crack on with my FYP too.

I guess that's it for now. Not much to report, unless I told you about all my knowledge of the five modules ive just been studying like crazy.

Oh and happy new year (though late now)!