Talks Given in 2016

Careers Talk Ipswich High School,

OK, so you know stuff, but what can you do?

An attempt at giving a careers talk at my daughter's school. I began with the anecdote about going to São Paulo the previous year and, within 3 minutes of arriving at a conference, being asked to be in someone's selfie. This was nothing to do with my time as a jock on Radio Orwell, which is what I was doing in 1989 when Europe was swept by revolution and the Berlin Wall came down. Realising there was a world out there, I went into countryside conservation, working for several years at Bradfield Woods National Nature Reserve. Marriage meant I had to get a better paid job and I ended up working for TimBL. I talked very briefly about what W3C is and how I got there before recapping on the jobs I've done and pausing for thought.

I reflected that all my jobs had involved communication and networking. The young people I was talking to had two distinct advantages if they wanted to do similar things: 1) they are all native English speakers; 2) they were female (it was an all girls school). Being able to communicate and network are very transferrable skills so it's possible to finish one job and make a fresh start in a completely different area as I have been privileged to do more than once.