Happy new year all, hope you had relaxing breaks and all that. Week one of 2026 was an energising one, and felt like a strong fresh start to a new year after a few skewed months of turmoil at the back end of 25.

This week was a good mix of spending some time 'head down' to deliver a few projects, whilst getting back up to speed with everything the year ahead has to offer. Also spent some time with mates outside of work.

Work

Time in meetings: 19.9hrs

  • Admin: The week started with some housekeeping admin, with an attempt to start the year as we mean to carry on, focused on clearning inbox and a fair bit of HR admin. Start of the week, and sprint, felt positive with energy levels across the org. high.
  • Product development: Spent some time in a workshop and thinking outside of it for a new product to be developed for one of our fundraising teams. Exciting one, with an opportunity to explore some three.js.
  • Workshop for next week: I'm facilitating a workshop next week aimed at mapping out user journeys for our rehoming service. This week involved pulling together all of the research and recommendations for find a pet, and designing a workshop plan to start mapping out journey opportunities for our target segments.
  • Prototyping for our studio: We're in the process of moving towards a project management tool that should theoretically be a 'tool that rules them all'. I spent some of this week pulling together a prototype for a single briefing process for our department in the tool.
  • My end of year review: Timely period and session to reflect on last year as a whole. Key themes of success were team stabilisation and growth, top-tier products/services, and growth in my visibility as a leader.

Read 📚

Work

  • Tech advances in 2025:https://www.rundown.ai/articles/the-rundowns-2025-year-in-review
  • 21 lessons working at google: https://addyosmani.com/blog/21-lessons/
  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKjgKr-kgAY&t=160s

Fun

  • Currently reading Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurthy.

Listen 🎧

Focus

  • https://open.spotify.com/episode/3twKBUXH7o6iRhj54j0KLK?si=8b7112a72ac24d16

Music

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Play 🕹ī¸

Sports

Slightly slower start this week due to some fatigue at start of week.

  • Run - 14km
  • Workout - 2hr30mins

Watch

  • ★★★★☆ Marty Supreme
  • ★★☆☆☆ Now you see me: Now you don't

Other

  • Dinner party for a mates birthday
  • Some drinks after work on Thursday
  • Marty Supreme with mates on Friday
  • Piano lesson - have moved onto chords