I’ve finally done it!!

After much toil, sweat and tears, (and ably assisted by my fellow Masters colleague, Vanessa, in the UK) my Masters (Strategic Change Management) dissertation has been printed, bound and handed in to Northampton University!
I won’t say it’s been easy, but it has certainly been a fascinating insight and has aided me considerably in my work.
I was heavily involved in Change Management over a 3 year period when I worked at Wealden District Council. My Director, Mr Nigel Hannam, sponsored me to enrol at Northampton University and complete my Masters in Strategic Change Management. The idea was that I would then have a valuable, transferrable nationally recognised qualification which would enable me to support Nigel and the council in their extensive Transformation Programme. We had moved a long way already: Introduced a Customer Contact Centre for the organisation, consolidated the offices onto a single site, with almost zero disruption to ‘business as usual’, largely due to my fantastic ICT team who worked incredibly hard, firstly relocating staff and networks to several remote offices to enable a total refurbishment of the main offices to take place, maintaining some pretty outdated equipment, then moving back to ‘new’ premises. Every one of them worked tirelessly for many weeks to achieve what I can only describe as almost text book delivery and project management. We also faced considerable resistance which required careful management. We still had a way to go, so when the opportunity arose for me to complete the Masters as a largely distance programme at Northampton, I grasped it firmly. Even at the beginning (September 2012) I knew it would be difficult. There were several weekend lectures at the university campus, which involved a three and a half hour journey each way. Andy and I were often seen leaving the house at 6am to make the journey on Saturday morning up to Northampton. After attending the four or five hour lecture, we would drive back home arriving early evening. I would then spend most of Sunday writing my notes up and completing assignments – there was little time in the week, what with working long full-time hours and helping with the children’s homework – it was pretty full on.
When I saw the job on Saint Helena Island advertised, I didn’t consider the impact of a job offer on my university commitments. So it wasn’t until I had accepted the job in February 13 that the enormity of what I was taking on hit home! Luckily I was able to attend all the lectures and complete the assignments before I left the UK in May 13, leaving me with the dissertation to complete remotely. I had already submitted the dissertation proposal which had been accepted and I was able to adjust the research questions once on Island, maintaining contact with my dissertation supervisor, Ilias, via email. Even this is tricky at times as there are regular power outages – the latest one blew up our printer/scanner! And the internet is flaky – although improving slowly. And to think we would complain if we didn’t have a superfast connection in the UK – now we only mutter about NO connection and a 1 Mb connection is a luxury – how priorities change.
So I’ve now completed many hours of research, data collection and analysis and produced a bound dissertation:
Isolated Islands – Managing Change

An Examination of St Helena Island, South Atlantic Ocean – ‘The Most Extraordinary Place on Earth’
Thanks to Vanessa, it has been submitted to the university and thanks to an unusually stable internet connection, I was able to submit it electronically via Turnitin. Now for the marking and moderation. Apparently we will hear late March – so fingers crossed for now. But what an amazing opportunity to study at first hand a remarkable Island, unique in many ways, but also similar to other cultures too. Fantastic!