When it comes to leaving, I hope you understand (The Allman Brothers Band)

Recently, like yesterday, I resigned from my job and took a new position at a school in northland, NZ, as Principal.

I was simultaneously offered another position at a school in the UK.

It was a dilly of a pickle. Which one of these great opportunities to go for? 

Both of them offered a Hobson's choice - take what was offered, or walk away. My head and heart went to battle.

As you know, I'm a huge believer in Occam's Razor - the simplest solution is often the best one. And in the end the most sensible and simplest solution won out.

Having made that decision (finally), my wife and I  found two properties we really liked in the area. Again - we faced something that all humans are famously bad at - deciding among multiple options.

Occam's Razor again came in handy. When I applied it, only one property was really fit for purpose in terms of being horse sport friendly for my wife. So we bought it.

Seth Godin recently added a third concept to my decision making armory - Wheeler's which.

As he points out -Wheeler's which* teaches us that the answer to "one egg or two?" is usually 'one', while the answer to, "do you want an egg?" is usually zero.

In my case, it wasn't a case of, "Do I want a fresh challenge?", rather it was, "Which challenge do I want?".

*[Elmer Wheeler was a sales trainer nearly a century ago. He got hired by a chain of drugstores to increase sales at the soda fountain. In those days, a meal might consist of just an ice cream soda for a nickel. But for an extra penny or two, you could add a raw egg (protein!). Obviously, if more people added an egg, profits would go up. Wheeler taught the jerks (isn't that a great job title?) to ask anyone who ordered a soda, "One egg or two?" Sales of the egg add-on skyrocketed.]

Even the cover looked like Catcher In The Rye (Jerry Maguire)

My report into the 2013 English department results and so on is done. I aimed to meet the March 7 deadline and that's been accomplished.

It clocked in at 33 pages in the end which I'm picking may be a record! It certainly is for me (see my last post for the less-is-more rant).

The actual writing and researching of the report has been a positive (albeit exhausting) experience for me in that I know have a much firmer grasp on the department's strengths and weakness. But not only that. I now know stuff. More stuff.

Luckily Jacky had a number of evening duties over the last couple of weeks so I was able to sped some long hours writing those 33 pages.

I have to do a board report in person later in the year (I did one at the end of last year as well) and I now feel on much firmer ground making generalisations about stuff. Confidence in this case comes from living the job and experiencing the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.

I am mos def a visual guy. This is not news to me. I find it really difficult to read tables so I need to create graphs from the information to draw trends and inferences. I guess it's more of that Occam's razor principle.

Our life is frittered away by detail. Simplify, simplify, simplify! I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb-nail. (Henry David Thoreau)

Among other things the last two weeks have been consumed by a subject report on last year's results and plans for 2014.

So far it's weighing in at 28 pages. It seems extreme. On the extremo continuum I'd put this at one end. Our neighbouring girls' school apparently doesn't require Heads of Departments to write a report at all. Clearly this is at t'other end of the extremo continuum.

I try hard not to do the 'when I was a Principal' bit but I recall being asked about what I wanted my Heads of Departments to report on when I was a Principal at Stratford High School and my response was basically twofold - ONE = where are the gaps in performance and whatcha gunna do bout it? and TWO = where are the strengths in performance and how yer gunna build on it?

So strengths and weaknesses basically.

Less is more!

I'm a big believer in occam's razor - the principle that you should go straight to simpler theories so that simplicity gives you a deeper understanding. 

Twenty eight pages and counting is not simplicity.

[Side bar - couldn't a done my 28 pages without the stellar support of my English Department colleagues and fellow HODder and regular reader - Toni Dunstan - you rock Toni!!]