Back at EU project world: Learning from the Extemes

Today I am so glad to be back in Athens after 7 years! Last time I was also here for EU project meeting - for back then Open Discovery Space. I have also been here in Athens exactly 9 years ago.. Even though I was privileged to meet some of the old crew this time - We are still missing some of the Greats... Henri, Tore, Thomas, Kerstin, Nikolas, Peter... I miss you guys so much! ./ Tänään olen takas Ateenassa 7 vuoden jälkeen! Mikä fiilis! 2015 edellisellä reissulla oli kyseessä myös EU projektin työmatka eli ODS-projektin arviointikokous. Samoihin aikoihin vuodesta eli kesäkuussa olen ollut Ateenassa myös vuonna 2013 eli 9v sitten! Vaikka olinkin onnekas sen suhteen, että monet 7-15vuoden takaiset kollegat ovat edelleen samoja - osa heistä on lähtenyt muihin hommiin tai toisiin projekteihin: Henri, Tore, Thomas, Kerstin, Nikolas, Peter... I miss you guys so much.

Words cannot describe how I feel about doing MY JOB again. For the last two years, all meetings have been online. I admit that having a baby on that period was useful, but still... So happy we are back at f2f meetings./ En voi enempää korostaa sitä miltä tuntuu tehdä *mun työtä*. Viimeisen 2,5 vuoden ajan kaikki kokoukset ovat olleet Zoom-välitteisiä ja vaikka toki meillä perheenlisäyksen kanssa tämä oli harvinaisen kätevää...

I can admit that for a while I was thinking that my job was not mine. This is the job that I am most good at. Where I am valued. /Niin täytyyhän se myöntää, että oma työ ei pitkään aikaan ole tuntunut omalta. Tämä on sitä MINUN työtä. Missä olen hyvä ja arvostettu.

It is so enjoyable to sit in a meeting after 15 years of collaboration with these Greek and other international partner and know exactly what they mean when they say something./On todella nautinnollista istua kokouksessa jo yli 15 yhteisen työvuoden jälkeen kreikkalaisten ja muiden kv-partnerien kanssa ja tietää täsmälleen, mitä he ajavat takaa jollakin asialla.

And that feeling when two Greek partners don't understand each other but you do. And better yet you can summarise it in 2 sentences. Aaaaah. /Se tunne, kun kaksi kreikkalaista ei ymmärrä toisiaan ja sitten itse kiteytät sen kahteen lauseeseen. Ah. .

I love my job and it is my hope that COVID will not kill it. People need to meet. Even by flying. /Rakastan työtäni ja toivon ettei Covid-19 voi sitä tappaa. Ihmisten täytyy tavata toisiaan, myös lentojen päähän

I am aware that this is an unpopular view of the world./Tiedän et tänä päivänä tällainen kirjoittelu voi johtaa julkiseen tuomitsemiseen.

On the other hand I refuse to change because the world has. I still like travelling: Adventures, cultures, people. /Toisaalta kieltäydyn muuttumasta, koska maailma on muuttunut. Pidän edelleen matkustamisesta: Seikkailusta, kulttuureista, ihmisistä.

This time I also had the pleasure to bring along a part of my family. My spouse celebrating his 50th birthday.../ Tällä kertaa minulla oli myös ilo tuoda osa perhettäni mukana tälle työmatkalle. 50-vuotissynttäriään juhliva puolisko...

And the young adventurer whose name is sooo Greek that people think that I am married to a Greek.../Ja nuori matkailija, jonka nimi on niin kreikkalainen, että kreikkalaiset epäilevät minun olevan naimisissa kreikkalaisen kanssa.

Learntech Accelerator Kicks-off

Two weeks ago was one of the most challenging working weeks of my life so far.
 It was time for me to step into the shoes (or in my case skirt!) of coordinator for the first time in my European projects working history.

To make things more difficult - the Description of Action, which is like the bible of the EU projects, said that the kick off shall be organised in Brussels - not in, let's say Jyväskylä, which would have made things a lot easier for this first-time coordinator...

So the new project, Learntech Accelerator, or as we call it "LEA", is about innovative procurement of learning technologies and in a nutshell, about how the supply & demand can come together and make something new in this market.

 The 'Mother' of this project is of course Ellinor Wallin, IMAILE's project manager and coordinator, who has now trusted me with her 'baby'...

 Even though LEA bases on IMAILE, which I have been the technical manager for about 18 last months of it and 9/17 partners were the same, it was still a room of mostly unfamiliar faces to me... Many partners have changed staff - that is pretty normal in software projects as well as universities of course, that people come and go. Throughout my working life, I have been blessed to work with hundreds of people. This kind of change of a working climate has it's challenges as well as opportunities.

Personally I find kick-off meetings very exciting. You get to meet a lot of new people and of course in the case of LEA, it was looking at 35 experts of their own areas in the room: So much competence all around which gave me a lot of confidence that this project will absolutely make great results, no doubt about that.

 In our consortium, we have experts on procurement, learning technologies, schools, law, contracts, procedures, policies etc. Procurement is a complicated process and it requires different fields of expertise coming together to ensure smart decision making.

 One of the key issues on why procurement of learning technologies is such a hard process is that the buyer and the user are almost never the same person. The chain of software/hardware development and purchase could for example be modeled like this:

Developer -> Seller -> Buyer (municipality, school etc.) -> User (teacher, student)

Then we come to the challenge of how to get this whole line of people to talk the same language, to understand what they say to each other...

 I am in favor of meetings where people discuss & work rather than sit behind their computers.

 This is why I had told my wp leaders that they have to use their time wisely and get the consortium active and away from their email. This is somewhat of a unique situation when the whole consortium is together. It will only happen six times during the project duration, so this means that we should be utilizing this time to actually contribute towards the work, not just sit there writing emails (which often is the case if a project meeting is not very well organised).
I was very happy with LEA's kick off.

 We worked hard for three days.

 Learned to get to know each other and established some common expectations of what this project will be about.

In European projects, there is always many levels of agendas going on. Companies want to sell and network. Researchers want to study and gather data. Managers want to get the reports done etc.

Picture (c) Ellinor Wallin

 It's good to keep in mind that people have perhaps many levels of agendas in mind when they come to a meeting. Coordinator's job is not to destroy all the levels, but to align enough of them in order to get the work done described in our project bible, the Description of Action, or DoA.

 Organizing a meeting isn't really that easy. 16hour days for 5 days in a row took it's toll, I was exhausted when the week was finally over. I literately had time to go for two walks of 30minutes in the Grande Place of Brussels.  Next meeting will be more relaxing, I have promised myself:) I am however now very excited of LEA as I see that the team is very strong and competent. Thank you WP leaders and participants of making this Kick-off happen. Let's do this!

Project in Review: IMAILE year 3

Today I attend the review-meeting for IMAILE project in Luxembourg. / Tänään olen IMAILE-projektin kokouksessa Luxebourgissa.

Review meetings are the checking points of the projects, where European commission gets to ask us, the people who work in the projects, what have we been up to in the last year or so. / Arviointikokous on paikka, jossa esitellään vuoden työt ja kuunellaan komission palaute meidän hommista.

Some review meetings can turn into a sauna where the consortium sweats over their work done./ Toisinaan arviointikokoukset ovat hiillostavia saunoja, joissa konsortio hikoilee.

IMAILE project has been running for three years now, so it was the third review for IMAILE, however the first that I attended as I inherited this project from Philipp last Autumn. / IMAILE-projekti on ollut käynnissä nyt jo neljättä vuotta. Tämä arviointikokous oli projektin kolmas, mutta minun ensimmäinen.

Sure I have attended many of these with my EU project career. /Toki olen ollut monessa monituisessa arviointikokouksessa aiemmin.

Kokousta edeltävänä päivänä istutaan pitkään iltaan valmistelemassa esityksiä. / On the day before there is usually a long preparation meeting where slides are added and cut... You start with 74 slides, cut down to 30 and then add 15 as back ups and so on...

I am the technical manager of this project. Do they usually look like this? / Allekirjoittanut toimii tässä projektissa teknologisena asiantuntijana. Dress to Success. Kaikki tekniset asiantuntijat näyttää tältä, eikös?

Kokouksen päättyessä ehdimme hieman käppäillä ja taksitella Luxembourgin keskustassa. / After the meeting, we had some time to walk/taxi around the centre of Luxembourg.

My colleague had tripadvisor us to a great Greek restaurant. /Kolleegani oli valinnut hyvän kreikkalaisen ravintolan. Thank you trip advisor.

Fresh sea food - hell yes! / Tuoreita merenelävä: mmmmm!

After a successful review the consortium can easily smile. Comission was at the end satisfied with our progress. Hurrah! What a hard working week - Proceccos were truly needed. /Onnistuneen review'n jälkeen on helppo hymyillä. Tällä viikolla ollaan tehty töitä kyllä yötä päivää - proceccomme olemme ansainneet. Review päättyö hyvin ja komissio oli vakuuttunut siitä, että teemme hyvää työtä. Sit hypätään koneeseen ja illaksi kotiin, Finnair.