Sam McLaren
Digital Dorset
Published in
3 min readMar 5, 2021

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As part of my #weeknotechallenge I have decided to challenge myself to doing a different style of weeknotes every week.

Time flies! I am now on #6 of my #weeknotechallenge.

The other five are linked below:

Anyone who knows me know something i enjoy is playing videogames. Today i am doing something a bit differently and basing my weeknotes on a game that has helped me through lockdown(s).

The videogame Animal Crossing!

Monday :

Yes i recreated my office in Animal Crossing…

This week started feeling a bit mentally tired. I lot of people seem to be having issues with time and workloads, but my issue is around being motivated, things that i normally enjoy doing seem to have become a chore.

Spoilers* this gets better as the week goes on.

Tuesday:

I wish we had a Podcast Studio that looked like this but you get the idea!

This week i have also been prepping for the next Digital Dorset Podcast.

The podcast is broken up into volumes so after the first 3 i decided we should transition to ‘Season 2’. We are going to mix up the formula and shakes things up because as Taika Wahiti said in my Sketch notes ‘Don’t get comfortable’.

Vol. 4 is going to be parents and children talking about all things home-schooling and their experiences. I am looking forward to the chaos of hosting a recording with 4 parents and 6 children!

Wednesday

If only Animal Crossing had post-its

Wednesday involved me working on some urgent discovery (a phrase i haven’t heard before) What i learnt from this is sometimes things can get ‘tied in a knot’ bouncing between multiple people but when you actually speak to the person directly you can get every single piece of information you want (and more) in less than 20mins.

I also managed to collate all the conversations i have had around a systems process map and get a final draft finished.

Thursday

Yes i did make a Digital Dorset jumper to wear

This week is Services week so the team have been doing lots of work presenting sessions and promoting the work we do. As i always get involved in these sort of events i made a conscious effort to not help with the planning of sessions. It helped me learn some management techniques around how even if you have a great idea sometimes its better to let people run with their own.

I presented two sessions at Services week one around testing ideas and one about team wellbeing. I got some great comments on the wellbeing session about how they were inspired and can’t wait to take things back to their team.

Made my week!

We are uploading some sessions to the Digital Dorset Youtube so have a look there if you have missed out!

Friday

The sun has started to come out over the past week so let’s hope that continues, its nearly easter and when people can meet up we are planning some more team talks.

It’s also just dawned on me that idea generation for this year’s Festival of the Future needs to start soon… who am i kidding i’ve been coming up with ideas since before it ended in October!

Now to go and watch the WandaVision finale! Uncharacteristically i have been avoiding the internet all day…

Sam out.

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Sam McLaren
Digital Dorset

Working to promote Dorset as a place to live, work, and visit. DL100 member. Inspiringthefuture volunteer. TED Speaker #SamsBrightIdeas