Janathon 2012 day 10: Ground truthing

Janathon 2012 day 10: Run - 4.5 miles, Time - slow, Weather - grey again

I have often asked myself what I think I am doing writing this blog. What is my mission statement? What are my goals? If I am going to take this enterprise forward I need to take stock and position myself more precisely by applying the rigorous analysis and intellectualism of management consultants.

The 'Management Guff of the year' awards as decided upon by Lucy Kellaway in the FT have ben a great help and I feel I can do no better than this:

Now for a sectoral prize, given to the most heroic attempt by a management consultant to overcomplicate matters. I was tempted to give it to the senior partner at a big four firm who told the Financial Times: “The challenge for me is to re-aggregate the big picture, while throwing my arms around as much of the density of complexities as possible, distilling them down to their most basic constituents and plugging them back into the big picture.”

But I decided he needed a holiday more than a prize, so am giving the gong to a consultant at McKinsey who said: “The assessment was based on international methodology and on ground-truthing.”

Yes this blog is all about 'on ground truthing'. We are no longer concerned with what happens 'when the rubber hits the road', that is so passé, we need truthiness.

So what was today's on ground truth when my trainers made contact with the asphalt? 

Well actually there was not a lot to report. I managed to run very, very slowly but it was a semblance of a run and my heart rate kept around the mark I wanted - so it was a big improvement on last time. I also ran by the canal for the first time in ages and felt a lovely sense of peace.

So there were positives but it is still hard to get my head round being so slow.