IF you are going to celebrate the end of a month-long lockdown then head east.
I marked the end of the second lockdown of the year by going to Hull and back on Wednesday.
But unlike most of my recent trips to this glittering jewel in the Far East, I wasn’t sipping Sancerre, nibbling on seafood and basking in the summer sunshine while gazing contentedly at seagulls squabbling over the remains of a Subway foot-long special sandwich on the banks of the Humber.
I’m a big fan of Hull, where I have plenty of friends who have been kind enough to introduce me to several of its restaurants and bars whilst also drinking in stories of a city steeped in history.
I think Kingston-upon-Hull, to give it it’s correct name, has the best collection of pubs of any city in Yorkshire.
Sadly they were all shut due to tier three restrictions during my visit this week.
But that’s probably for the best given I was working.
The Covid pandemic has meant that the last event I compered was back in early March.
It was so long ago that I remember tittering when one of the guests at the Woodrow Mercer Future of Work panel discussion insisted on bumping elbows rather than shaking hands.
Mind you, we also discussed how remote working from home would probably increase over the next five to 10 years.
Nine months on and I think the fast forward button has been pressed to get us well beyond the point that most of the panellists thought we would be at in a decade’s time.
In the same way working life has changed, so have events.
While I’m still convinced that nothing can truly replace a live event where you can see, hear and speak to people face-to-face, the short to medium term is going to be all about virtual events while in the longer term I think events will morph into a combination of people attending both live and online.
Last week was my first chance to host a purely online event.
I wouldn’t say it felt like dipping a toe tentatively in the water hosting this as particular Zoom webinar as picking up an anvil and jumping into Hull Marina.
It was my job to compere a consultation webinar where the audience were over 200 concerned residents and the panel facing them were the developers and experts behind a multi-million pound project to build a global retail logistics facility on the fringes of a village just outside Hull.
Dominic Gibbons, the managing director of Hull-based property company Wykeland asked me if I would be an independent host for the webinar to present the plans for the project at Melton West business park to residents of North Ferriby.
It was a challenge, but I’ve known Dominic a long time and like him both as a person and how he does business, running his company the way its late founder, Jack Brignall – an early business partner of the legendary Lord James Hanson and Lord Gordon White – would be proud of.
I thought I should see the site ahead of the event and so put my wellies on to walk around it before heading to the impressive C4Di digital innovation centre in Hull.
Thanks to the technical talent and skill of John Connolly at C4Di the event ran smoothly enabling more than 200 residents of North Ferriby to question Dominic and his fellow directors Jonathan Stubbs and David Donkin and a panel of experts in planning, highways, ecology, landscape design, architecture, air quality and noise and contamination.
It was important to make sure that everyone had their say and so residents were able to pre-submit questions, ask them via a Zoom chat facility on the evening and also request to ask them live.
Four-and-a-half hours and 150 questions and answers later I think that was achieved.
While I was keen that the Wykeland team were satisfied with the event, it was equally important to ensure that everyone of the local residents who took part felt they had ample opportunity to both air their views and ask questions.
So as I closed the event at 11.30pm on Wednesday night, it was nice to see a comment pop up on the Zoom chat from one local chap who said: : “I have to say…David Parkin has played a blinder. Thank you.”
I’ll take that.
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MANY thanks to two readers for answering my query about how Black Friday got its name.
Finance expert Drew Haymes prefaced his answer with the comment: ”I’m enjoying your blogs.”
To be honest that’s going to get anyone a mention.
Drew added: :I understand that Black Friday historically originated from retailers being in the red (from a ledger book/bank balance perspective) all year until this date.”
And on the same note Mark Williams of estate agents and property consultants Carter Jonas, said: “Black Friday as it’s when retailers move out of the red and into the black (as Jim Bowen almost said). For 2020 I guess it can be ‘Slightly Less in the Red Friday’.”
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I’M wondering whether this blog should become gender neutral.
Stop sniggering at the back, I’m being serious.
And it’s not just the way I’m standing.
One reader wondered whether my recent description of Caroline Pullich and Karen Swainston of Barclays as the Cagney and Lacey of regional banking is beyond the boundaries of political correctness.
Knowing Karen and Caroline I reckon being compared to two sassy New York detectives is right up their strasse.
But not everyone is the same.
One reader forwarded me an email from someone at a global professional services firm which under their name at the bottom of the message helpfully included the words: “Pronouns: he / him / his”.
My correspondent is probably not the politically correct type because he said to me he’d decided his new pronouns are to be: “Spartacus, Universe God and Dog’s Boll****”.
Then I saw someone’s profile on Linkedin the other day and their name was followed in brackets by “he/him”.
Given he’s bald and called Andrew, I think I could have guessed the right pronouns to use without this helpful advice.
Have a great weekend.