Bader Sharepoint

Um newsflash. That doesn’t stop the amount of emails.

Aaaaannnnnddddd

We’re back to 2007.

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But stops you constantly feeling inclined to look at a phone, which is a malaise of modern society, phone rings, dings or some other sound and it’s there in the hand. My phone gets switched off at work and when I’m at home in the evening and weekend as the important people will have a land line number for me.

It is very rare that there is something that phenomenal in an ATC email that it can’t wait for a couple of days. Remember (if you can) not so many years ago you’d get a mail shot once a week. If there is something that drastic whoever needs to tell you will have your number.

Possibly - but when the CoC cascade chain all add on their own “I need this by XXXX” fat factor, sometimes the action date to reply is relatively short, or, advance knowledge is very useful to give a quick heads up to the relevant staff member.

Once at RASFC Cranwell, I was called direct by the Commandant to discuss options for a presentation he needed for a month’s time; all agreed with an action date of about 3 days ahead of the event in case minor changes were needed. The same day, I was called by someone else lower down in the food chain - need the presentation urgently, no later than XXXX (next week!!); they had been tasked by the person above them, who had subtracted 10 days from the required date - so did the next person down! They got told, politely, to refer to the Commandant… :wink:

For me, with “down time” when abroad with work, that’s often the best opportunity to action / research / plan items. Last week was very productive, directly from emails received whilst at work - 3 stn visits planned for next year. :slight_smile: Obviously, that fits my personal circumstances rather than say a hectic 9-5 office position.
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But we can’t be accountable for their incompetence and PPP.

If the email went all address people would find out in good time, expecting the OC to be the ones to tell everyone everything is somewhat archaic,

Quite possibly - if you have the time / willingness to have the river of platitudes coming your way! :wink: There are, advantages & disadvantages, & of course varying approaches to how to deal with “email all.”

Most medium size companies (far less in personnel size than the number of CFAVs, & without a massive IT department) manage “all email” options very successfully with each staff member having an individual email address - which can be automatically sub-grouped depending on “department” or specialisations. Same applies for important document updates with associated “e-signature” if required as “having seen” the changes; also very easy to apportion to specialist groups if required. The last number of CFAVs in the ACO shows at about 11000 - far too many to issue an individual an “ACO e-tablet” = use of technology must improve to enhance what is there so that existing personal devices can access / share data much more efficiently.

Maybe one day for the ACO…probably when iPhone 37 is available!! :wink:

We have the sub groups already set up and I get ones that confuse me as to why I’ve got it and not everybody.

Businesses have to invest in IT as to not to in the modern era is suicidal. It seems HQAC thought 15 or so years ago we need to do this and forgot to invest and fund properly.

I have self discipline not to do that thank you.

How about instead of lots of emails from each HQ, HQ’s could compile them together into a single document to be disseminated on a regular basis - and only urgent business outside of those would come via individual emails?

We could call them something like “routine orders”, perhaps?

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Sounds like the old weekly post. I would like one big document. Notwithstanding the different formats some PDF, some Word, some Excel.

HQAC seem to be phobic of documents that we can use. I’ve tried redoing some of the things they put out so they are usable.

The problem is that everything is or would be seen as important enough to be worth it’s own email.

However I would doubt the technical ability of WHQ staff being able to compile such a document.

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I disagree with the having one big document, I like getting individual updates on specific subjects. It make them easier to manage and easier to disseminate to those who need to know.

There is nothing more annoying than people who email all when the information is only needed by a specific group, except perhaps for people who then reply all to the email all.

As an OC I haven’t got any issues with being CC’d into everything as it’s my job to have an overview, but in most cases if it’s aimed at another member of staff then I just want to be able to forward it to that member of staff, I don’t want to be sending my DofE Officer updates to AP818, along with the DofE related bits and bobs as he won’t care.

As for the idea of just check your emails once a week because that’s what we used to do when all we had was the post, that’s a very quaint idea but I bet it causes cadets to miss out on things.

We regularly get first come first served emails for extra flying slots and camps, if you aren’t checking emails regularly then you have no chance.

The counterpoint to that however is that emails generally aren’t targeted anyway. As the trg off account holder, I still receive lots of stuff that is completely irrelevant.

With a single document, you can have nice big bold headings that can be ignored by those who don’t need to know.

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Two parade nights, two times to check emails. Constantly checking ATC emails is a pain, ignoring the fact that my employer’s system now blocks ‘bader’, as the different HQs don’t understand we have real jobs that pay the bills and can’t be always checking for things.

As for last minute thing you invariably have to get cadets names, parental consent, perhaps a payment etc it can wait for the next parade. Last minute things generally indicate poor planning.
I’ve never filled one of the last minute camp/course slots that come out.

OK AEF sometimes comes up but as we aren’t ‘just around the corner’ and you need a member of staff and they bin flying a lot at 5AEF, last minute slots are not something I’m inclined to go for.

A year or so ago we got the whole Wings Allocation to Cyprus camp purely because I read my emails regularly and we use Facebook to communicate with our cadets. (Bad planning that HQAC only put the details out 8 days before the deadline true, but in those 8 days we got the forms, money and copies of the travel documents into WHQ when no one else could).

As for flying details I have enough staff who work shifts to do a quick whatsapp message to see who’s , confirm I have a driver and respond to Wing quickly. They cancel enough details that when a spare one comes up we should be grabbing it with both hands.

For both of these things not reading the email until Monday would mean not getting that oppourtunity for my cadets. I don’t respond to every email straight away as most can wait, but it’s handy to keep an eye on what’s coming out.

Good grief!

SharePoint Upgrade – Downtime

When: between 0730-1530hrs each day, from 12th December 2016 until 17th December 2016

What: SharePoint will be unavailable between the times above to allow the BADER Team to carry out the rectification work to allow SharePoint 2013 to be deployed.

Obviously don’t like working nights. It would have to be catastrophic to allow system downtime like that here.

Thought you religiously avoided checking BADER at any other time than during parade nights?

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Absolutely correct, but there are many who check it throughout the day, so having planned downtime during these hours is nonsensical. These updates must be planned which indicates poor working practice,
I would imagine from either the end of this week or after the early part of next week squadrons will shutdown for Christmas, so there is plenty of time to do all these things.

Are you stupid? Would you work nights if you weren’t paid to? Come in over the Christmas break once everyone else had gone? Didn’t think so.

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Our IT bods are contracted to work outside normal hours and take TOIL.