The Big Visit

Today we had a visit from the Chief People Officer (HR equivalent to CFO), Karen Wood.  We have had a long list of senior managers to come visit us, check progress and meet the new team members...but never at this level.  In fact, in my 3+ years with the company I have only met one other manager at this level, and that was by chance in an elevator in Melbourne.  

As you can imagine the place was jumpin'!  Everybody really wanted everything to be in tip top shape for the big visit.  Then in a morning meeting yesterday, the finance team was asked to create a presentation!  Oh shikes!

We built our presentation yesterday afternoon, and even videotaped the thing so we could critique it.  Today dragged on and on, and the tension grew and grew.  Everybody read their bits over and over...it just had to be perfect!  

When we finally presented, I was really happy to see everybody come into their own and not only present their assigned material, but really put their best work into showcasing our team.  It was the first piece of work that we have put together as a team and we did it very well.  

After the dust settled, we all went to get a drink to wash away the jitters.  It was still 4pm so coffee or tea had to do the trick!  It was a good decompression though.  

I guess to me this is a milestone.  Mike, Tania and myself came over here to "set up financial services," but didn't really know what that meant.  There were never any real finite milestones along the way, just about a trillion minute tasks that have moved us to the presentation today.  We spent months discussing theoretically what we wanted to create here, and watching the team today I can vouch that we have hit the mark and then some.

In light of this wonderful realization, I left work early!  ha!