A half-eaten box of Roses, a McVitie’s selection box, a dozen Christmas cards and a smattering of Hotel Chocolat chocolates are evidence that Christmas hasn’t quite left our office (yet). So, today, when there are a handful of pink and orange cellophane wrappers littering my desk and I feel the need to walk off one too many strawberry dreams or orange creams (all the best ones are gone), I take a brisk walk in the garden.
“Can you tell what it is yet?”
I am, at this very moment, shouting this Rolf Harris catchphrase at the computer screen whilst wielding a wobble board fashioned from an identification key to millipedes.
Those less eagle-eyed among you could be forgiven for mistaking the picture on the left for the iconic image of E.T. and Elliot whizzing across the night sky on a bicycle – all lit up by the glow from a full moon. It isn’t, and my mention of the key to millipedes was a clue. In fact, taken through the microscope, this is a picture of a male millipede’s external reproductive organs (known as ‘gonopods’) – important when identifying some species of millipede.
I can honestly say that when I started my KTP eighteen months ago, I didn’t think a millipede’s gonopods would prove so exciting but there we are. KTP projects, I’ve realised, are great at providing you with lots of new skills. Skills that you may have expected, and others that come as a nice surprise. Developing project ideas, costing projects, initiating them, managing them, communicating with stakeholders and pitching ideas are all skills that develop through training provided by KTPs, mentoring received from the KTP project team (which includes senior managers and academics from your company and knowledge base) and on-the-job learning. But there will be other skills that Associates pick up which are likely to be more project-specific.
I’m doing a weekly shop at Sainsbury’s today.
I’ve got the basics in my online basket and I’m trying to think like a student. I’m guessing more alcohol, less food. I should probably take out the distinctively sweet but tart pressed apple juice made from hand picked apples and replace it with a couple of cans of baked beans.
But before I do that, I should probably clarify that I am actually working.
‘But the Royal Horticultural Society is all about gardening, isn’t it?’ I hear you cry.
Well yes, it is (we are, in fact the UK’s largest gardening charity), but whilst everyone I’ve met at Wisley does love a good pootle around their own garden, it is only a lucky few that get to do this as their day job!
