A Day in the Life: Radiant Analyst

Ok, so this first post is going to fall firmly into the category of descriptive. I’ll aim to give a broad overview of my life as a Radiant analyst working for Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) but also, will add some specifics around what I’m working on (without breaching any confidentiality of course). As these posts go on, I’ll try to include some personal stuff as well, interests, thoughts, goals etc.

5am — Office day today so it’s an early start. Shower, eat, walk the dogs and then cycle to the train station. The ride takes me about 15/20 mins (including the time it takes to lock up my bike). I live in Cambridge and work in London so travel between the two takes around 50 mins. Short walk to the office and I’m usually in by 8:00am.

9am — Emails, service tickets and checking the calendar for the day. When I’m in the office I try and schedule some time to walk around the departments for a quick ‘check-in’. This usually consists of saying heeeeellooo and asking how things are. Generally, we have the system in a fairly stable state so nothing major comes up in these conversations. It is a good opportunity though to watch some workflows in action and (wearing my Radiant hat) I can try and identify some areas that could be improved (maybe there’s an extra “click” that isn’t necessary, we love removing clicks!). Back to the office and it’s time to work on some build.

12pm — Lunch, eating out feels like a luxury, but when I don’t do it that often, it’s easy to justify 🙂.

1pm — More time to work on build / config. Lots of projects going on at the moment but generally, our focus lately has been on improving links between departments. Initially I found it surprising that technical solutions aren’t the be all and end all… Well, it’s obvious to me now, but just because a workflow has been designed, in no way does that mean our end users will (or even should) follow it. I’ve come to realise more and more that an ‘ideal’ workflow and what happens in reality are two very different things.

2pm — Coffee and catch up. Being in the office is a good chance to “disturb” people. I say that jokingly of course, but those little interactions often lead to interesting conversations. I absolutely love the flexibility of working from home, but when I’m in the office I’ll try and have an (unscheduled) face to face conversation with someone. Team’s calls aren’t quite the same as coffee in the kitchen. Either way, it’s a good chance to see what everyone else is working on and potentially offer some insights from my own projects.

4/5pm — Home time. The wonderful national rail service is always reliable and never busy, so it’s a quick journey back to Cambridge and home around 7pm.