Busy Day, Happy Day

Today was our all-staff meeting at work. As usual, the meeting began with breakfast and a nice meet-and-greet. It's always nice to see everybody after the long, lonely winter. This year's meeting started on a high note- we had over 2,500 attend our family-friendly Spring fundraiser this past weekend... a record breaking figure.

Regarding our staffing, our CFO (who bears a bit of a resemblance to Mr Burns) will be retiring this coming June, and four members of the executive group were promoted to the position of Vice President. Our gift shop manager and his administrative assistant will also be retiring. On the bright side, twenty-eight new hires were brought on to help with our upcoming season.

After the President of the organization spoke and the CFO gave his goodbye speech, a representative of the county tourism board spoke about the importance of tourism to the region, and the need for increased communication between the county government and the various tourist attractions. Being the guy who locks up the joint on the weekends, I told her, "Please run a campaign with the slogan 'Leave Brooklyn Before Eleven AM' because I get a lot of people showing up just as I'm locking up."

Then the head of our education department gave a presentation about the development of an educational app funded by a grant from the federal government, and then showed a video of an interview he did for a BBC production. He's a mellow fellow, and his BBC video was great- he was sporting a jaunty porkpie hat and a soul patch, and he just looked too cool for school. He's universally beloved in the organization, so this bit went over very well.

He was followed by our head of collections, who described some recent acquisitions. She's a lovely, caring person, and she got very emotional reading one of the newly acquired documents. It's nice to know that she has a real connection with the objects placed in her care... I often note that one key to working here is 'buy in'. None of us makes a gajillion dollars, so a proprietary feeling toward the place is crucial.

After the staff meeting, I had to put in four hours to cover a site which is a polling place for the primary elections. I'm happy to say that the turnout has been high. We also have a school group onsite. At one point, a bunch of eight year-old girls started chanting, "Hillary! Hillary!" I was very proud of the girls for being politically savvy, but I had to inform them that there was no electioneering within 100 feet of the polling site. Happily, they walked another five feet and resumed the chant.

It's been a fun day, albeit a busy one. I'm not making a gajillion dollars, but I've got a sense of 'buy in'.