Tuesday, June 26 - Final day on the project

Today I felt much better physically.   We gave our final report-out to the CEO and our Professor.   The CEO told us we did a great job and represented our college very well.   The CEO got invited to a reception at the Titanic Museum to meet the Queen.   He is considered a success story in Belfast.

We finished up at 1:30 on that and then interviewed our subject for our Leadership Study, Bryan.

Bryan is a successful entrepreneur that was the first distributor of Apple Computer maintenance in Northern Ireland.   He sold this company 20 years ago and is now an Angel Investor for other start-ups in the Belfast area.   He was very personable to talk to and has been a mentor to the CEO we’ve been working with for many years.  Bryan started as a researcher at a university and switched to business at age 30.    

We also interviewed Leslie, who used to be a direct report of Bryan’s.   She said the Bryan is a model leader and great mentor.   She is now in HR and tries to get people to model Bryan’s leadership behaviors such as being available, giving timely feedback, and walking the talk. 

Walking back to the hotel which goes past the Titanic Movie studio where they make films, we saw a woman flying around on a crane doing acting a bit silly.    Don’t know if she was being filmed or what, but below is what we saw:

Our team planned out the work for the Leadership PowerPoint and bought our tickets to go on a city tour in the morning.

I had dinner with Patrick a co-worker of mine that I work with on the phone who lives in Belfast.   His 9 year old son joined us.   It was great seeing how 9 year olds are basically the same where ever they are.   He sat at dinner and played his DSI and ate chicken nuggets and fries while we ate Indian food.    Patrick gave me a mini tour of the city showing me all the peace walls, police stations that look like prisons, the school next to his that was hit by a rocket and a bar where to be a member you had to have been in prison fighting for the IRA.  

As I write, I am seeing the first sunset since I’ve been here.   The sky is orange, purple and teal.   It is 10:30 pm.   

7:53 AM

I got up early and went running.   Since the Queen is coming to the Titanic Quarter, the police are stopping every car and searching before entering our street.   I ran past a policeman with a machine gun.   It was a bit intimidating.   I hope there is no violence today because there are a lot of people here who don’t like the Queen or anything to do with Britain.