Here Steven Guthrie, Head of Communication, Marketing and Memberships in Sport and Exercise, explains a typical day.
7.00am – Alarm off and after a few snoozes I am up. After a “few” years off I’m running 5k every second day at the moment, and actually really enjoying it. PS If you are looking to start running, the team at FASIC have some helpful tips.
On the day’s I’m not running I try and make sure I am on “baby duty” in the morning, getting my seven month year old Alia ready for the day.
8.00am – One of the benefits of working at home is my lack of commute. It means I’ve been able to have breakfast with my daughter every morning. She’s a month or so into weaning so every morning is a wee adventure trying new tastes and textures. Buttery toast is going down a storm.
9.00am – By this time I’m at my desk (I’ve commandeered my wife’s make up table in the spare room) with my first coffee of the day, having checked through any emails that have come through and prepared my to-do list. I also have a quick check with my team each morning. As a small team who normally would be sitting in an office together all day, this gives us an opportunity to have some social time to chat about things other than work.
9.30am – My mornings are a mix of regular and project meetings as well as 1-2-1 contact with my team. Keeping active is incredibly important to both mental and physical health so although user activity at our facilities is currently suspended we are doing all we can to share advice, tips and guides on how to stay active during lockdown. Over the last eight weeks, we’ve adapted our marketing and communications activity to help us do that, which has been a fantastic team effort. We’ve launched a new YouTube Channel and created a new Keep Active area on our website as well as ramped up our activity across our social media channels.
Sport & Exercise Keep Active area.
12.00pm – Alia normally has her lunch around this time so I try to time meetings to avoid it, it’s not always possible but it’s been great to have the opportunity to spend time with her that I wouldn’t have had otherwise. Depending how my day is going and meetings that are in the diary (and the weather) we will also try to go for a quick family walk to get some fresh air.
1.00pm – We are starting to work on our Adaptation and Renewal planning. This is a massive undertaking for the whole of the Sport & Exercise team. It’s vital we plan and communicate how we are going to continue to offer the level of service students, staff and the wider University community have come to expect from us while following public health guidelines and ensuring the safety and wellbeing of users and the team.
3.00pm – My last coffee of the day and quick afternoon check in with team. I try and keep some interesting tasks for the last few hours of the day!
5.00pm – Dinner time for Alia and on the days I’ve not been for a run in the morning I’ve been completing a 20-minute HiiT session either in the living room or in the garden. It’s very strange that I am exercising more while working from home than I did when working with the amazing gym facilities we have on offer in the same building! Ill also try and spend time with Alia and let my wife chill or do some exercise.
6.30pm – Bath and bedtime for Alia. My wife and I take it in turns to do her bath and put her to bed. She’s a very chilled out baby (touch wood) so this is a really fun time, lots of splashing and giggles!
7.00pm – I’ll normally have a check of emails and our various social media channels before making dinner and switching off for the day. Our evenings vary between getting chores done in the house, catching up on Netflix (although we are running out of things to watch) and (as sad as this is) playing Football Manager, I’m on a four league title streak with Aberdeen at the moment!
What does your new nine-to-five look like? Share it with us at bulletin@ed.ac.uk