Week One at POST

Diary of a POSTie

Thanks to sponsorship from the EPSRC, I am embarking on a 3 month placement with the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST). POST write scientific briefing documents for parliamentarians, based on the literature and interviews with academics, industry and 3^rd parties. Their purpose is to provide evidence and inform, but not give recommendations. My POSTnote will have the topic “Big Data in Business”. I plan to update my blog once a week, so everyone can see what I get up to!

Week 1

Day 1

I arrived at POST on Monday morning in gorgeous sunshine and met Lydia Harriss, who will be supervising me throughout my stay. POST is based in 7 Millbank and has about half a dozen offices, with permanent staff and quite a few postgraduate fellows – other people on similar programmes to me. I will be based in an office with two other fellows and one permanent staff member during my 3 months.  After some crawling around to try and locate the right Ethernet cable and socket, I was set up with my parliamentary account and computer. I started (as you do) by checking my e-mails and discovered I already had a timetable clash! A conference on Big Data at UCL and my tour of parliament both booked for the 7^th April! I was then given a tour of POST and introduced to a lot of people. At the moment, the fellows working in POST almost outnumber the permanent staff: it’s great that almost everyone is in a similar situation to me, just a few weeks ahead. This means that any concerns about the POSTnote writing process can be answered easily by one of the other fellows.

Mark (another fellow who works in the same office as me) took me and another new starter Anusha over to “the Palace” to get our permanent access cards. After a long wait, we had a quick walk through to Portcullis house and then back to the cafeteria at POST for lunch and a post-lunch coffee at Ravello's. The fellows eat together in the cafeteria everyday – it’s nice to chat and see what everyone does for their research and in their spare time. From vaccines to ecology, we have a broad range of backgrounds!

I spent the afternoon reading up on Big Data, trying to work out what it is and how it relates to businesses before we headed off at 4:30 ish to go to a networking event in Portcullis house. The event was the last part of a workshop that had been going on all afternoon, and by the time we got there most people had gone! We chatted to someone from RCUK who seemed optimistic about our future job prospects in the world of science in policy whilst helping them finish the drinks they’d provided for the reception…

I then went off to join the gym! Only, a 15 minute walk away in Victoria, and only £30 per month for a student.

Day 2

After a pre-work swim, I arrived at POST and soon headed off for training on the parliamentary IT system SPIRE. This system is used to ensure that all documents and communications can be saved in a logical manner, particularly useful for POST with their high turnover of fellows.

I spent the day reading about big data, finding examples of companies that have used it productively. The day finished off with popping into Portcullis house to see William Hague give evidence to a select committee on UK foreign policy. As you do…!

Day 3

Started off weirdly, with a spin class in the dark! Apparently that’s how they do it here…

I discovered both the BBC and the Guardian are running long term features on big data, so I caught up with what they had already published. I then began thinking about a potential structure for my POSTnote, before meeting with Lydia. We had a really good discussion – she started by introducing me to how POST fits into parliament (not government!) and then we talked about the note for a while, giving me lots of ideas and things to look up.

Day 4

I finally remembered to bring in my earphones, so spent most of the morning listening to videos and audio clips on the topic of big data that I had bookmarked. At the same time I managed to collate my research so far and make some headway on making a structure.

At lunch, we went over to the palace to have a quick walk around – went to Westminster Hall, the lobby in with the entrance to the houses in and onto the roof! The lift to the roof is wood panelled!!

Started compiling a summary document combining all the case studies I had scribbled in my notebooks and after an afternoon tea break at ravello's I finished it off.

Day 5

Found out on arrival of my colleagues that Friday is apparently dress down Friday! As I missed my alarm, it was lucky I was wearing any clothes at all… I also heard that my leave of absence from UoB has been accepted, pushing my finish date back to Christmas day 2015!

I met with Lydia to discuss how the structure of the note was coming along, and she gave me a bit more detail about the purpose of a POSTnote and how they are normally structured. She also encouraged me to attend select committees, debates and Prime Minister’s Questions to get a flavour of parliament and make the most of the full access pass we get as part of the placement. Our passes only work with a PIN code, and the doors at 7 Millbank are like pods – so only one person can fit in at once. Whenever I leave, I feel I should emerge from it dressed like a superhero!

After lunch I had a re-structure of my note, and added where I had found case studies that might fit in. Lydia also cced me in some communications with academics asking if they would mind us interviewing them: we might have one on Tuesday!

On Fridays, there is no sitting in the houses and so you can go in to have a look. So on our way home, we went into both houses and had a good look around, before celebrating the end of our first week with some G&Ts in the House of Lords bar made with special House of Lords gin!