A supplier let me down this morning, so the important job I’d wanted to get done just wasn’t going to happen. After a frustrating couple of hours trying to be ‘resourceful’ and to achieve something despite the circumstances, I eventually wised-up. This is always a difficult call for me - I think of myself as a tough capable, ‘can-do’ person - so how do I know when to stop banging my head against a brick wall? And what do I do instead?!

One thing that occasionally helps me is to stay in touch with the flow of things – people, events, even just the weather – that is happening around me. Today I realised was the Christian holy day of Shrove Tuesday, a kind of ‘cleansing day’ before Lent. I experienced a huge sense of relief; instead of having to struggle and fight, here was a big signal that actually what was right for me in that moment was to stop and reflect.

I was out on Monday evening to get the latest briefing from the Bank of England on their quarterly inflation report. All very interesting stuff on how the UK and the global economy is doing. The information’s available to anyone on the Bank of England website. But here’s the information I was most interested in - why would a bunch of people give up their evening to go to something like this? 

I got around to talk to a few people and discovered mostly business people and representatives of industry bodies, like the Engineering Employer’s Federation. The answer that came up the most, and which struck a chord with me, was about the importance of seeing the big picture and of knowing how our world, our businesses and our daily lives are shaped by this kind of information and by the people who use it to make top-level decisions.