It was The Institute of Internal Communications Awards 2010 on Friday night (the artist formerly known as Communicators in Business). And, together with our talented chums from the O2 IC team, we were chuffed to pick up a gong for ‘Best Reward and Recognition’. Huzzah!

The night didn’t get off to the best of starts. Having manfully resigned myself to missing the England game, one of the O2 gang whipped out her iPhone and got the whole game live streaming. Magic. Except, as history will reflect, it wasn’t.

No matter. Shortly after the whistle was blown on that aberration, the world of spin’s most spinniest spinster, spinmeister-general Alistair Campbell took to the stage and delivered a blinding speech. I mean blinding in the most literal sense. By that point I’d consumed an ill-advised quantity of white wine and the stage lights were really bright.

Then the awards began. All 35 of them. To be fair, it was all conducted with ruthless efficiency. Nominees announced, winner declared, blast of contemporary popular music, shake Big A’s hand, pose for photo, jog on.

Listen to me, pretending to be all like, whatevs. My hoop was well and truly a-cocked when our turn came around and we got the nod. Less thrilled when I realised I’d been nominated to represent WMW in the twosome who would actually go and collect the award.

Possibly through our last minute booking arrangements, our table was located at the remotest possible point from the front of the room. At that moment, the path from table to stage seemed roughly equidistant to the path from Bag End to Mount Doom.

I staggered gamely towards the light with an amiable (drunk) grin plastered on my face and the whole handshaking/posing/leaving thing seemed to go okay. I didn’t fall over or insult anyone and I’m 90% sure my flies were in the appropriate position. Returning to our table, group hugs and multiple high fives ensued. Oh yes. We were classy in victory.

Congrats to all the night’s other winners and short-listers. If I met you on the dance floor, I can only apologise.

Favourite hazy flashback
Mr Campbell’s segue into announcing our triumph:

“And the winner is the entry the judges said had the wow factor – Fanclub!”

One of the competing category entries was called ‘The WoW! Factor’.

The ladies of WMW ventured out last night to hip new micro-boutique 40 Winks in Mile End. As far as I could fathom, the event involved dressing in nightwear, sipping cocktails from tea cups and listening to fanciful (i.e. weird) stories. Naturally, us blokes weren’t invited. Though apparently this didn’t stop half of East London’s male population whom, having got wise to the ‘girls in undies’ theme, suddenly warmed to the idea of being transported into a magical, whimsical fairytale land where they could explore their heretofore undiscovered sensitive sides. Anyhoo, Lando’s written a poem about it. I think you’ll agree, it’s enchanting stuff.

Once upon a time…

In a land far away from Clerkenwell (but still this side of Bow); there were eight lovely ladies dressed up from head to toe.

The night was young, the air was warm and excitement filled the air! The first stop was dinner… where the chefs seemed not to care. They tried to poison Jenny TWICE, with pine nuts everywhere.

‘Oh never mind,’ the ladies cried, we have far more adventurous plans… off to the wondrous 40 Winks, for gin, stories and lullabies.

Eight ladies dressed in their finest nightgowns filled the ornate rooms, they sipped cocktails from teacups, nibbled on treats – oh, they were over the moon!

Ascending the stairs to the music room, they were told such enchanting tales… midsummer nights dreams and fairies, sweet romance …Oh! More cocktails!

The opium den was to follow, where soft music flowed through our ears, our eyes were starting to fall… when Mr Carter then said adieu to us all.

The eight lovely ladies sleepily wandered home to bed, and awoke the next morning surrounded by fairies all…perhaps it was only a midsummer nights dream after all.

The End.

I gave a speech on social media at work the other day. It was to IC practitioners in the financial services industry.
The central point of my speech was that trying to use a cascade to irrigate people with information pertinent to what your firm is up to is highly inefficient because communication by cascade is a flawed model.
Oh the irony then that the organisers forbad water at the lecturn for the speaker.