Weeknote 2025/44

/ Sharon O'Dea / Leave a comment
A person stands next to a fruit-shaped bus stop designed to look like a pineapple, with a coastal view in the background.
Joyfully waiting for a bus on the Kyushu coast

This week began, and ended, where Japan once met the world.

On Monday I joined a walking tour that began on Nagasaki’s Holland Slope, a steep street lined with stone houses built in a vaguely Western style. Unlike the northern half of the city, flattened by the atomic bomb, this area survived intact. From there we climbed to the old foreign settlement, where those same European influences linger in a scattering of beautiful but increasingly unfashionable hillside homes. Two centuries ago this was a rare pocket of openness. A place where Japanese and Westerners co-existed, warily but productively. The air smelled of camellias and salt. The views were heartbreakingly pretty. But many of the houses stand empty now, their owners long gone. Beautiful places without people.

That night I walked up to Glover Garden and looked out over the harbour as the city twinkled below — one of Japan’s three best night views (though I’ve yet to find a Japanese city that doesn’t make that claim). From up there, Nagasaki looks vast and alive, not a place quietly losing its young to Tokyo and Fukuoka.

On Tuesday I visited the Twenty-Six Martyrs Museum, which marks the spot where 26 believers were crucified after Japan decided foreigners were less opportunity than threat. Even for someone as devoutly irreligious as I am (I got ‘ungraded’ in my RE GCSE, which I suspect makes me a statistical anomaly in both Britain and Japan) it was oddly affecting. The museum is small, restrained, and unmistakably clear in its message: at times, this city welcomed new ideas; at others, it nailed them to a cross. “Openness”, it turns out, has always come with terms and conditions.

Later, from a co-working space overlooking the football stadium, I met a local entrepreneur building clever, local solutions for a future with fewer people. Our conversation — and a viral LinkedIn post that followed — circled the same theme: how societies adapt when the gates start closing.

The rest of the week blurred between rooftops and basketball games, onsen and Halloween costumes. Proof that even in decline, a city can still have fun. One afternoon I took a trip up the coast to see a series of fruit-shaped bus stops (mandarins, strawberries, melons) built in the 1990s for no reason other than civic whimsy. A perfect, pointless joy.

A person standing in front of a whimsical fruit-shaped bus stop designed like a watermelon, with a clear blue sky and trees in the background.
A person standing inside a fruit-shaped bus stop designed to look like a yellow orange, wearing a white t-shirt and jeans, with sunglasses on a sunny day.
A person standing in front of a large, fruit-shaped bus stop designed like a tomato, with a clear blue sky and greenery in the background.



At a weekend Halloween party, a swarm of small, costumed children buzzed with ideas, enthusiasm and an excessive intake of sugar. Watching them, I couldn’t help wondering: when does that curiosity wear off?

Group photo of adults and children dressed in various Halloween costumes, posing together in a festive environment.


The next evening brought Nagasaki Canvas, a monthly gathering of locals trying to re-imagine their city’s future. The facilitator shared a statistic that stopped the room: Japanese adults spend just 13 minutes a week learning (compared with more than 100 in China). Over half do none at all. After graduation, curiosity apparently clocks off. In a culture where jobs are secure but unfulfilling, and advancement depends more on age than ability, perhaps there’s little incentive to keep learning.

It struck me because, just last month, I spent an hour on a podcast — The Company You Keep — talking about my own wiggly career path and all the people who’ve nudged, mentored, or occasionally derailed me along the way. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that curiosity is rarely efficient but always generative. I can’t imagine giving it up after graduation.

That same evening, someone at Canvas pointed out that the Digital Nomads programme I’m part of exists precisely to counter that — to bring in outsiders, new ideas, and different ways of living and working. A kind of 21st-century Dejima experiment, but with better wifi and a flawless Instagram aesthetic: drone shots of beaches, latte art, and neatly captioned transformation stories. We’re here to model a different future; one where you can work from anywhere, learn constantly, stay open.

Still, it made me wonder how easy it really is to escape deeply held expectations and culture, even when the door’s wide open. Because openness isn’t just physical; it’s mental. And those gates can be harder to spot.

Maybe that’s the quiet tragedy: when curiosity stops being rewarded, we don’t just lose new ideas —we lose the muscle that made them possible.

By Sunday I was walking through the reconstructed streets of Dejima, the man-made island where foreign traders were once confined. The exhibits are immaculate, the streets spotless, the story neatly told. Even curiosity has been restored, curated, and contained.

Everywhere I went this week, Nagasaki seemed to ask the same thing I ask myself more often than I’d like: how do you stay open in a world that rewards staying safe?

This week in photos

Colorful lanterns hanging over a dark pond, reflecting on the water's surface amidst lush greenery.
A nighttime view of Nagasaki, Japan, showcasing a cityscape illuminated with colorful lights, featuring a mix of modern buildings and traditional architecture against a mountainous backdrop.
A monument commemorating the 26 martyrs in Nagasaki, with statues of figures on a granite wall against a clear blue sky.
A basketball game in a stadium with a large scoreboard displaying the score, players in action, and a packed audience.
A person dressed in a black outfit and cat ears playfully poses with claw-like hands against a backdrop of urban buildings and electric wires.
A woman sitting on a bench among flowers, wearing sunglasses and a white t-shirt with a small bunny design, smiling and lightly touching her hair.
A person stands in front of a series of red torii gates against a blue sky with clouds, on a rocky shore.
A person using a ladle to wash their hands at a traditional water basin in a Japanese shrine, surrounded by other visitors and traditional architecture.
Wooden prayer plaques with handwritten wishes hanging at a shrine.
A pathway lined with vibrant red torii gates under a clear blue sky, leading into a serene park setting.
A stone statue of a figure wearing a red hat, surrounded by greenery and traditional Japanese architecture, in Nagasaki, Japan.
A woman giving a presentation in a modern workspace with a large screen displaying a thank-you message and contact information.

Weeknote 2025/43

/ Sharon O'Dea / Leave a comment
Group photo in Nagasaki, Japan, with a statue in the background and participants posing together in a relaxed outdoor setting.
Nomads at the peace statue, Nagasaki.

This week swung between solemnity and silliness. Running down hills like a kid one day, weeping in a peace museum the next. Japan has a way of pulling you into the present: the light shifting over the Onidake hills, the hum of the ferry engine, the precision of a plastic lettuce leaf. I’ve realised that wonder doesn’t live in grand gestures, but in paying attention. To history, to people, to the unexpected joy of learning something new every day.

On the Goto Islands, I learned about the Hidden Christians who practised their faith in secret when it was banned. Centuries of silence, survival, and small acts of defiance, told through the weathered walls of Gozaki Church. Then, an hour later, I was in a tiny distillery tasting gin and running down a volcano at sunset, laughing like a child. That’s Japan in a nutshell: reverence and play, often in the same breath.

A scenic sunset over rolling hills and a body of water, with vibrant orange and pink hues illuminating the sky.

That evening, at Ako House (the beautifully restored old home we’d been staying in) I somehow found myself running an impromptu workshop. The team needed to gather feedback from our digital nomad group for the programme organisers, and fast. So out came the flipchart paper and markers; within minutes I was scribbling objectives, framing questions, and herding participants like it was a Tuesday in a London boardroom rather than a tatami-floored home in rural Japan. It reminded me that the craft of facilitation — starting with the outcome, working backwards from the constraints, adapting to the people in the room — works anywhere. I prefer more than an hour’s notice, but it turns out I can pull it out of the bag if I have to.

A person sitting on the floor of a wooden room, working on a flipchart with sticky notes, while surrounded by cups and snacks.
A group of three individuals sitting on a tatami mat in a traditional Japanese room, engaging in a workshop while writing on a large sheet of paper and discussing ideas.
A woman sitting at a wooden table with a large sheet of paper, writing notes during a workshop. She has a friendly expression and is wearing a colorful scarf and blouse.
A lively group photo of diverse individuals posing together in a cozy indoor setting. Some people are smiling and making peace signs, while others are seated or leaning against each other, creating a joyful and relaxed atmosphere.

When bad weather cancelled our ferry, we took the slow boat back to Nagasaki instead — a cavernous hall where everyone simply curled up on the floor with blankets and napped. Absurd, communal, oddly peaceful. Plus as a bonus I caught another stunning sunset over the islands as we left.

A woman lays on a pillow, looking perplexed, while others are seen resting nearby wrapped in blankets on a floor in a communal space.
Weirdest ferry ever

Back on the mainland, I toured Nagasaki’s improbably numerous coworking spaces, then spent the evening listening to Dr Brian Burke-Gaffney trace the city’s long history as Japan’s window to the world. He spoke about how trade made peaceful coexistence possible — how exchange, not isolation, sustained the delicate balance between cultures during the Meiji period. A timely reminder, as barriers to trade seem to rise again elsewhere: Brexit, tariffs, walls, and fears.

At the Atomic Bomb Museum, that idea of coexistence shifted from something I’d read about to something I could feel and relate to.

My grandmother was born just after the First World War; my grandfather, a lifelong conscientious objector, shared her pacifism. They met at a Communist peace rally in Hungary — that strange, hopeful post-war moment when people still believed a fairer world was possible. They didn’t stay married long, but both spent decades campaigning against nuclear proliferation. I remember Grandad’s “Nuclear? No thanks” badges scattered across his coat like small, stubborn acts of hope.

Standing there in Nagasaki, I thought of them. Near the end of the exhibition, a display on the global anti-nuclear movement caught my eye. One photo showed the Aldermaston marches he’d told me about going on. Another placard read No More Hiroshimas — the same title as a writing competition I entered as a teenager. I wrote about my grandparents’ stories and won a modem. My first gateway to the internet.

It occurred to me that it was that prize which set me on the path to working in digital. A path that that’s brought me, improbably, here: three generations, three threads — a peace rally that led to my grandparents meeting, a writing competition that launched my career, and now this moment in the city that connects them both. History has a funny way of looping back on itself sometimes.

View of a skylight with a geometric glass design, allowing sunlight to illuminate the interior space.
An antique octagonal clock with faded numbers and hands, displayed in a glass case. The time is frozen at 11.02 - the moment the atomic bomb hit.
An exhibit showcasing a large yellow bomb in a museum setting, surrounded by gray walls and museum visitors.
A wall display with the date '1945.8.9' inscribed in bold letters, illuminated softly against a dark background.
A man holding a sign displaying the numbers of casualties in a park, with trees and buildings in the background.
A view from inside a modern building, showcasing tall glass partitions and an open sky above, creating a bright and airy atmosphere.

The rest of the week unfolded with lighter lessons: football chants with strangers at the Peace Stadium, and a day in Hasami making sampuru, the hyper-realistic wax food that adorns Japanese restaurant windows. My wax tempura prawn and lettuce are ridiculous and perfect, symbols of the care and craft that run through everything here.

The rhythm of the week has been all contrasts: reverence and laughter, reflection and running downhill. I’m learning (still) that wonder hides in the small stuff: a shared laugh, a wax prawn, a quiet moment in a crowded room.

This week in photos

Two silhouetted figures sitting on a bench on a ferry, with a sunset and colorful clouds in the background.
A large bronze statue of a seated figure with one arm raised, surrounded by green trees and a cloudy sky, with visitors gathered around.
A person wearing sunglasses and a blue top stands on a bridge with stone walls, a river behind them, and buildings in the background.
A scenic view of a river lined with stone banks and modern buildings, featuring an arched stone bridge and greenery along the water's edge.
A large crowd of enthusiastic fans wearing blue jerseys cheer in a stadium, surrounded by banners promoting their team.
A woman wearing a striped shirt is writing on paper with a brush in a dimly lit environment, surrounded by shelves of bottles and other items.
A group of seven people posing playfully inside a bar, smiling and making peace signs. A bright 'OPEN' sign illuminates the scene, and the warm, inviting atmosphere reflects a lively social setting.
A person smiling while wearing a large replica of noodles and vegetables as a hat, surrounded by displayed fake food dishes on a wooden shelf.

Weeknote 2025/42

/ Sharon O'Dea / Leave a comment
A tranquil view of a bay surrounded by lush green islands under a cloudy sky, with large, smooth rocks in the foreground.
Goto, Japan. Photo by me.

I’ve been in Japan for a week, but it feels like at least three already — the kind of week that’s so full it bends time a little. So, I’m abandoning my usual weeknote format and just trying to catch the highlights before they blur together completely.

I’m here for a month on a Digital Nomads programme in Nagasaki, living and working alongside a small United Nations of place-independent entrepreneurs, founders and freelancers. We’re here to explore new ways of working. Or at least that’s what the brochure said. In reality, it’s a mix of workshops, late-night chats, questionable karaoke, and the occasional existential crisis about Wi-Fi speeds.

It’s been equal parts exhilarating and exhausting: a reminder that throwing yourself into something completely new is as disorienting as it is energising.

Somewhere between shaking off the jetlagged fug and learning to navigate Nagasaki’s trams, I found myself at a welcome dinner with local founders and civic leaders. I ended up deep in conversation with a financial-services comms exec who told me that while Japan was once the global gold standard for employee engagement — with workers showing legendary commitment — it now ranks among the lowest.

That chronic low engagement, they said, reflects deep cultural, structural and managerial issues rather than any lack of worker motivation. To tackle it, the government has launched a series of work style reforms (働き方改革) since 2019 — ramped up again this year — aimed at modernising corporate culture and improving well-being.

Among those efforts are initiatives like the one I’m on, inviting nomad workers to spend time in Japan and share new perspectives on work, innovation and entrepreneurship.

Two days in, our group boarded a ferry bound for the Goto Islands — a scatter of green peaks rising out of the Japan Sea, two hours off the coast of Kyushu. It’s the kind of place that makes you lower your voice without quite knowing why: quiet fishing villages where boats creak gently in the tide, camellia flowers nodding in the wind, the air scented faintly with salt and cedar.

A serene beach scene featuring soft sand and shallow water, with a person walking along the shore under a clear blue sky.
A person sitting on the beach next to paddleboards and a kayak, with a calm sea and blue sky in the background.
A spacious café with large windows overlooking the sea, featuring wooden tables and chairs, and patrons engaged in conversation.
A vibrant sunset with shades of pink and purple, partially obscured by fluffy clouds, casting a warm glow over a line of trees.
A serene view of a calm bay surrounded by green hills under a cloudy sky, with rocks protruding from the water.
A large, lush tree with extensive branches and dense green foliage, surrounded by various plants and a stone wall in the foreground.

Nizo Yamamoto, the artist behind Studio Ghibli’s most iconic painted backgrounds, was born here. One of his final projects was a series of a hundred landscapes of these islands — misty forests, fishing harbours, weathered temples — all rendered in his delicate, dreamlike style. Being here feels a little like stepping inside one of them; like living in the set of Princess Mononoke.

We explored an ancient castle, ate dinner in a local izakaya, then I ducked into The Pier coworking space to join calls with colleagues and clients in the UK, Spain and Bangkok. Truly putting the “remote” in remote work.

A lively dinner gathering at a wooden table in a Japanese izakaya, filled with various dishes, including fried foods and sashimi, as people engage in conversation.
Izakaya dinner

The next morning began with a swim off a completely deserted beach — the kind of stillness that makes you hyper-aware of your own breathing. The water was clear and just the right level of cold, the sand so fine it squeaked underfoot.

Afterwards we popped into to a tiny community library built from villagers’ three favourite books, donated. Inside, the shelves were uneven, the labels hand-written, the air carrying that faint, papery scent of places built for love rather than profit. We chatted to the owner about his plans to publish nice things — a beautiful coffee-table periodical paean to local design and craft — in English and distribute it overseas.

A wooden shelf displaying various books, featuring titles in Japanese, with a warm and inviting atmosphere.
A stack of magazines titled 'nice things.' displayed on a wooden table, featuring an image of a chair and lamp on the cover.

A welcome dinner taught me how to correctly accept a drink from someone else, then pour them one in return, in traditional Goto Islands style. A skill I soon put to use in a karaoke bar, where our group and another of Japanese salarymen took turns to murder western pop hits and anime theme tunes. 

A person smiling while holding a sign that says 'Goto's Way of Drinking Yattatottu' and a glass of beer, in a restaurant setting.
A group of people having fun at a karaoke bar, with one person energetically jumping on stage while another sings into a microphone.
A group of four men standing in a karaoke bar, with one man shirtless holding a microphone. They appear to be having fun while singing.
A group of people singing karaoke in a lively setting, with two women and a man participating energetically under dim lights.

I’m fairly sure Bohemian Rhapsody has never been sung with quite that level of enthusiasm or linguistic uncertainty.

The next morning we swapped chopsticks for circuitry. A handful of us boarded a boat to visit a local wind turbine, before heading inland to meet a drone-delivery startup. From a small base on the largest island, a three-person team at  Sora-iina fly medicines to pharmacies and hospitals scattered across the archipelago — cutting journeys that once took a day by sea to under an hour. It’s a fascinating glimpse into how automation and demographics are quietly reshaping work and logistics in real places.

A tall offshore wind turbine with a yellow and white base, standing in the sea under a cloudy sky.
A group of people on a small boat in the ocean, wearing life vests, with a wind turbine visible in the background and a cloudy sky overhead.
A display of drones used for medical delivery, arranged on a red metal rack in a spacious indoor facility.

I even made a short video about it — my first real attempt at doing this kind of thing for social. Be kind! I’m just learning!

While my co-founder Jonathan was presenting our recent SEFE case study at IntraTeam in Stockholm, I was visiting a local blacksmith to see traditional metalworking, tapping away at Teams in the background while avoiding stray sparks. A call later that day saw our Japan-Sweden collaboration expanding to a four-way including folks in the UK and Iceland.

An Israeli couple in the group offered to cook dinner for everyone — my first Shabbat dinner, unexpectedly hosted in a far-flung corner of Japan. They improvised with whatever they could find in the local supermarket, and somehow managed to conjure a proper feast.

There was homemade challah, baked in a rice cooker(!), soaking up stews made from recipes carried in memory rather than written down. We passed dishes, poured wine, and shared stories about where we’d come from and what had brought us here, and some of the places we’ve seen along the way. Each of us on our own version of a journey, all momentarily paused in the same place.

It struck me how food is the great leveller and connector: you don’t need a shared language or background to break bread, just a willingness to sit down together. In that tiny corner of Japan, between the sound of waves outside and the hum of conversation, it felt like we’d built a small, temporary home. The kind that only exists when people choose to show up and share.

The next few days blurred into a mix of work, wandering and wonder. Long walks through the Ghibli-esque landscapes — all misty hills, moss-covered walls and winding lanes — where it’s easy to imagine forest spirits just out of sight. Bowls of ramen at tiny counters where the steam fogs your glasses. Even more baffling visits to convenience stores that somehow manage to sell everything from umbrellas to octopus on a stick.

Each day brings a small surprise, a reminder of how far from home I am, yet how familiar human rhythms are everywhere. Eat, talk, laugh, work, repeat.

But it’s not all ’gram-worthy hotels and beaches. Working like this isn’t without its challenges. I’m struggling with timezones — trying to join calls late in the evening because I’m eight hours ahead. Working from sub-optimal setups (my MacBook + iPad Sidecar combo is no match for the optimised, three-screen standing-desk setup I have at home). And there’s the constant need to reassure clients that I am, in fact, working here and not on some kind of extended holiday.

No routine anchor either. Without a stable base, habits like workouts, meals and focus blocks fall apart easily (I haven’t worked out since that epic one in Paris, nine day ago, and I miss it).

And the environment whiplash is real: one day you’re in a serene co-working space, the next you’re hunched over a kitchen table with a wobbly chair and bad lighting, getting eaten alive by mosquitoes during stand-up.

Still, it’s worth every moment — and every insect bite — for the change of pace, the conversations with people building weird and wonderful things, and the chance to see work and life from a completely different angle.

Somewhere between the sea breeze, the stand-ups and the sake-fuelled karaoke, I’ve remembered why I love this work. It keeps the world feeling big, keeps me curious, and reminds me that the edges of the map are the places worth exploring.

This week in photos

A cozy dining space featuring a wooden table with a bowl of ramen, a glass of beer, and a bottle on the side. The kitchen is visible in the background with steam rising and chefs working.
A workspace setup featuring two laptops, a keyboard, a water bottle, and a can of soda on a wooden desk with a wall-mounted light in a well-lit room.
A person smiling and posing in a narrow, dimly lit street lined with traditional lanterns and signs, showcasing a lively nighttime atmosphere in Japan.
A person making a funny facial expression while holding food with chopsticks, sitting at a dining table with a name tag visible.
A person's hand holding a transparent wrapper containing three types of bread labeled as Pumpkin, Lemon, and Chocolate Chip, with a colorful vending machine and greenery in the background.
A red lighthouse standing on a rocky shoreline, overlooking calm waters with a cloudy sky in the background.
A cluttered artist's workspace featuring an array of paint containers, brushes, and tools, with a lamp providing illumination.
A close-up view of a person's hand holding a traditional Japanese knife, showcasing the intricate damascus pattern on the blade, with other knives visible in the background.

Weeknote 2025/41

/ Sharon O'Dea / 1 Comment
Interior view of the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, featuring intricate stained glass windows and ornate architectural details.
Sainte-Chapelle, Paris. Awe-inspiring, literally.

A week of motion and mixed emotions: gratitude, nerves, excitement. Paris one day, Japan the next. I keep catching myself thinking how lucky I am — and then immediately worrying I sound insufferable for saying so.

The truth is, I am grateful. I get to do things my younger self could never have imagined. But I’m also anxious, tired, feeling guilty and slightly overwhelmed. Big changes always come with a wobble, even the good ones.

This week at work

Still a quiet one. Began the final tranche of chapters for the book. Prepped for Japan. Did some thinking about (organisational) transformation.

Spent some time with an firm doing a discovery in a complex, multi-national setup, helping them to make sense of what they’ve seen and heard. Like many such organisations, they’re trying to find the right balance between central control, consistency and governance — and giving local teams the freedom and flexibility to create relevant content and experiences. In our experience, good governance balances both: standards set centrally, freedom within a framework. And an acceptance that, much as you’d like to, sometimes it’s best to control the things you can change and accept the things you can’t.

We also started ramping up work on a project that’s kicking off soon. Less positively, another proposal got bounced. The market’s pretty tough for everyone right now, I know, but I’m really feeling it right now.

Also this week

I went all the way to Paris for an exercise class. Which is, however I spin it, a ridiculous thing to do. The bonkers class I go to in Amsterdam announced a one-off special at Sainte-Chapelle — that extraordinary 13th-century jewel box of stained glass, in the city my grandmother called home. So I blagged a ticket and went.

Interior of Saint-Chapelle featuring intricate stained glass windows and Gothic architecture, with people gathered and soft lighting.
A woman smiling while participating in a dance exercise class inside a beautifully illuminated gothic chapel, with colorful stained glass windows in the background.
An indoor yoga class taking place in a grand, Gothic-style chapel with colorful stained glass windows. Participants are on yoga mats, and soft lighting enhances the serene atmosphere.

I danced to Florence and the Machine in silent-disco headphones, gazing up at the kaleidoscope of light and thinking of all the history those windows have witnessed. During the meditation at the end, I lay on my back listening to Alan Watts’ Dream of Life speech:

“Then you would get more and more adventurous and you would make further and further-out gambles as to what you would dream. And finally you would dream where you are now — the dream of living the life that you are actually living today. That would be within the infinite multiplicity of choices you would have.”

Somewhere between Paris and Tokyo, that line landed hard. What was once a dream really is the life I get to live — and I’m grateful for every improbable, ridiculous bit of it.

Consuming

📺 Watching

Rewatched Princess Mononoke to get in the Japan mood (after last week’s Silence misery-fest). Looking forward to seeing some Ghibli-esque landscapes in the Goto Islands this week.

📚 Reading

Made some slow progress on Blood in the Machine. Still grimly fascinating. A reminder that every technological revolution, from the Luddites to AI, comes with winners, losers and a lot of noise in between.

🎧 Listening

Still have Life of a Showgirl on repeat, but after hearing Alan Watts in the Sanctum class I’ve been deep-diving into more of his speeches on Spotify. Here’s the playlist — perfect plane-listening for big thoughts somewhere over the ‘stans.

Coverage

Had a flurry of messages this week telling me that a provocative LinkedIn post I wrote a few months back — asking if enterprise social networks are over — was being used by Kim England to open her talk at the Unite conference in Nashville.

When you send things out into the internet, you’re never quite sure if you’re sparking debate or just belming into the void. So it’s lovely to hear when something actually lands — and even better when it sparks thoughtful replies and reflection months later.

Turns out being a twat on the internet isn’t a total waste of time after all.

Connections

Met up with campaigner and growth hacker Pranay Manocha as he was passing through Amsterdam this week. We talked Brexit, passport privilege, growth, social media toxicity (and balanced it all out with a few Amsterdam beers).

A smiling man and woman taking a selfie outdoors, with a cafe ambiance in the background.

Travel

I’m writing this 39,000 feet over Asia, midway through a 24-hour, three-flight travel day. I’ll land in Tokyo in four hours and be in Nagasaki by the afternoon. My bag’s still in Paris, so I’m reluctantly piloting a minimalist approach to packing. Wish me luck. I fear I will need it.

Aside from that, looking forward to exploring my new city and meeting the other nomads on the trip, starting with a ferry to the Goto Islands.

Excited to explore, learn, get lost and find something new. Or, at the very least, buy some clean clothes. I’ll share it all here.

This week in photos

A picturesque canal scene in Amsterdam with a paddleboarder gliding along the water. Lush green trees are lining the banks, and colorful houseboats are moored nearby, reflecting in the calm water. It's a tranquil autumn day.
A view of a tree-lined street in Amsterdam during autumn, with bicycles parked along a canal and fallen leaves covering the ground.
A group of four friends sitting at a table in a cozy setting, smiling and enjoying each other's company.
Reflection of a person in a gym with a yellow and black geometric design on the glass wall, other gym-goers in the background.
A vintage-style Paris Metro sign in front of an ornate building, with cloudy skies above.
Train station display board showing Eurostar departure information for Paris-Nord.
A woman smiling in a casual black top, sitting in a lounge area with a suitcase in the background and soft lighting.
A meal served on an airplane tray, featuring chicken, vegetables, and a side of sauce, with a screen displaying a colorful abstract image in the background.

Weeknote 2025/40

/ Sharon O'Dea / Leave a comment
Autumnal Amsterdam. Photo: Sharon O’Dea

Some weeks feel like a hinge — the quiet click between what was and what comes next. This was one of them. Projects paused, others reignited, the to-do list reshuffled yet again. A reminder that most progress doesn’t look like momentum; it looks like waiting, adjusting, packing, planning.

Autumn’s fully arrived in Amsterdam, ushered in by the season’s first storm, Amy. All wind, rain, and sideways bikes. Bleak, but bracing. There’s a certain kind of forward motion in the colder air: the sense that the year’s winding down, and it’s time to get things finished, filed, or flung into motion before winter properly settles in.

The trees along the canals have started to turn, the light’s gone soft and golden, and the air smells faintly of woodsmoke and deadlines. It feels like the season for tying up loose ends — wrapping edits, clearing decks, and sketching out what’s next.

For me, that’s Japan. It’s suddenly just days away: a shift in season, continent, and perspective all at once. The perfect point, perhaps, to pause and take stock before the next chapter properly begins.

This week at work

A quieter one, though not without its twists. Two proposals we’d been hopeful about got knocked back — not lost to anyone else, just shelved as client plans shifted. Always frustrating when work evaporates for reasons outside your control, but that’s consulting life: sometimes you’re sprinting to meet a deadline, sometimes you’re rearranging the post-its and waiting for the next wave to break.

Happily, another project that wasn’t due to start until next year has come roaring back into view, so the pendulum swings both ways. If there’s a lesson in all this, it’s that flexibility isn’t just a virtue in this job — it’s survival.

Between that and chipping away at edits for the book (slowly, steadily, like a glacier), I’ve been getting ready for the Japan trip; finalising logistics, lining up interviews, and reaching out to people I’ll be speaking with while I’m there. It’s shaping up to be a fascinating few weeks of research, conversations, and new perspectives — and, hopefully, a bit of inspiration to carry back home.

Also this week

I went to a Science & Cocktails talk at Paradiso on the emergence of a post-growth society, given by Derk Loorbach. It was one of those evenings that quietly rewire your brain a little.

He spoke about how societies evolve not through steady progress but through short, chaotic bursts — moments when old systems destabilise and new ones start to take shape. The idea of “transitions” was framed as both inevitable and hopeful: collapse as transformation, not just destruction.

There were plenty of sharp takeaways: that our economy’s dependence on perpetual growth is fundamentally unsustainable; that our obsession with technological “fixes” is often an implementation illusion masking the need for deeper change; and that the real barrier is not resources or technology, but imagination — we’ve forgotten how to picture alternatives to extractive growth.

The phrase that stuck with me most: “Transition is a more hopeful form of collapse.” A useful lens, perhaps, not just for climate policy but for any complex system — from organisations to the digital workplace.

Also, I can confirm that lectures are vastly improved when preceded by smoky cocktails and a funk band.

Consuming

📺 Watching

With less than a week to go until I head to Nagasaki, I thought I’d give Silence — Martin Scorsese’s 2016 film about the Christian missionaries who came to Japan in the 17th century — a go. That was an error.

It’s a punishingly joyless three hours of mud, martyrdom, and men staring meaningfully into the middle distance while being slowly crushed by the weight of their own faith (and, occasionally, actual rocks). It’s beautifully shot, of course (Scorsese can’t help himself) but it’s the cinematic equivalent of flagellation: grim, ponderous, and utterly devoid of warmth or light.

By the end I wasn’t enlightened; I just wanted someone, anyone, to shout, “Cut! Enough suffering, lads!” I suspect the real silence here was my will to live slipping quietly away.

If the goal was to get me in the mood for Japan, it failed spectacularly — though it did make me grateful for central heating, antibiotics, and the fact that nobody’s currently boiling Christians in Nagasaki Bay.

📚 Reading

After listening to a podcast about the Levellers — the 17th-century political movement, not the 90s crusty band — I picked up Blood in the Machine by Brian Merchant. It traces the parallels between the early industrial revolts of the Luddites and today’s tech-driven upheavals, arguing that resistance to automation isn’t anti-progress but a fight for dignity and agency.

I’m about a third of the way through and impressed so far. It’s well-researched, surprisingly pacey, and full of eerie echoes: the concentration of power, the myth of innovation as inherently good, the way workers’ rights get trampled in the name of efficiency. You could swap the textile mills for data centres and the rhetoric would barely need editing.

It’s one of those books that makes you glance uneasily at your laptop and wonder which side of history you’re really on.

🎧 Listening

On Thursday my bestie and I caught the sold-out final show of Little Simz at AFAS — the North London rapper, actor, and all-round force of nature. She was magnetic: precise, powerful, utterly in command, with a crowd that sang every word back in adoration.

But the week’s real soundtrack belonged to Taylor Swift, whose much-anticipated new album dropped on Friday. I devoured it immediately. Unconvinced at first, but by the time of writing it had properly lodged itself under my skin — the kind of slow-burner that keeps revealing new layers every listen.

Saturday morning saw me at a special “Swiftie Saturday” spin class — 66 of us belting along on stationary bikes like a pop-powered peloton — and by evening I was at the cinema for the album launch film. Immersion therapy, basically.

It’s not a cult. It’s a group of like-minded individuals engaging in synchronised cardio and light emotional processing.

Connections

I had the pleasure of catching up with Amsterdam-Canadian communicator Cassie Jorgensen this week. We chatted about the challenges of building a professional network as a blow-in from another country and the merits of agency vs in-house.

Travel

Six days till Japan (and two of those involve a side-quest to Paris). Packing lists are being honed, chargers located, adapters counted, and contingency plans made in case the airline decides my suitcase needs a longer layover than I do.

This trip has come around quickly, but it feels like the right moment for it: the book nearing its final stretch, work shifting gears, the season turning. If this week’s talk on transitions had a message, it’s that change rarely happens neatly — it’s messy, unpredictable, often inconvenient — but also full of possibility if you keep your eyes open.

I’ll be spending the first week between Nagasaki and the Goto Islands, talking to people about how work, technology, and community are evolving in Japan — a country that’s long been living the future the rest of us are only now stumbling towards.

More on that next week, from the other side of the world.

This week in photos

Two musicians performing on stage with keyboards, illuminated by purple lighting, and an abstract background projection.
A narrow Amsterdam street lined with traditional buildings, featuring a rainbow flag hanging on the left and the tower of a church visible in the background, under a cloudy sky.
A serene view of a canal in Amsterdam during autumn, with trees displaying yellow leaves and reflections seen on the water's surface.
A person with shoulder-length brown hair, wearing a white shirt with black polka dots, smiles slightly while posing in a well-lit indoor setting.
A cozy café scene with a glass of red drink on a wooden table, silver headphones nearby, and a rose in a vase beside the window showing passing pedestrians and buildings outside.
A person holding a large bouquet of flowers, wearing a black jacket and red shirt, with a red bag slung over their shoulder. They are reflected in a shop window on a street in Amsterdam.
A digital clock and a round clock displayed on a dark screen in a cinema, with a countdown of two seconds remaining before the Taylor Swift film begins.
A promotional card for 'The Life of a Showgirl' album release ride, displayed on a wooden stand, with cycling shoes visible in the background.
A group of individuals participating in a spin class, surrounded by red lighting, with one person taking a selfie in the foreground.

Weeknote 2025/39

/ Sharon O'Dea / Leave a comment
A scenic view of a canal in Amsterdam, featuring trees with autumn foliage, a clock tower in the background, and boats floating on the water.
Autumn in Amsterdam. Photo: Sharon O’Dea

Some weeks are about routine, others about momentum. This one was about spotting opportunities and grabbing them before they slip past.

As Seneca put it: “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” I’ve never been much for masterplans — my career has been more patchwork than roadmap — but I’ve learned that when the right thing comes along, you say yes and work the rest out later.

And while there’s a bigger adventure brewing in the background, the week itself had plenty to get stuck into closer to home.

This week at work

The book keeps marching forward, as has the season. Amsterdam has taken a sudden autumnal turn, the light thinner, the mornings chillier. The shift feels like a metaphor: the year heading into its final quarter just as the book does. Another week, another chunk wrangled into something that (hopefully) resembles prose. This time I’ve been working on the chapters that shift from platforms to messy and unpredictable people, which means wrestling both with frameworks and with the practical realities of how organisations actually operate. Let’s just say it’s one thing to cite the Barcelona Principles, it’s another to translate them into something a harried comms team can actually use on a Tuesday afternoon.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about multilingual content. European Day of Languages was a neat reminder that we default far too often to the assumption that “everyone speaks English.” They don’t, and even when they do, it’s rarely the language of the heart. For intranets and employee comms that aspire to feel genuinely inclusive, that means more than slapping machine translation on your news pages—it means designing governance, content types, and workflows that respect linguistic diversity from the outset. I’ve blogged about that here.

Back from holiday I’ve also thrown myself back into Statement, focusing on the narrative and comms. The app’s core idea — authenticity through verified transactions — is resonating, but the story around it needs to land as strongly as the product itself. So I’ve been sharpening the positioning, and working out how to talk about Statement in a way that’s both clear and compelling.

Towards the end of the week I virtually sat down with Jack Aspden from The Company You Keep to talk about my career.  Which will never not be funny to me, as (as I wrote about in Week 28) I’ve been working for over a quarter of a century and am still to have anything close to a plan. My career is less a trajectory and more a Jackson Pollock spray-painted across a life. A series of (occasionally good) decisions and some sheer dumb luck. We spoke for over an hour, a conversation that felt more like a session with a therapist at times. I wish him the best of luck editing that into something resembling useful career advice. As Helen Keller said, “Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing at all.”

Finally, proposals. We have a couple on the go, in that place where we kick them back and forth between us and the client until the shape of the project feels right. This where I get excited about the work itself and slightly queasy about the potential workload if they all land at once. It’s the consultant’s eternal dilemma: complain about the pipeline being too quiet, then panic when it starts filling.

Also this fortnight

Remember back in Weeknote 38 when I said I had some big news? Here it is: I’m off to Japan.

Starting next month I’ll spend a few weeks living and working there as part of a digital nomads programme with the Prefecture of Nagasaki. It’s a proper experiment in how regions can attract and support place-independent workers — and for me, a live case study in the future of work.

Japan is already grappling with challenges others are only just waking up to: ageing populations, shrinking talent pools, automation, AI, and the redesign of work for wellbeing and productivity. Those forces shape our comms, processes and platforms — the digital workplace is just a mirror of that reality, and the reflection is shifting fast.

I’ll be based mainly in Nagasaki (with some time on the Ghibli-esque Goto Islands) before wrapping up in Tokyo. I’ll keep client work ticking along (just seven hours in the future), while also writing, researching, and learning from innovators, business leaders and fellow nomads.

The future of work is being written everywhere. For a few weeks, my chapter will be from Japan.

If you know of anyone doing interesting things in the comms, collaboration or future of work space in Japan or the broader APAC region, I’d be grateful for an intro.

Consuming

👩🏻‍💻 Internetting

Unusually for this section, a podcast. WB40 is a long-running show about tech, but what makes it special is the community around it: regular listeners who are collaborative, generous, and always up for sharing advice.

This week’s episode features my friend — and occasional Lithos Partners associate — Lisa Riemers, talking about her new book Accessible Communications. I was lucky enough to get an advance copy, and I love how she and her co-author Matisse Hamel-Nelis not only make the case for accessibility in comms, but show how achievable it can be.

Listen in… and then go and buy the book.

📺 Watching

I dipped into Alice in Borderland on Netflix, partly to whet my appetite for all things Japan. It started off promising — stylish, intriguing, Tokyo-as-character — but it veered into Squid Game territory faster than I expected. Not sure yet if I’m hooked or just mildly traumatised.

📚 Reading

Somehow didn’t have much of a book mojo this week.

🎧 Listening

Bret McKenzie’s new album turned out to be an unexpected treat. Best known as one half of Flight of the Conchords, he’s gone solo here with something warmer and more musically layered. I put it on out of curiosity and ended up staying for the melodies — witty, yes, but also surprisingly tender. Proof there’s more to him than business time.

Travel

Nothing at all this week, and ngl I’m delighted about that.

This week in photos

A busy art gallery exhibition featuring a diverse group of people engaging with artwork displayed on the walls, with a focus on a central table where attendees are interacting.
A man in a light suit riding a bicycle carrying his bride in a white dress, adorned with flowers and bells along a tree-lined street in Amsterdam during autumn.
A cyclist riding in Amsterdam while pulling a wheeled suitcase. The street is lined with bicycles and storefronts, showcasing the urban landscape.
A hand holding a coffee cup with a logo that reads 'SCREAMING BEANS COFFEE ROASTERS' in a street with colourful buildings in Amsterdam.
An indoor exercise class taking place in a large, ornate space with stained glass windows and dramatic lighting. Participants are on yoga mats, some in poses, while others interact with the instructor.
A view of a canal in Amsterdam surrounded by trees displaying autumn colors, with a boat docked along the bank and buildings in the background.
A scenic view of a gazebo surrounded by trees and a calm pond, with lily pads floating on the water's surface under a clear blue sky.

Weeknote 2025/38

/ Sharon O'Dea / 1 Comment
Group of five hikers posing triumphantly at the summit, with rugged mountains and a clear blue sky in the background.
My pals and I at the peak of the Valbonë-Theth Pass in Albania, this week

Bumper two-week note: I spent ten of the last fourteen days adventuring around the Balkans. So this one’s light on work and heavy on holidays. I’m not apologising.

Two themes stuck with me: who shows up, and what happens when they do. At the IABC summit Mike Klein dropped the line “the world is run by the people who show up” (sometimes credited to Ben Franklin, who probably didn’t say it but would’ve if he’d had LinkedIn).

Then in Albania I learned how a tiny communist party basically turned up, seized power, and held the country in a half-century headlock. Proof, if you needed it, that history isn’t written by the best ideas; it’s written by the people who managed to get a room booked and never gave back the keys.

In politics, as in comms, it’s never the smartest who win. Just the ones who had the audacity to pull up a chair and refuse to sod off.

This week at work

Book progress continues: three new chapters in draft. People, on the skills and roles that actually make digital comms work. Content, the stuff employees actually come for, and what shapes their real user experience. And Communities, why they’re not fluffy side projects but strategic assets in the comms mix.

I drafted mine in a bar in Tirana while Jon hammered his out in a Bristol home office. Then we swapped, edited, iterated. That’s our system: one of us gets words down, the other makes them better, and the time zones/weird schedules do the heavy lifting.

Back from holiday, I went straight into the IABC Strategic Communication Leadership Summit. Blissfully free of the usual death-by-panel (aka “three senior leaders carefully saying nothing for 45 minutes”) or the kind of platform case study where a vendor insists their intranet launch was “seamless” and everyone claps politely while knowing full well it wasn’t.

Instead: an unconference. Fifty comms leaders from 30+ countries, fifteen sessions, zero sponsor pitches, and actual conversations about the real stuff — strategy, frontline and middle managers, the impact of AI, the future of the profession. I even left with a notebook full of scrawls that might translate into something useful, rather than the usual bingo card of buzzwords. If I can read my own writing, that is.

The big theme: Leadership in comms isn’t about craft or channels. It’s about showing up, making space, and keeping the profession credible, vibrant and tied to business goals.

Huge thanks to Mike, Natasha, Ruxana and Monique for pulling it together. I left buzzing with ideas — and reminded that this job is at its best when we stop presenting at each other and start working with each other.

Also this fortnight

But for most of the past two weeks I’ve been blissfully offline, on a proper adventure in Balkans. Some people spend two weeks horizontal on a beach. But  apparently my idea of a holiday is “exhaust yourself in three different countries, climb a mountain, then fly straight to a strategy summit.”

Kosovo first. Europe’s newest country, where Tony Blair is such a national hero that people have named their children after him. (Yes, Tonibler is an actual given name. No, I didn’t meet a little Gordonbrown.)

Colorful large letters spelling 'NEWBORN' in a public square in Pristina, Kosovo, with a blue sky and buildings in the background.
A panoramic view of a city in Kosovo, showcasing modern buildings, green park areas, and clear blue skies.
Interior view of a modern building featuring a geometric skylight and circular patterned flooring, with a person standing in the center.

A stop in the capital Pristina, with its monuments to Mother Teresa and Madeline Albright. Prizren was next: Ottoman bridges, minarets, mountain views — basically Türkiye on decaf.

A view of a traditional architectural structure featuring a dome and minaret, surrounded by trees and a courtyard with a fountain.
A person sitting on a stone bridge overlooking a river in the historic town of Prizren, Kosovo, with a mosque and scenic hills in the background.

Then North Macedonia: home of the Cyrillic alphabet, Alexander the Great, and views so good they should come with subtitles. That also makes it my 86th country. I promised myself that’s the last new one this year, but let’s be honest: my willpower is about as strong as Balkan WiFi.

A historical church with a red-tiled roof situated near a calm lake, surrounded by greenery and mountains in the background.
A historic stone church with a conical red tile roof, surrounded by neatly trimmed green hedges and trees, under a bright blue sky.
A scenic view of a calm lake (Lake Ohrid, North Macedonia) surrounded by green trees and a distant mountainous landscape under a partly cloudy sky.

Speaking of which, Tirana. Bunkers, boho bars, bonkers architecture. The whole vibe reminded me of backpacking in South America in my 20s — nothing works how you expect, yet everything somehow does. Bring patience. And raki.

A vibrant restaurant interior featuring colorful decor, eclectic artwork on the walls, and neon signs. Patrons are seated at tables, enjoying their meals and drinks in a lively atmosphere.
A blend of modern and traditional architecture, featuring a mosque with a tall minaret alongside contemporary buildings under a clear blue sky.
Aerial view of Tirana, Albania at sunset, showcasing a mix of modern and traditional architecture, surrounded by green hills.
A panoramic view of a city at sunset, showcasing tall buildings and lighted streets, with a mountain range in the background.
Interior view of a dome featuring multiple framed portraits arranged in a radial pattern, illuminated by lights, with a central skylight at the top.

Then things got really good: a farm on the edge of Lake Koman, a place as beautiful as any I’ve ever seen, accessible only by boat, where we swam, kayaked, ate food that had been growing approximately five minutes earlier, and slept under a million stars. Basically an Instagram advert for “disconnecting” that, for once, was actually worth it.

And then: the Valbonë–Theth trail. 16km, 1100m of climb, endless switchbacks. My lungs and thighs staged a coup about halfway up, but the views shut them right up. There’s something oddly satisfying about doing hard things — like hiking a mountain or checking your inbox after a week offline.

Person standing on a rocky outcrop, arms raised in triumph, overlooking a mountainous landscape on a sunny day.
A hiker trekking on a rocky mountain trail surrounded by lush greenery and distant snow-capped peaks under a clear blue sky.
A panoramic view of a mountainous landscape featuring steep peaks, lush greenery, and a winding river in the valley below, under a clear blue sky.

And then, as if to prove I have range: Tirana airport, shorts and hiking boots still on, headed straight to a Brussels for the conference. From mountains to meeting rooms in 72 hours. Wouldn’t have it any other way.

Consuming

👩🏻‍💻 Internetting

CIPR’s new report An Age-Old Problem confirms what most of us already knew but the industry prefers to pretend isn’t happening: PR has an ageism problem. If you’re young, you’re “too green to lead”; if you’re older, you’re “out of touch”. The sweet spot, apparently, is being exactly 32, fluent in TikTok dances and miraculously free of childcare or eldercare responsibilities.

The report calls for common-sense fixes: make age part of DEI, stop sneering at colleagues across generations, build careers that don’t fall off a cliff at 40, and measure progress instead of writing another report about it in five years’ time. Reverse mentoring even gets a mention (because god forbid we admit that both a 23-year-old and a 57-year-old might know useful things at the same time).

In short: if comms wants to be taken seriously as a profession, it needs to stop treating people’s date of birth as more important than their talent. Otherwise, the only thing ageing gracefully in this industry will be the clichés.

📺 Watching

Didn’t turn a TV on for two weeks. Turns out the world keeps spinning (and the scenery’s better).

📚 Reading

Finished The Albanians: A Modern History while trundling around the country. I like to read the history of wherever I land, and in this case it was much-needed: I knew shamefully little about Albania beyond bunkers and Enver Hoxha. The book filled in the blanks — a crash course in how a small, beautiful country endured decades of isolation and is still shaking off the aftershocks at speed. Makes wandering its chaotic, charming present-day streets feel a lot less baffling.

And yes: turns out there’s more to Albania than Taken 2 and handing out pity points at Eurovision.

🎧 Listening

Nothing in particular — except discovering that Boney M’s Ma Baker is bizarrely popular in Albania. No idea why, but it seemed to follow me everywhere. Answers on a postcard (or a disco beat) please.

Connections

The IABC event was basically a high-end school reunion: catching up with old comms friends and finally confirming that the people I’ve known online for years do, in fact, have legs.

Also managed a Breakfast App meet-up with Rita, an academic visiting from California (proof that occasionally the internet serves up something more useful than ads for AI tools). And Brussels gave me the bonus of a catch-up with Anthony and Jane Zacharewski — because apparently I can’t set foot in a European capital without turning it into a networking opportunity.

Travel

Made it home yesterday and, for a fleeting few hours, thought I might actually have no travel booked for the rest of the year. Cute idea. Obviously didn’t last. Now there’s something very exciting in the diary… but you’ll have to wait for Weeknote 39 for the reveal. Consider this the cliffhanger no one asked for

This week in photos

A historic stone bridge with two people walking on it, set against a backdrop of traditional houses and a mosque with a minaret, under a partly cloudy sky in a picturesque Balkan town.
Serene view of a lake surrounded by lush greenery and colorful autumn leaves, featuring two small boats docked near the shore.
An abandoned room with peeling walls, broken tiles, and overgrown plants, illuminated by natural light coming through the windows.
A hiking signpost with various trail directions and distances, surrounded by green pine trees under a clear blue sky.
A stone structure rising from a rocky base, framed by green leaves and against a backdrop of cloudy sky.
Speaker presenting at a conference, gesturing with one hand and holding a microphone. Behind them, a digital screen displays a collaborative brainstorming tool with sticky notes and questions.
A group of five people taking a selfie outdoors with a mountainous landscape in the background, surrounded by trees.

Weeknote 2025/36

/ Sharon O'Dea / Leave a comment
Panoramic view of a lush green valley - the Les roches Tuilière et Sanadoire - surrounded by rocky cliffs under a partly cloudy sky.
Les roches Tuilière et Sanadoire. Photo by me.

This week I travelled to the Auvergne to scatter my grandmother’s ashes, close to the village where she was born more than a century ago.

In her last years she painted from memory a scene of her childhood: a forest road, two great rocks, then suddenly a clearing — the valley opening up below. “It was a wonderful sight I would always remember,” she wrote.

On Friday I stood in that same spot, saw the same view she carried with her for a lifetime, and laid her to rest in the ground she loved. A return, of sorts, to her beginnings.

Nan’s life stretched far beyond that valley. She lived through occupation in Paris, celebrated its liberation in a shower of tricolores, trained as one of the few women engineers of her generation, raised a family in a new country, and never stopped campaigning for the values she believed in: liberty, equality, fraternity.

But she was also the woman who knitted us jumpers, made extraordinary birthday cakes, and whose cooking remains unmatched. She juggled logic and creativity — designing a trigonometry-inspired cushion one day, writing poetry the next.

Being back in the volcanic hills where she was born, I kept coming back to this thought: our origins matter. The places we start from, the people who shape us, the values we inherit. Even if we take a different path, we carry those beginnings with us.

That theme ran through the rest of my week too. A conversation with Cathryn, who was a formative influence on me as a teenager. And then my gym instructor, during a Sanctum class — which, if you’ve not had the dubious pleasure, is essentially a wellness cult disguised as a workout. Picture a candlelit room full of beautiful people in Lululemon, bouncing in silent-disco headphones to pounding techno, somewhere between burpees and interpretive dance. It’s like Berghain meets a yoga retreat, only designed to be an Instagrammable Experience.

In the middle of this fever dream, the instructor delivered his pep talk about looking back at who you were five years ago. Normally I’d have rolled my eyes so hard I’d need medical attention. But, landing as it did at peak pre-menstrual sensitivity, I found myself ugly-crying into my wireless headphones while influencers around me humped the ether like it was a path to enlightenment. A spiritual awakening via techno squats.

And I couldn’t help but wonder what my Nan (practical, principled, sharp as a tack) would have made of it all. Probably a raised eyebrow, then a wry laugh at the strange, circuitous ways we find meaning.

So that’s this week’s reflection: on beginnings, origins, returns — and remembering to be proud of the journey as much as the destination.

This week at work

After a quiet summer, the inbox has suddenly remembered we exist. A flurry of new business signals came through, so this week was largely about shaping proposals. One’s already had a tentative yes — the best kind of feedback — and I’m looking forward to getting started. The others are out in the world now, hopefully working their magic.

On the book front, Jonathan and I made good progress on the next two chapters: one on the people and skills needed for digital comms at work, the other on content. We’re finding our co-writing rhythm — passing drafts back and forth, layering in ideas, editing each other’s words until we’re not quite sure who wrote what. It’s satisfying, collaborative, and occasionally a little disorienting.

But even as the chapters take shape, I can hear the sound of deadlines approaching fast, like distant thunder that’s getting louder every day.

Also this week

I climbed up the Dek van de Stad, a temporary platform built on top of the Nieuwe Kerk. The views were spectacular — a chance to look down on Dam Square and Amsterdam’s rooftops from a height you don’t normally get. Equal parts breathtaking and mildly vertigo-inducing.

Aerial view of Dam Square in Amsterdam, showcasing a busy plaza with numerous people, surrounded by historic buildings under a cloudy sky.
A sign stating a disclaimer about a restoration project, indicating that it has no relation to Taturo Atzu's work titled 'The Garden Which is the Nearest to God.' The sign is set against a backdrop of scaffolding and a brick wall. I have no idea why this sign exists.
I… have questions about this sign
A panoramic view of Amsterdam featuring a mix of historical and modern architecture, with rooftops, trees, and cloudy skies in the background.


And then straight back down to earth (and into chaos) at Paradiso, where I saw Kneecap. Security was tight, the crowd was raucous, and it’s still mad to me that less than two years ago I saw them in what was basically the upstairs of a pub. Now they’ve got a sold-out Paradiso bouncing in unison, two nights in a row. The rise has been meteoric, the energy relentless — right through to the crowd singalong to Come Out Ye Black And Tans after they went off stage.

Consuming

👩🏻‍💻 Internetting

News this week that the UK Department for Business and Trade’s three-month trial of Microsoft Copilot found… no real productivity boost. Emails and meeting summaries sped up a bit, but anything more complex actually slowed people down or spat out lower-quality work. So much for the hype cycle.

Does that reflect a lack of proper strategy and training, or just cold, hard reality? Probably both. In my experience, some people and roles naturally click with AI tools while others flounder when left to get on with it. Curiosity, persistence, confidence — and the time to experiment — all matter. Without those, adoption lags.

There’s clearly a lot we need to do to help people level up with AI at work. But I can’t say I was surprised. My own encounters with Copilot have been… underwhelming. Let’s just say it’s not yet living up to the billing of “revolutionary productivity tool” — more “expensive intern who occasionally remembers to attach the file.”

📺 Watching

Marking 50 years since its release, we re-watched Jaws. Still the ultimate advert for staying on dry land. Half a century on, the special effects remain gloriously ropey, the mayor still deserves a prison sentence for crimes against public safety, and John Williams’ two-note score is still the best thing ever written about imminent death by fish.

It’s amazing how Jaws manages to be both a tense thriller and a camp comedy, depending entirely on how rubbery the shark looks in a given scene. And yet it still works: a masterclass in making you terrified of something that looks like it escaped from a theme park gift shop. Just the thing I need before a holiday that involves boats.

📚 Reading

Continued with The Albanians: A Modern History, but have only got as far as the Ottoman Empire. Hoping to nudge my knowledge closer to the 20th century by the time I get there.

🎧 Listening

Driving around with my brother this week introduced me to Cheekface, an LA indie trio who specialise in anxious brain dumps set to catchy riffs. Imagine Lou Reed or Jonathan Richman talk-singing about late capitalism, social awkwardness and existential dread.

They’re smart, deadpan and gloriously uncool, with songs that turn modern malaise into shout-along anthems. Start with I Only Say I’m Sorry When I’m Wrong Now or Listen to Your Heart. If you like those, welcome to the cult of Cheekface.

Coverage

My Red Hot Opinion Department was working overtime this week.

For Strategic, I looked at the noticeable chill in corporate culture — how empathy has slipped off the agenda, and what that means for leaders trying to engage their people when the mood music is getting distinctly frostier.

And over at Unleash, I turned a jaw-droppingly bad comms experience into something more useful: practical advice on governance, sequencing, and the role internal comms can play in making difficult moments a little less painful.

Connections

Earlier in the week I had a long Teams chat with Cathryn Atkinson, who led the youth journalism project I was involved in as a teenager (which I mentioned back in Weeknote 33 — and which prompted this catch-up). The last time I saw her she had a baby strapped to her in a harness; that baby is now in his late 20s and about to get married. Safe to say we had plenty to catch up on.

I also met with Cai Kjaer, CEO of Swoop Analytics, who was in Amsterdam for meetings. We talked about the looming launch of their Information Overload Calculator, the Viva Engage Benchmarking Report, and the uncomfortable truth that while tech platforms — and now AI — make it easier than ever to publish, people’s bandwidth hasn’t magically expanded to cope. My line on this: internal comms needs to focus on orchestrating flows and making sure messages land safely. Hyper-personalisation will be key, but that comes with its own challenges.

A smiling woman and man posing for a selfie on a staircase with stained glass windows in the background.

Travel

I’m off on an adventure tomorrow — Albania, Kosovo and North Macedonia, all firsts for me and all a little off the usual tourist trail.

Next weekend I’ll be hiking in the gloriously named Accursed Mountains (because why not tempt fate on holiday?), and there’ll be a few boats involved too. Which, having just re-watched Jaws, feels like impeccable planning. So there won’t be a Weeknote 37 — unless I’m writing it from the belly of a shark.

This week in photos

A dimly lit yoga class taking place in a grand, circular room with an ornate organ. Participants are scattered on yoga mats, using wireless headphones and surrounded by glowing candles.
A person with sunglasses posing next to a stone sign indicating an altitude of 1415 meters.
A scenic view from a rocky outcrop overlooking a lush green valley and distant mountains under a partly cloudy sky.
A historic stone tower of a castle set against a clear blue sky, with some greenery at the base.
A panoramic view of a lush green valley surrounded by rolling hills, under a bright blue sky with fluffy white clouds.
A lively Kneecap concert crowd with enthusiastic fans dancing and raising their hands, illuminated by stage lights.
View of a canal in Amsterdam with houseboats lining the banks and a clock tower in the background under a clear blue sky.
A person taking a selfie reflected in a shop window, wearing a white shirt and denim shorts, with a bag slung over their shoulder.

Weeknote 2025/35

/ Sharon O'Dea / Leave a comment
A tranquil view of a canal in Amsterdam, lined with trees and colorful buildings, reflecting in the water under a clear blue sky.
A last blast of summer in the city. Photo by me.

Six years ago tomorrow I packed up my London life into two suitcases and moved to Amsterdam.

In previous years I’ve marked the date by listing lessons: how to get lost (a lot), how to start again, how to build a life from scratch armed with nothing but Google Maps, a bicycle with no brakes, and one magic Dutch ID number that unlocks everything from taxes to library books.

But this year feels different. This year, I feel settled.

I’ve found my gang. I’ve got my groove.

It took a while to get here. The pandemic didn’t help. Two years suspended, the streets quiet, friendships impossible to spark. Loneliness isn’t dramatic; it just seeps in, until you look up and realise the only stranger you’ve spoken to in weeks is the cashier at Albert Heijn. Add the Dutch weather and the joy of navigating Belastingdienst paperwork, and it sometimes felt like a long audition for a very niche endurance sport.

And then, gradually, things shifted. The map filled in with people and places. Now there’s the crew I go to gigs with, shouting lyrics into the night. Local WhatsApp groups that point me to the freshest dahlias or the new season herring hitting the kraam. Gym buddies who somehow make turning up at 8am almost fun. The barista who knows my order before I open my mouth. Dining companions who linger long after the plates are cleared, conversations spiralling into politics and philosophy. A neighbour with my spare keys and another who’ll lend me a sander. Friends who water the plants when I’m away, sending sheepish updates about the ones that didn’t make it. The impromptu neighbourhood borrel that starts with “just one drink” and ends, inevitably, with bikes wobbled home in the rain. The late-night ping of a meme, answered instantly with another. And a friend who says, simply, “Pop by on your way home — I’ll put the kettle on.”

Small things, maybe. But they’re the everyday glue of belonging; the tiny threads that weave a city around you until it feels like home. Things I never really had in London, but here I’ve somehow found.

It turns out that moving countries isn’t really about geography. It’s about patience and persistence, and the slow magic of weaving yourself into the fabric of a place. Until one day you look up and realise the unfamiliar city has become familiar. The strange has become ordinary. And you somehow quietly belong.

I came here with two suitcases. What I’ve gained is a home, and a community.

This week at work

A productive stretch on the book front: we submitted three new chapters, and resubmitted another three we’d reworked to make the flow more logical. Feels good to see the pile growing and the structure sharpening up.

Tiny green shoots are popping up online too — the book quietly sprouting on pre-order pages for the exceptionally keen. A strange but thrilling sight: proof it’s starting to become real.

At work, the same theme of belonging surfaced in conversations with a client about how they use Viva to build connection, and what to do when those bonds fray. It struck me that the process is the same: digital spaces can be where colleagues find their gang and their rhythm. Because belonging at work isn’t really about tools or systems. It’s about that moment when you realise you’re part of something bigger.

Otherwise it’s been a deliberately quiet spell before the next project kicks off. We’ve used the breathing space to wrangle business admin and finally give our website some overdue attention.

Over at Statement, it’s been live for a week now. We’ve got a steadily growing number of people signing up, using it, and (crucially) giving us feedback. The team have been busy fixing things behind the scenes, while I’ve been working on comms to answer questions about how it all works. Early days, but exciting ones.

Also this week

The carillon of the Westerkerk, just across from my house, played a concert of Amsterdam-themed songs on Friday. I’d like to think it was for me personally, but I suppose it’s possible it’s in honour of the city’s 750th birthday. Either way, I was treated to a very Dutch soundtrack, including a rousing rendition of Tulips From Amsterdam. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Tulips From Amsterdam played on the carillon of the Westertoren, filmed from my front window.

Consuming

👩🏻‍💻 Internetting

This week I was struck by Emma Parnell’s piece on living abroad and returning home.  She writes beautifully about the dislocation of overseas life — how it’s not always the big things that unsettle you, but the small absences, like the sound of owls in the morning. And about how moving back, supposedly the “easy” part, can feel just as alien: friendships moved on, milestones missed, the nagging sense you’ve fallen behind.

What I loved most was the ending. Ten years on, she’s not only rooted again but surrounded by people she loves — proof that the feeling of “home” is less about geography and more about connection.

It resonates with my own experience of moving abroad (and back, and abroad again): that moving countries isn’t only about the logistics of visas and flat-hunting, but about patience, persistence, and the slow work of building community until one day you realise you belong. You’re home.

📺 Watching

I finally made it to Amsterdam’s oldest cinema, The Movies, and watched The Roses. Essentially a British remix of the 80s American classic The War of the Roses, but with upgraded swearing. Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman play a couple whose marriage unravels in increasingly petty and chaotic ways. I love both actors, the narrative was charming, and Colman’s wardrobe was iconic.

It’s not winning any prizes, but as a stylish way to pass a couple of hours it does the job. Come for Colman’s shirts, stay for the creative insults. A solid 6/10.

📚 Reading

I’ve just started The Albanians: A Modern History ahead of my holiday there in a couple of weeks. Albania’s a country I know embarrassingly little about, so it’s time to learn my Enver Hoxhas from my Mother Teresas. Looking forward to seeing how what I read on the page stacks up against what I find on the ground.

🎧 Listening

Been on a CMAT tip this week. Big choruses, sharp lyrics, country-pop with a wink. The kind of soundtrack that makes late-summer evenings feel like they’ve got a bit of eyeliner and a sense of humour.

Travel

Off to the Auvergne later this week. Volcanoes, valleys, villages, and the chance to dust off my GCSE-level French.

This week in photos

A group of people practicing yoga in a beautifully decorated church, wearing headphones with blue lights, creating a serene atmosphere.
A cozy Amsterdam canal-side bar illuminated at dusk, with people seated outside and a tree nearby.
Close-up of a hand showing metallic silver nail polish with a red bike in the background on a cobblestone path.
A person wearing sunglasses holds a large bouquet of colorful flowers wrapped in brown paper, standing in front of a reflective window.
A glass of beer sits on a table in a café with a view of a bustling Amsterdam street behind it. People are seen cycling and walking in the background, revealing the lively atmosphere of the city.
A person sitting cross-legged on a mat in a bright room, holding a phone in front of them. The background features large windows and a dark wooden wall.
A scenic view of an Amsterdam canal with boats and people enjoying the waterfront, featuring a tall tower in the background against a clear blue sky.
A bowl containing two oysters, a lemon wedge, a small bowl of red dipping sauce with diced onions, and two small round items, alongside a glass of mint-infused beverage.
Person taking a mirror selfie in a gym setting, wearing a black workout outfit, with a colorful background.

Weeknote 2025/34

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A busy scene on the water during a festival, with various boats and people enjoying the event under a partly cloudy sky.
Sail Amsterdam was chaotic and wonderful. Photo by me.

This was one of those weeks that makes me sound far more impressive than I actually am: shiny award, marathon of book research, and — for reasons that presumably made sense once — launching a social network. From the outside: overachiever. From the inside: mostly caffeine, bad posture, and a browser with 147 tabs open.

Aristotle said excellence is a habit*. Personally, I’ll settle for a week that pinballed between dusty footnotes and the App Store. Hardly the Nicomachean Ethics, but it kept me out of trouble.

* actually he didn’t, it’s misattributed to him, but let’s roll with it.

This week at work

Some weeks crawl by with all the excitement of a damp Weetabix. Then there are weeks like this one: I won a big shiny award and launched a social network — while allegedly “writing a book” in my spare time. IKR? Truly, I contain multitudes (and also have no free evenings).

First up: the intranet we delivered for German energy company SEFE bagged a Step Two Intranet & Digital Workplace Award. This matters because, unlike so many industry awards these aren’t pay-to-win baubles dished out to whoever coughed up for a table at the gala dinner. They actually recognise… excellence. Imagine!

And this project was exactly that. We turned around an entire intranet in 100 days: config, IA, content, training, the lot. In an age where everyone is trying to duct-tape ChatGPT onto their mess and call it strategy, we did the radical thing: used humans. Actual, qualified humans, working with subject matter experts to create content that was both new and correct. Wild, I know. We binned the outdated sludge, rebuilt the lot (in two languages), and put governance in place so it doesn’t immediately rot again. Is it sexy? No. Does it work? Yes. And frankly, that’s what counts.

Bonus humblebrag: between Jon and me, that’s now three Step Two Awards. At this point we may need a bigger shelf.

Meanwhile, I spent much of the week haunting London’s university libraries like some over-caffeinated academic poltergeist. Goldsmiths, my alma mater, has somehow become a library with almost no books. Which feels a bit like opening a pub that’s mainly vibes.

One afternoon I even wandered back to my old haunt: the 5th floor of Senate House, same desk, same view, same faint eau-de-dust. In a world of absolute batshit chaos, it’s oddly reassuring that one corner has politely refused to move on since 1976.

A quiet library aisle filled with tall shelves of books, with a single stool positioned in the middle of the path.
An empty study room with multiple wooden desks, a laptop on one desk, and a black chair with blue wheels. Sunlight is coming through a window.

And because nothing says “healthy work-life balance” like juggling flaming chainsaws, I also launched a whole new social network. The big idea: Instagram and TikTok are increasingly full of shit, so how do you prove something actually happened? Simple. Your bank statement.

Enter Statement: Strava, but for your wallet. You securely connect your bank account, pick a transaction, and share it. It’s a social network powered by proof.

Yes, it’s early days. Yes, it’s missing about nine hundred features we’d like to add. But it looks good, it works, and it’s live in the US app stores. We’ve got a small band of early adopters making Statements and sending us feedback. If you’ve got a US iTunes account, go on, download it. Because nothing says fun like letting your friends know you really did make that 3am drunk eBay purchase.

Screenshot from the Statement app
Screenshot
Screenshot from the Statement app
Screenshot

Also this week

I landed back in Amsterdam just in time for the last couple of days of Sail — the floating festival where hundreds of ships gather on the IJ and the entire city decides to throw a party on the water. It’s meant to happen every five years, but thanks to You-Know-What the last one was cancelled, so this was my first. And honestly, it was magical. We hopped on a boat to get up close, which turned out to be like playing Mario Kart with actual consequences: hundreds of little vessels jostling for space, glasses clinking in the sun, the whole city afloat and slightly tipsy.

As if that wasn’t enough, last night was the Prinsengracht Concert — the annual tradition where a stage is built on the canal by my house and everyone piles into boats to watch. It closes with Aan De Amsterdamse Grachten, sung by hundreds of people swaying and belting it out across the water.

Between the tall ships and the canal choirs, this weekend was Amsterdam at peak Amsterdam: chaotic, beautiful, and just a little bit smug about how lovely it all is.

Consuming

👩🏻‍💻 Internetting

Stumbled across e-mail.wtf this week — a quiz on allowable formats for email addresses. Turns out the answer to “is this valid?” is almost always “yes, unfortunately.” You can have an address that starts with an exclamation mark, or one that’s just a single letter. Fun little distraction, and also a reminder that the internet is basically held together with duct tape and regret.

📺 Watching

Not a thing.

📚 Reading

This week I mainlined close to 100 journal articles. Anything even vaguely relevant from the International Journal of Organisational Analysis, Public Relations Review, Review of Management Literature, and everything in between. Footnotes, citations, abstruse diagrams: give me the lot. And you know what? I loved it. Apparently “spending a week buried in academic journals and calling it fun” is my kink. Maybe a PhD isn’t such a terrible idea after all.

🎧 Listening

News just dropped that Belle and Sebastian are touring next year for their 30th anniversary. And yes, I immediately bagged tickets for both nights. Obviously. Cue me tumbling headfirst into one of my periodic B&S rabbit holes, where I remember all over again that no one does wistful indie quite like them. Some people binge Netflix; I binge flutes and wryly observed teenage melancholy.

And the timing was spot on: I’d just spent the week buried in my old university libraries, right where I used to listen to them on my OG iPod while reading books on media theory. Full circle moment, soundtrack included.

Connections

A week in London meant the rare treat of seeing a bunch of people I’ve not caught up with in yonks. Highlights included coffee with my old colleague Nic Wilson, scheming with my regular co-conspirator and accessibility wizard Lisa Riemers, swapping stories with comms legends Janet Hitchin and Anne-Marie Blake, and a long-overdue reunion with governance guru Steve Way — who I somehow hadn’t seen in a full decade. Proof, if nothing else, that time really does bend in strange ways.

A person smiling while sitting at a table, with two glasses of beer in front and bookshelves in the background.
Lisa Riemers
Three women smiling together for a selfie in front of a modern building during sunset.
With Anne-Marie and Janet
A woman smiling for a selfie with a man, seated outside a pub with a sign that reads 'British Spirits' in the background.
With Steve Way

Coverage

My recent post on whether corporate culture is shifting — and what comms needs to do about it — was picked up by Jenni Field and Chuck Gose on their Frequency podcast. Always nice when your musings escape LinkedIn and make it into other people’s conversations.

Travel

Nothing for two whole weeks! I barely recognise myself. No airports, no 5am alarms, no half-packed suitcase glaring at me from the corner of the room. Just the novelty of staying put — which, frankly, feels almost decadent.

But let’s be honest: it’s the calm before the storm. September has me ricocheting across five countries in two weeks, all while trying to crank out the next three chapters of the book. So I’ll enjoy the rare luxury of my own bed and my own coffee machine while I can… before life turns back into one long game of suitcase Tetris.

Here’s hoping for a quieter week ahead. Though given recent form, I’ll probably accidentally launch a space programme by Thursday.

This week in photos

A person smiling in front of the Goldsmiths University building, wearing sunglasses and earbuds, carrying a large bag.
A spacious library interior featuring several brown leather sofas arranged around coffee tables, with bookshelves lining the walls.
A view of a canal with boats docked along the side and people seated on tiered seating in the background, under a cloudy sky.
Exterior view of the English National Ballet building alongside a modern apartment complex, with a blue sky and clouds in the background.
A dish featuring a portion of deep-fried croquettes, served alongside cubes of cheese and mustard, placed on a wooden table.
A person holds a bouquet of vibrant flowers while standing in a bustling outdoor market, with people and bicycles in the background.