September is always a quiet month for transcription. Instead of taking the time to enjoy the breathing space, catch up on the filing, tidy the desk, we start to panic that nobody loves us any more and that we'll never do another bit of transcription again. Luckily that didn't happen and in no time at all we were back to full on. Laura was off in Cyprus for her sister Ashling's wedding. They had an amazing time and here's a couple of the gorgeous photos from such a happy event.
You may remember me telling you that Jen Lannagan was helping us with the administration since Lesley moved on. Well, as you've probably heard by now, Jen is now undertaking the role on a permanent basis - and we couldn't be more delighted to have her as part of the team. She works with us Monday-Thursday 9am-5pm and on Fridays until 12. We've known Jen a long time, she has transcribed with us for over five years and is a great person to have on board. She lives not too far away from me so will be on hand to cover if we're away. She's also very good at bringing me hot chocolate when we get together :)
October kicked off big style! The work was flooding in and we were all hands on deck to make sure that the workflow process didn't get gummed up. As usual you all stepped up to the plate and took on as much work as you could manage and we transcribed 28,019 minutes!
Mark, the family and I took a week off to go and visit Mark's brother in Spain. We had a fantastic time, with great weather and food and the kids really enjoyed spending time with their aunt and uncle. (Yes, I am officially the smallest member of the family).
Emily came and stayed in the house to look after Bo while we were away and had to deal with the postman too (he literally threw the mail at me today). It was great to have an extra pair of hands transcribing for the week and she was certainly kept busy.
November has been a great month for clearing the feet. I have a list of things I need to do before the end of the year as long as my arm (maybe not that long looking at the photo) so I made the decision to book Jen, Jackie and Claire to cover the QC full-time up until Christmas. It's been a long time since I've had the opportunity to work on the business rather than in it and it's great to be able to put some of the ideas that have been on the back burner into practice. I always feel better when the admin is all up to date too. Just need to deal with that pile of filing...
December is already shaping up to be a busy month. Having submitted a PQQ for a tender just before I went on holiday, we heard at the beginning of November that we'd been shortlisted. We're delighted to have an opportunity to bid and it's going to make the run up to Christmas very challenging! Luckily we have some expert help on board in the form of Julie Caughey, a specialist in tender writing. She's keeping me calm - so far there haven't been any tears - and we seem to be making progress. It's giving me a chance to look at stats - which I love. Do you know that, as of the end of November, we've transcribed 250,256 minutes this year! That's a whopping 4,170 hours of recording.
I've also badgered [my] Mark for weeks to get our new public website up and running and it's nearly ready! Final read through of the text and we should be good to launch within the next couple of days. We're also in the final stages of testing our client website too. It's fantastic! You're going to love it! Not quite at the stage where I can give you an exact launch date, but I've set myself the target of the beginning of 2015.
Laura and Daniel are coming over next week and it's going to be fantastic to see them. As well as spending some time with Jen to do some staff training, we're also taking the opportunity to have a staff Christmas lunch. It's going to be lovely to all be together - I wish you could all be there!
Laura is going to be in touch with you shortly regarding your plans for work over the Christmas holiday period. The office will be closing at the end of the 23rd December until the 5th January but, as in past years, we plan to allocate all the work for completion during that time. You can let Laura know your availability to help her plan accordingly.
Just wanted to welcome Jane and Anita to the transcription team - another couple of fantastic transcriptionists who we're lucky to have on board.
Right, is that enough do you think? Another blog in January, I promise.
Take care
Dawn xx
