48h in Madrid
I had two reasons to visit Madrid. Its Spain’s capital and BA fly a long haul plane once a day (or did). I booked LHR to MAD on BA’s 777 service, when booking you have to assume the plane may get switched back to a regular A320. We arrived in Madrid and took a taxi […]
48h in Rome
I had never been to Rome, our house was undergoing renovation, so we decided to spend the weekend in Rome! We departed LHR as a family and had booked a family room in ibis styles. As we arrived late we booked a taxi to take us to the hotel. We aimed to see; Rome ColosseumRoman […]
36h in Dubai a travel guide.
I regularly work in India, and usually if i”m there for a weekend, I spend time with my colleagues outside of work. I don’t like to impose, so if people have plans I like to ensure they don’t change those plans on my account. This one weekend, all my team had plans, I’d visited almost […]
36h in New York
My wife deserved a break, she had been full on with our youngest for several years and I wanted to take her away. I was told I was allowed to plan something for just 1 night, so was planning to make the most of it. We left early morning and started celebrating in the lounge […]
Kos Adventure
In 2019 we visited Kos, we were looking for a 2bed room all inclusive package deal. We stayed at Kiprioti Panorama Aqualand and had a really good time. The hotel had a waterpark which was separate from the main pool. Entertainment was very family friendly and we had a great time. We did one excursion […]
36h in Lisbon
Having transited in Lisbon I really wanted to explore the city, and having a weekend spare, we fly out on a Friday to return Saturday evening! We flew from London to Lisbon, exited the airport and then walked across to the metro. which was metres away from the exit. You can buy a 24h/28h transit […]
A week in Iceland Feb 2022
Having booked this previously in 2021 but due to covid had to be rescheduled. We rebooked for Feb half term 2022. We based ourselves near Laugarvatn in the golden circle so that we could drive to the places we wanted to visit, having been before, we decided to find a budget friendly chalet in the […]
Mini Break and Holiday Adventures
In my spare time I like to explore and see different places, some to just wind down, others for culture, discovery and fun! Here’s some of my adventures Young Family adventures Iceland 2022 Norfolk Broads 12 hours in 12h in Agra, India (in one day) 36 hours in I’m a believer that you can cram […]
With increasing airline costs, will charter flights in 2023 be a luxury tour operators may not be able to afford?
Background; When a tour operator starts up, they will usually rely on ad-hoc flight seat purchase, but with variable pricing this soon introduces costs outside of their control which could limit the sale of their products. To overcome this a tour operator usually negotiates group rates with an airline to agree an amount of seats […]
Onboarding materials
When a new member starts, I find it good to provide some 3rd party training material so we can ensure we’re all at the same level. Udemy provides a great cost effective source for video led materials.I use this in addition to our own LMS materials (confidential!) to ensure there’ s a common business understanding. […]
Software
Software needs to be well built and perform well. For many projects Enterprise Architecture/Applications (EA) is desired. EA can mean different things to different businesses. To me EA represents, scalable, modular, fit for purpose software which follows best practise to deliver stable and efficient execution. EA requires good object orientated (OO) design principles, such as […]
Building an off-shore team.
Off-shore development can be a difficult one to get right, but accomplished well it can deliver real benefits. Having established a team from 1 to over 150 members, here’s some of my pointers and advice. Recommendations for building a successful off-shore working model. Start with your current business. Although Covid was a difficult time, it […]