Year of anniversaries

In my older sister’s family, 2008 will see a 50th and a 21st birthday as well as 25th wedding anniversary.

I prefer retrospectives to resolutions (typical historian), so here are some of my anniversaries this year. Ten years ago, I set out on the journey from corporate communicator to communications skills trainer that has also led to me being here. I’m now approaching my fifth anniversary as a university lecturer.

I’ve been a member of the now CIPR for ten years. This used to bring an automatic fellowship (FCIPR) – in our professionalising age, these are no longer handed out for so little merit. Instead, I will either have to become a jolly good comittee fellow or sign up for CPD.

Twenty years ago I was shuttling across the Atlantic as a writer on business technology. I recall attending two very different trade shows in the Las Vegas heat: one majored on typewriters (explanation for digital natives), the other a few months later was the world’s showcase for the emergent personal computer industry. At the time, I thought it inevitable that Japan would overtake America – as it has in cars and photocopiers – in the forefront of the PC business. You see why I don’t do predictions?