Exploring New Horizons (aka "Hire Me!")
TL;DR: I’m tired of twiddling my thumbs. I’ve got creds and a LinkedIn profile. Email: hire-me@dougbelshaw.com
I’m looking for new work.
Inspired by Laura James, I’m sharing the somewhat uncomfortable fact that I seem to not be as good at business development as I used to be. Coupled with being a somewhat round peg in a very square hole when it comes to advertised jobs, I’m in a bit of a quandary.
Can you help?
I’ve worked across every sector of education as a teacher, senior leader, and/or consultant. My TEDx Talk has almost 175k views. According to Google Scholar, my doctoral thesis is cited by a new academic paper pretty much every week, and the ebook I created from it is stocked in many university libraries. I’m probably best known for my evangelism of Open Badges across Europe, and I’ve spoken and written about the subject in more places than I can keep track of.
I led Mozilla’s work on creating a web literacy map together with ~100 global stakeholders, working with educators and industry partners. I’ve advised many organisations, for example helping an awarding body as they acquired a start-up. I’ve also run workshops on a range of topics, and have been unexpectedly popular in The Netherlands.
I’ve been a product manager, spending a couple of years at Moodle taking an idea through to building a team and shipping the world’s first decentralised digital commons for educators. Here’s what it looked like. After we left the incubating organisation, the team pivoted it into Bonfire, an an open source toolkit for network societies. I continue to help them with the project, both informally as an advisor and more formally through user research and ways to counter misinformation.
I built a team during the pandemic to prototype ways of helping marginalised people claim Universal Credit remotely for the first time. We presented our findings to the Department of Work and Pensions (twice) and the resulting app won an innovation award.
I’m nine years into a journey with my We Are Open co-op colleagues, with whom I’ve helped develop everything from training programmes, to digital transformation plans, and communication / community strategies. We’ve worked with organisations you may have heard of such as Greenpeace, Sport England, Change.org, MIT, Friends of the Earth, and Creative Commons. The co-op was a part-time gig that we made into a full-time thing. I’d very much like to continue working with them, even if it’s back to being on a part-time basis.
I guess what I’m saying is: there’s no ‘obvious’ next step for me here.
I’m a generalist.
Some people see a job advert and realise that they fit the requirements like a hand entering a velvet glove. That’s not the case for me. Given my range of experience and interests, I’m kinda-qualified for lots of different roles. But they often end up either not being a good fit for me, or I’m not a good fit for them.
With my doctorate, I could go down the academic route — but my publishing history is open and on the web, rather than in journals. With my product management experience, I could pursue senior product roles — but I only have experience, no qualifications. With my background in education, I could advise edtech companies — but so many of them are backed by venture capitalists. With my growing systems thinking knowledge and skills, I could help organisations change systemically — but I haven’t finished my MSc yet.
Here’s what I can do.
In response to the dreaded question “what do you do?” I guess I could respond that I’m a combination of consultant, coach, service designer, project lead, facilitator and researcher. It’s an odd mix, but I like it. I work at the intersection of learning, technology, and community. I’m extremely comfortable with ambiguity, and can think strategically when there’s no clear path forward. I’m good at making decisions, usually by gathering appropriate data and opinions, and through working collaboratively.
I’ve been told that I’m good at generating innovative ideas. I work quickly, keeping up-to-date with the latest technologies (at the moment, I’m investigating local CoT LLMs). I’m cooperative, inclusive, while challenging others to work to the best of their ability. Most importantly, I’m curious. I like to know the why behind what’s happening, blending my philosophical training with an intensely pragmatic way of working. That means that I get stuff done, and help others to get stuff done. Read what kind people have said about me.
Help me find what’s next.
I’m looking for a role that allows me to work remotely in the UK. I’m happy to travel once or twice per month, but I’m not looking to be in an office on a weekly basis. I want something which helps me leave the world better than I found it. As I have super-high standards of myself and others, I’ve been waiting for the right thing to come along. I’ve withdrawn from the application process for more than one position when the answers to the questions I posed didn’t satisfy me. While I’ve got some work on through WAO, it’s not enough, and it’s been like that for a while. I’m aware that it’s not just me who is feeling the economic pressure. But the reason for writing this now is that my runway is shorter than it used to be, and I’ve got to look after my family.
Get in touch!
My career to date has been an unexpected yet fulfilling one. I’m not sure what’s around the corner for me next, but I’m willing to explore all options. If you think you might know of something Doug-shaped, please point me towards it, or we could have a virtual coffee? ☕
Email: hire-me@dougbelshaw.com
Feel free to share my high-level CV or LinkedIn profile. You could also share my work with me page if you think someone is looking for something that’s consultancy-shaped.
Thank you in advance.
Reading this far matters. Your help is very much appreciated 🙏
Image: CC BY-ND Visual Thinkery for WAO