Treasurer of a sheltered housing not-for-profit company,

Treasurer of the local Music Festival, and

Chair of Finance on my local town council.

Not much stereotyping there then… Most of the time this doesn’t impinge upon the “day job” but just recently one has clashed with a vengeance! Question – is this a question Scanning an email and reading the above would you realise someone was asking you a question? With the benefit of hindsight, yes they are but it is missing that one little ingredient that gives one a clue – the b***dy question mark!!! If no one chases a response for nearly six months the presumption is that all is good. Until… Someone unconnected sparks something off that brings this to light and that person is (temporarily, potentially) disadvantaged until the question is sorted. They contact a paid official at the organisation who requests I deal with it. I point out that I am doing the year-end accounts for the organisation (which needs work to a deadline because of auditor visit and that is governed by the date of the AGM and we have had a change of staff at a certain position so there is an unfamiliarity aspect in gathering information) at the moment which is taking up a good amount of my time and I will deal with it when I have time. This quickly escalates when said official and another trustee try and deal with it themselves but realise they do not have the necessary skill set to give an answer. Some other information prepared for a similar (but different) purpose finds its way to an associate of the third party who did or did not ask the original question. This sparks an unrelated question and off we go again! The original (question) is overshadowed by this question and paid official is off on one and I have to drop everything because they are being harangued by the affected individual… But I haven’t got time! So far this week, I’ve an agreed set of accounts to get out with a substantial fee to be raised, I’ve three VAT returns to get finalised, a doctor’s appointment and a visit to my osteopath, not to mention wanting to do a bit of work that should lead to a reasonable ongoing monthly retainer fee and so on. So my quandary – drop everything I am doing to help a paid official of which I am an unpaid trustee or make sure I’ve got enough income in the pipeline to be able to carry on doing said unpaid work in the future? Note question mark this time. We almost have major toys out of pram situation – and that’s just me! What would you have done? Organisation’s year end accounts completed today. Only took 4.5hrs… Add critiquing daughter’s university presentation, writing this blog and attending a meeting of another organisation that gives back to other businesses and you have to wonder how I get to earn any money at all! Just a typical day at the coalface. ]]>