Plans for 2012

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2012 is shaping up to be an interesting year for me. So I thought I’d take the time to sit down and note down some of what I’m planning to do. It’ll help me solidify my plans as well as give me something I can look at this time next year to see how well I’ve done.

Looking Back

2012 is looking to be a pretty big year for me, but it’s built upon a foundation. 2011 was a rather significant year too. First and foremost I graduated from my degree with a First Class Honours, the highest grade you can get.

During my time on the degree I developed ReferenceIt, a web application which makes referencing easier and better for students. With next to no promotion it’s now got a userbase in five continents. This is something I’m quite proud of.

Having graduated from Interactive Multimedia Design, I was also fortunate enough to find employment with Fresh Made Media. This is something I am rather proud of during these troublesome economic times.

I have since returned to education where I am working on several projects, individually and with my partner in crime Kyle Gawley. Some of these have already seen some basic use, but they will really come into their own in the next year.

Looking Forward

So I’ve been busy this year, working on projects and working with a studio for clients. So what plans do I have for 2012? Quite a few. First and foremost is to push forward with my web applications. This will help me get my products out there, and get them used. It will also have a secondary benefit.

It is my intent to work towards setting up a business, along with Kyle, that specialises in creating software for people to use. Tools like ReferenceIt and Vizuali are a small part of what we seek to do, but they are a starting point.

I also intend to spend more time writing. I’ve spent a significant amount of time reading and digesting information, but very little of it has been spent sharing with, or giving back to, the community that I love being a part of. 2012 will hopefully see a change in this.

Education

This year has also seen me placed in a position that I hadn’t seen myself ever being in. I’ve been working for the University of Ulster as a Studies Advisor for first years of the degree I just graduated from. Whilst unexpected, I’ve really enjoyed the experience.

I’m not certain what the future will bring on this front, but I’ve enjoyed helping people that care about what they’re doing. I’d like to explore taking this further, be it in an official capacity, or by adding more to my own site for others to refer to.

Working with people that care about what they do, it seems, is enjoyable be it in the workplace or in an educational capacity. It’s also been quite awesome to see that the class that I’ve been helping has more logs online than any other year.

Professional

I’ve touched upon this briefly above, but I want to outline things in a more definitive fashion. There is a lot that I would like to see happen in the coming year in a professional capacity.

First is that I want to push my current projects further. This could be improving ReferenceIt, but I feel that it will consist much more of developing other projects further. There’s no point in working on a project if it’s never launched.

I will also hopefully be taking some initial steps towards setting up something resembling a business with Kyle. The work we are doing, collaborativly and individually, is work we care about. It’s also work in the same field. We both know we can do better work together than individually.

In the comming year it is also my intent to network more. People that know me believe me to be a socialble person, but I struggle with initial communication with people. This is something that probably hampers me, and that I hope to better deal with in the coming year.

As a part of this I want to stop just absorbing information, and start giving back. Whilst this will largely be via my portfolio and twitter, I would also like to start talking at events such as Barcamp Belfast and at smaller events.

Starting with such events will let me share what I know in a not-entirely-overwhelming environment. I seem to be, based on feedback from my fellows on the Masters, quite good at presenting, which should help in this.

Personal

In my personal life there are a few things that I would also like to change. Probably the most important of these is to strike a better balance between my professional and my personal lives. I love what I do, but sometimes I spend too much time doing it, at the expense of other things.

I have been fortunate in recent years that I have been able to spend a decent amount of time travelling. This is something I would like to continue doing, but I would consider travelling slightly more, and to different locations. We’ll see how that goes.

Exercise is something which is sadly lacking in my day to day schedule. This is something that needs to change. I do try to walk as much as possible, taking longer routes to get to University each day, but there is definite room for improvement.

Reading is another area in which I hope to diversify. A lot of my day is spent reading web-related material. In 2012 I would like to spend more time reading novels, and giving myself time to relax and get away from the more work related topics I typically read.

Nit Picky Things

There’s one other thing I would really like to see happen in 2012. If you follow me online I hope you will have noticed that I’m trying to brand myself using my name, David Turner. There is one notable exception to this, twitter.

Unfortunately my name isn’t available on twitter and instead sits inactive, and has done for over two years now. It’d be really nice if I could get my hands on the account, to help bring my branding more inline with my name.

Finishing Up

2011 has been an important year for me. It’s formed a solid foundation for my future, and has helped me to identify what I would like to do with my future. I’m pretty confident that I can achieve some of these goals with realtive ease, but others will be more troublesome.

I look forward to seeing how well I do over the coming year.