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As I write this blog I am lying on the bed in my room at the Great Northern Hotel at Kings Cross in London.

The room is tiny but it’s great. It overlooks the Kings Cross station and is really quiet and comfortable.

It’s the night before the ITI congress in London and my mind has gone back to the ITI congress in 2011 in Liverpool.

At that congress, I was on the leadership team of the ITI and the Communications Officer for the UK and Ireland ITI section which meant there was much to do at the ITI congress for which I had been part of the Scientific Programme Committee.

I had been given the opportunity to run a parallel session for the dental team which was a whole day mini conference for dental team members which was quite successful in 2011 (although I think it lost a lot of money). We also had a leadership team meeting which involved meeting with Danny Buser and some of the high-level guys from the world wide ITI about finances and various things that I had little understanding of.

When I checked into my hotel in Liverpool I was already registered on the congress and my congress laminate was on my pillow with all the fancy colours on it to say that I had ‘access all areas’. Marie had done me a schedule which I carried with me that told me where I had to be, hour after hour for the whole of the three days.

It was mental.

It was a wonderful experience to do that, I got to go to the speaker’s dinner at a fancy restaurant, walk around Tate Modern with Danny Buser as he complained about his knees and the ‘crap art’ but never really got to see any of my friends that had come to the conference.

My team came up the next day for the team day and I was exhausted and went to bed early, I arrived home the usual ‘chewed bit of string’ after a conference where I had done too much, drunk too much and not looked after myself.

This time, at the Great Northern Hotel it’s totally different.

No one has registered for me and no one has a schedule for me because the pre-registration, the fancy room and the fancy schedule was for the position not for the person.

It’s always worth remembering that the ‘perks’ that go with these positions are attached to the position, you don’t keep them when you’re not in the position anymore.

So, here I am in my room. ‘I am nobody when the door closes’ as my father in law used to say, but my bike is with me for cycling in the morning and I can pretty much run my own agenda.

There is beauty in simplicity and anonymity that people all too often forget.

Blog post number: 1630