In Your Shoes - Chamber Team

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March 2021...a year on from the Chamber team working fully remotely...brings us one of our biggest challenges yet - onboarding six new Chamber colleagues across a wide variety of roles: from Kickstart administration to Chamber customs & e-learning! Hailing from all corners of Angus and Dundee and helping bring so many different experiences & skills to the team - I'm very proud that we're continuing to grow in this way, constantly expanding the support and services on offer to business across our region. Welcome to the team, folks!

Alison Henderson, CEO

George Peacock - Customs Officer

I'm George and the newest member of the DACC team. Started on 8th March so only one Monday to report on so here goes.

Got up and had some breakfast and try to organise the best place for my new laptop. Best for signal, lighting etc. Dining room table was the preferred spot. Got half dressed (pyjamas on the bottom half and casual shirt on top). Only joking!!!

Most of the day was made up of face to face calls with the other team members, just to get a feel of what everyone does in the business, and to put a face to a name.

By the end of the first day my head was spinning with facts, names and job titles and trying to get used to the new concept of working at home. It will get better.

I have enclosed a picture of my current workstation. Please ignore the Balloons, Champagne and Pink table cover. It's my wife's birthday!

Gemma McGregor - Administrative Assistant

Gemma works with Donna the office manager as an administration assistant on the Kickstart scheme project. The kickstart scheme provides funding for young people who are at risk of long-term unemployment.

Gemma recently started working on 3 leaflets related to the Kickstart Scheme. She has been looking through a document with information and has matched the information to the specific leaflet. The leaflet topics are:
1. How the Kickstart Scheme works?
2. Funding
3. Other employment schemes

Simone Steele - International Trade Assistant

Today is my first working day of the week and I start off  by catching up on emails and helping Katie or Vince if needed.

I spend the rest of my day am getting in touch with members as just now we have a new system and have to move everyones details over, I also work on putting up any news articles or events onto our website that might interest people about international trade.

Amber Farquhar - International Trade Assistant

I started working at the Chamber 3 weeks ago, joining the International team. This morning I start with finalising some social media posts for the International Trading course that the International team have been working on. I have been working on this for about a week now on and off which has been a big learning curve as I have never worked with the software or created any kind of advertisement before. I am happy with both how the posts look and what I’ve learned along the way.

By lunchtime, my dog was pestering me to take him for a walk. He always brings your socks to you when it’s time to go! He also likes to take his toy donut with him.

After our walk, myself and another team member were trying to solve an issue where some staff members couldn’t log into a part of the system. I too couldn’t log in but managed to find a solution that worked for me. I spent the rest of the day trying to resolve the issue for other team members however not had much luck so far, that will be tomorrow’s task!

Gemma Blackie - Administration Assistant to Chief Executive Officer

My name is Gemma, I am 21 years old, and I work as Personal Assistant to the Chief Executive Officer. I was employed to the DACC as part of the “Kickstart Scheme”. This is a government led scheme which helps young people who face the risk of long-term unemployment.

Today I started off with a team meeting, where we shared our top tips for working at home and how to make it as comfortable and easy going as possible. After this, I collated 2 sets of individual feedback notes I had taken from a meeting I attended last week. I spilt my coffee, so I got up and went through to the kitchen to get something I could clean it up with, on my return, I soon notice that I no longer have a chair to sit on… my lunch time normally consists of a dog walk, then home for a cup of tea and something to eat. In the afternoon I had a check in with my manager, and met with another one of our team members to introduce ourselves to each other – a nice way to end the week after what had already been a good day ????

Christy Rattray - International Trade Officer

I very recently joined the Chamber and I’ve had a busy few weeks preparing for our upcoming Virtual Trade Missions to Virginia and The Netherlands in May, which is a really exciting role to be a part of with lots of exciting opportunities for businesses in both of these locations.

Being new to the team I’ve been getting to know everyone albeit virtually and via teams which is proving to hate me slightly.. but the team here at DACC have all been very welcoming and lovely! We had a fun time on our Teams call playing Drag Bingo which has been the highlight of 2021 so far since I am a hugeeee fan of RuPaul’s Drag Race and the weekend was spent catching up on the final of that, only to be disappointed that that’s the end of it until another season.

There’s a few of us here at DACC that have signed up for the Cateran Yomp in September so I was out for a 9 mile walk in preparation for this ahead of the 22 mile walk that we’ve signed up for… YIKES!