Regular meetings day

When I looked back over this blog recently I realised that I had been posting to it since 2009 which seems a long time ago now.  Also that some of the early posts in particular were quick posts about everyday happenings which are quite useful to have a record of to refer back to.  Recently I have posted more lengthy posts about more interesting aspects of managing a service or particular initiatives which others in a similar role might find useful.  However I miss the mundane posts so am going to pick up some of those too.
This week I had a day off on Monday which gave me a longer weekend as I had been to Cambridge.  Yesterday, Tuesday, I spent quite a lot of the day catching up on emails and catching up with the rest of the team.  Then we had the regular supervisors/managers meeting which is myself and the two supervisors and consists of a general chat of what has been happening with the Student Information Points, any meetings or events that have happened or are going to happen and anything that we need to have on the agenda for the team meeting.
The team meeting happens on a Wednesday morning and we open the Student Information Points slightly later to allow for this.  I think team/department meetings are very important and should happen on a regular basis for two main reasons.  Firstly to catch up with what is happening and plan operational stuff for the week ahead - if everyone's there it's easier to circulate the information and get a consensus and saves time.  Secondly, it's a forum and an opportunity for people to raise any issues they have - communication is important but also difficult unless you work at it and create opportunities for it to happen.
Also today I had my fortnightly catch up with my line manager - it's not usually Wednesday, it's usually Friday but gets moved around depending on diaries.  This is my opportunity to let him know what's happening, ask for his advice on some things and ask him to pass up to a higher level some issues that need decisions making.  It's also a chance for him to let me know what's happening at a more strategic level and for us to discuss where and how we want the Student Information Points to develop as part of the Student Experience Project.