Currying favour with MPs

To prove that I actually do some work, rather than gallivanting around Bangkok attending gallery openings, ballets, swimming galas and lunches at the Oriental Hotel, here's a not untypical exercise I carried out this afternoon in rather more mundane office surroundings...

Although the British Council is an independent organization, it receives a grant each year from the Foreign Office so the new round of public sector cuts affects us too. We're constantly trying to convince government that we're good value for money. Trouble is, many MPs have no idea who we are, what we do and what's the benefit to their constituency. So last year our CEO wrote to them all individually, detailing every single company, organization, university, school, artist etc on their patch who've benefitted from us. I saw an example of the letter he sent out last year and it was actually pretty impressive.

So that's what I've been doing today: talking with colleagues in ten countries and putting together a ton of information on the 200 UK-based artists, galleries, museums, consultants etc who we've helped 'get into' East Asia over the last year, including (importantly) all their postcodes. Next stage is for some poor soul in HQ to sort through all 13 regions, and not just arts but our work across education, science, climate change etc. Then the info goes into 650 individual letters plus a google-map so the MP can see at a glance the local spread. And then our CEO signs the letters. Best not to ask how long all this takes. Of course there was lots of other stuff, but enough already.