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As we kick off the new year, Derek Allen considers how we will be remembered. Often, at this time of year, we reflect on the past as well as looking to the future and the forthcoming new year. I was very lucky recently to go to the O2 Arena, in south-east London, to see Paul McCartney, the legendary ex-Beatle, live in concert. When he ran through his repertoire of the past four decades I thought, Wow! This guy will be remembered for year and years. I guess, if we look at the much smaller role we have played in our own work and personal life, it is worth thinking about what we might be remembered for, what our contribution has been, and whether we have, in some small or big way, made any sort of difference. Perhaps, more importantly, we might all want to know what we would like to be remembered for. The Swede, Alfred Nobel, who was a pacifist at heart and an inventor by nature, introduced dynamite to the world. In 1888, when Alfred's brother Ludvig died, a French newspaper mistakenly ran an obituary for Alfred which called him the ‘merchant of death'. Not wanting to go down in history with such a horrible epitaph, Alfred created a will which soon shocked his relatives and established the now-famous Nobel Prizes. I have seen many local politicians and senior managers in my 30-plus years in local government trying to create something which is in better shape when they leave than when they started. Ranging, for example, from much better-quality social housing and crucial transport infrastructure to smaller innovations, such as keeping a local street clean or a park open and accessible for families. The reality for most of us is that the best we can hope for, apart from perhaps what our own children achieve as the future generation, is to pass the baton on to our successors, and ensure as far as we can that the baton is in relatively good shape and the offspring do not drop it. So, at a time of reflection, spend a few minutes thinking about what you would like to be remembered for, and if you are a fair few miles away from that, think in 2010 how you might just get a bit closer to achieving your legacy. As the saying goes, no-one on their death bed ever said, I should have spent more time in the office! For me, I think I should have continued in my college band and just might have been at the O2 actually playing to the audience, rather than being part of it. As the famous line goes in the Pogues/Kirsty McColl song Fairy Tale In New York... ‘I could have been someone', [and she replies:] ‘Well, so could anyone!' On that note, I had better get busy for 2010 and start practising on my guitar playing... again! Derek Allen is executive director at LACORS

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WHITEHALL

What's your legacy?

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