The Unreasonable Man

Technophobe managers face the chop

Robert Jaques, over at vnunet.com, reports on a recent Henley Management College report.

Adapt or die, warns a Henley Management College report, a cull of "old-fashioned" technophobe UK middle management is looming.

The research found that that too many managers have failed to adapt to the dramatic changes brought about by the introduction of technology in today's workplace. Such managers face exposure unless they change their techniques and improve their skills.

The problem has been identified in a report entitled "Managing Tomorrow's Worker" which found that the growing number of flexible workers in the UK has exposed ignorance and resistance among the UK's middle management. Many more organisations now have flexible working policies which mean that managers have to work in different ways in order to effectively manage staff.

The research noted that team working and communications become significantly more difficult for managers with the trend towards flexible working. Flexible working was also found to require significantly more trust on the part of a manager, leading to a shift from the more traditional 'controlling' style.

According to the study, the key organisational advantages of flexible working are staff attraction and retention, improvement in work/life balance, higher productivity, reduction in commuting and lower stress levels, despite people often working longer hours.

Peter Thomson, director of the Future Work Forum at Henley Management College, and author of the report, said: "British management is at a significant crossroads. For years, managers have been used to managing people simply by watching over them."

"With the rise in flexible working, that style will have to change completely or we face the prospect of managers holding back the tide of flexible working, like a modern-day King Canute."

Link: Technophobe managers face the chop - vnunet.com.

Bird flu virus 'close to pandemic'

Expert warns estimate of 7.5m global deaths is optimistic writes Mark Honigsbaum in The Guardian, Thursday May 26, 2005

A leading scientist warned yesterday that the avian flu virus is on the point of mutating into a pandemic disease and says that current estimates that such a pandemic could cause 7.5m deaths may understate the threat. His warnings come as experts writing in today's edition of Nature voice concerns about the world's inability to manufacture sufficient vaccines for a pandemic and warn of the impact that the virus - H5N1 - could have on the global economy.

In an accompanying editorial Nature argues that so far such warnings have "fallen on deaf ears". It backs a call by Prof Osterhaus and his colleagues at the Erasmus Medical Centre, in Rotterdam - one of the world's leading virus research labs - for a global taskforce to strengthen agencies on the ground. There have been 90 human infections in south-east Asia , from which 54 people have died.

But while culling and the vaccination of poultry appears to have slowed outbreaks in Thailand and other parts of south-east Asia, this year Vietnam has seen a worrying number of human infections in the same family groups. According to Prof Osterhaus such clustering could mean the virus is becoming more efficient at infecting humans - a precondition for a pandemic.

Another concern are reports which emerged from China last weekend that H5N1 was responsible for the deaths of 178 migratory geese at a wildfowl reserve in the western province of Qinghai earlier this month. Prof Osterhaus says the geese's deaths could be another indication that the virus is mutating and becoming more virulent.

The problem is that countries such as China and Vietnam are not providing animal and human health officials with enough data, leaving scientists in the dark.

According to the WHO, within a few months of the pandemic 30 million people would need to be hospitalised, and a quarter could be expected to die.

In his Nature commentary, Prof Osterhaus describes current estimates that a pandemic could infect 20% of the world's population and cause 7.5m deaths as "among the more optimistic predictions of how the next pandemic might unfold".

Link: Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Bird flu virus 'close to pandemic'.

Convergence. No such concept error. Abort. Retry. Cancel.

Martin Geddes writing over at Telepocalypse, a weblog I'd not come across before. Important stuff.

I'm presenting to the International Bar Association's Communications and Competition Law conference in Madrid today.

There are around 170 attendees. I'm the only one with a laptop open. This is not my usual crowd. There are no seats near power sockets - zero. But there is the general (and free!) hotel Wi-Fi. All praise the connectivity gods! Oh, and I might be the only person who isn't a lawyer or regulator. As I was invited to come after I'd left home for my holiday, I didn't bring my expensive consultant uniform. But I borrowed a tie from my Dad to make me look less conspicuous, so only my words and ideas should stand out from the crowd.

I'm curious to see how far away from reality the mindspace of this audience is. I'm going to present a short pitch that three of the words they use are in fact intellectually bankrupt, and should be avoided:

Convergence. No such concept error. Abort. Retry. Cancel. Think: displacement, divergence, fragmentation.

VoIP. Nul points. Fatal misunderstanding of what creates value in this new world. Think: Presence, social network integration, identity, transaction integration.

Telecom. Bad news - they're getting a divorce, into Tele (the connectivity) and Com (the application). Good news: Divorce makes for good business for the family lawyers. Bad news: Com was making all the money, but just got replaced by six guys from Estonia armed with laptops. Worse news: Tele was cross-subsidised from Com. Terrible news: Tele is fundamentally impossible to fund from network operation. Need new ownership structure that aligns interests of network users and owners.

From what I'm hearing so far, this Eurotelco world is very different from the US one I'm more familiar with. Different jargon, outlook, structure.

Link: Telepocalypse by Martin Geddes: All bar one.

Don't confuse Examination with Education

GCSE textbooks limit pupils, don't inspire them and insult their intelligence, says Susan Elkin, writing in the Daily Telegraph.

Actually the same is increasingly true for A Level (AS/A2) as well.

Personally I see no obvious connection between Education and Examination whatsoever. I spend much of my time educating students way beyond any formal "specification" and I then narrow down to the syllabus (and believe me, "narrow" is exactly what is involved) in the last few weeks leading up to the exams.

Exams are the pass-key for opportunities by virtue of their role as the "gatekeepers" to Higher Education.

But a tool for Education? I don't think so...

The GCSE system was a miserably thin concept even at its birth in 1988. Seventeen years later, it has been starved of rigour for so long that it is academically anorexic.

Pupils, teachers, examiners, parents - whipped along by self-interested politicians who value votes more than education - are all locked into the same conspiracy. I refer to the wicked pretence that examinations, however flawed, equal education.

Some of the main culprits in this scandalous reductiveness are the new-style, course-matched GCSE textbooks. Often these limited, dull, all-you-need-to-know books are written by "senior examiners, experienced teachers and markers".

That's according to advertising material put out by Heinemann, which publishes English course books for all three GCSE examination boards and books for most other subjects, too. So it's a near monopoly, and the commercial implications are far-reaching. School textbooks sell in tens of thousands, which means big royalty cheques for writers and profits for publishers.

Just think for a moment about that harmless-sounding Heinemann advert and others like it. First, examiners write the syllabus (now called a "specification"). Then they set the exam papers and mark the scripts. And, all too often, they also write books that teach nothing except how to get high grades in the exam in question - hardly educationally disinterested.

Link: Telegraph | Education | Exams = education? Not a hope...

Private pupils do 'hard' A-levels

"Hard" A-level and degree subjects are becoming the preserve of independent school pupils, analysis suggests.

An article published by the Independent Schools Council said independent pupils were getting more A grades in "harder" subjects such as sciences and maths.

This was not because of better teaching but because they accounted for more and more of the entries in those subjects.

The Department for Education has denied some A-levels are harder than others.

The ISC article said research by Prof Peter Tymms of the University of Durham "has provided strong evidence that some A-levels are harder than others".

That study looked at the A-level grades achieved by students who had scored a B grade in their GCSEs.

Those doing history, economics, geography, English language and literature, sociology and business studies went on to score a grade C on average.

In maths, computing, German, French, chemistry, physics and biology the average was a grade D.

The ISC article, by research officer Sam Freedman, said that art was among "the very easiest" subjects.

Art and communications and media studies, design and technology and business studies had seen significant increases in the number of entries by state school pupils between 2000 and 2004.

Among the "hardest" were chemistry, physics, maths, French and German - which had all seen decreases.

In the independent sector the trend had been largely in the opposite direction

Link: BBC NEWS | Education | Private pupils do 'hard' A-levels.

Cambridge seeks harder A-levels

The head of admissions at Cambridge University is advocating compulsory tougher questions for A-level students.

The government plans to include more challenging questions to differentiate between the best students.

Cambridge's Dr Geoff Parks says if these are optional, bright but diffident students might do themselves a disservice by not attempting them.

But he says the real solution to the problem is to implement the Tomlinson plans for a comprehensive diploma.

In a personal presentation prepared for a conference at Brighton College, Dr Parks argues that A-levels should go.

He says changes to A-levels have resulted in greater "accessibility", with students given more opportunities to show their ability and fewer, if any, "sink or swim" questions.

The exams are fairer and have meant higher levels of achievement.

But what has been lost is the opportunity for the most able students to develop and demonstrate originality, creativity, insight, clarity of thought and analysis, extended arguments and problem-solving.

Also lost: the ability to differentiate the exceptional students from the good.

These are all things universities want from the qualifications, he says.

His proposed solution is simple: "Implement the Tomlinson reforms in full."

[...]

Dr Parks says that if A-levels "have to stay", the Advanced Extension Award should be taken by all - replacing the existing "synoptic" unit, ranging across the subject, which everyone has to do.

Otherwise, he has said, "bright kids from less good schools" might lack the confidence to tackle them.

Students would get a letter grade for their overall achievement, plus a numerical grade to show how well they had done on this extension component.

The very best should therefore get A1. The "unconventional but brilliant" might get B1 while the "moderately talented slogger" might get A4.

Link: BBC NEWS | Education | Cambridge seeks harder A-levels.

What are they thinking on schools?

A nice piece from the BBCs Mike Baker.

Today we are going to play the manifesto game. Your starter for 10: identify the political party which made the following promises:

1. "We will allow churches and other faith communities, groups of parents, charitable foundations and companies to set up new schools."

2. "We will give parents the right to call for a special Ofsted inspection if they fear their child's school is failing. If the inspectors confirm their view, the school's management will have to be changed."

OK, your time is up. Hands up all of you who said this was the Labour Party manifesto in 2005. Right, you can all go to the back of the class.

The correct answer is: the Conservative Party manifesto of 2001.

Parent power

However, those who thought it was Labour's promises this time round were not far wrong. Let's see how their latest manifesto commitments compare with the five-year-old Tory plans:

1. "Where new educational providers can help boost standards and opportunities in a locality we will welcome them into the state system."

2. "Ofsted will be given new powers to respond to parental complaints and where necessary to close failing schools or replace failing management."

They are, in short, remarkably similar.

Perhaps we should not be too surprised. In 2001 the Conservative theme was "power to parents" in the form of a Parents' Guarantee. During this election, the mantra of the Education Secretary, Ruth Kelly, has also been "parent power".

Recent development

So where have these policies come from? Has Ofsted been pressing for the power to respond to parental complaints and to be appointed both judge and executioner of failing schools? There is no evidence of that.

And when was the new policy thought up? Last summer, when the government published its Five Year Strategy, there was no hint of Ofsted being empowered to close failing schools.

So why does the government want to change the current system where Ofsted identifies failing schools and LEAs (local education authorities) decide whether to close them?

Are ministers frustrated that LEAs are shutting their eyes to the Ofsted evidence?

If so, on what evidence? Recent analysis suggests that failing schools are being closed at the rate of almost one a week.

Privatisation?

So what is behind this new policy? Some in local government believe it is all about creating more openings for private companies to run state-funded schools.

Link: BBC NEWS | Education | What are they thinking on schools?.

Online exam clicks with students

Thousands of teenagers in England have taken online Sats tests in ICT for the first time.

They are guinea pigs for a national test which will become compulsory for 13 and 14-year-olds in 2008.

The trial is being run in more than 500 schools by the exams and curriculum watchdog, the QCA.

The organisation says it is the first time a national test has been sat online anywhere in the world.

Pupils at Chesham Park Community College in Chesham, Buckinghamshire, were among the first guinea pigs.

The 13 and 14-year-olds recently sat two, 50-minute tests which were delivered entirely online.

The tests are marked by computers. They are double-checked by humans but Karl, 13, found the idea rather un-nerving.

"I find that aspect a bit worrying - like computers are taking over the world," he said.

'Less stressful'

As for the tests themselves, pupils were happy to award them a good mark, saying they were fun, interesting, clear and more easy to understand than written tests.

Because they are typically taken in an ICT room, not a big exam hall, they also found them less stressful than other tests.

"It was not as hard as other tests, because you were not constantly writing, and there was more explanation than with some of the others," said Karl.

The tests are set in a virtual world, with specially-designed software, not standard programs used in many schools.

When they log in, children see a number of graphical icons for such things as e-mail, spreadsheets, the internet and presentations.

Link: BBC NEWS | Education | Online exam clicks with students.

Westminster aims for Wi-Fi everywhere

Westminster Council's Wireless City project received a boost today when BT announced that it would be providing the network infrastructure for the initiative.

The project seeks to integrate Wi-Fi technology into all areas of the council's responsibilities, providing access for remote workers, linking CCTV and microphones to council headquarters and providing hotspots for consumers.

Link: Westminster aims for Wi-Fi everywhere - vnunet.com.

Everything Emergent is Good for You

Steven Johnson was talking at Demos this evening.

He was using an Apple PowerBook. So were all the Bloggers in the audience...

Also interesting to note that he was using Keynote rather than PowerPoint.

Since he was talking around all his books he thought he'd title it "Everything Emergent is Good for You"

Everything from here on in is pretty much in Note Form - I'll endeavour to tidy it up later... probably...

Steve's real theme was the move from Print to WebLogs.

What we've lost:
* Sustained Argument
* Quality
* Consensus
* Authority

What we've gained:
* Responsiveness
* Context
* Participation
* Collateral Problem Solving

In the early days of the Internet people figured out that they needed all this stuff organised. People figured they needed to find a bunch of Librarians to figure out what's important on the Web... Err, or maybe they could just use Google's PageRank...

This is democracy. Google effectively "outsourced" the Librarian function to everyone who uses the Web. This sort of Democracy is on the rise. Wikipedia is a very interesting example. Wikipedia's material on the 2004 Tsunami was incredibly Timely.

Part of the strength here is the level of Participation.

Why do people contribute? Well, People are very comfortable with the "Gift Economy". There is this Myth of the "Slacker Mind", but the evidence is that people are happy to seek out intellectual engagement. And you don't need many people to be engaged if the numbers are big enough. 1% may be enough.

Context Matters
* Print Thinking is Linear
* Web Thinking is about Connections

An interesting aside:Emergent behaviour only really works when you can see who is pointing to any particular page on the Web. This sort of analysis is done partiularly well by Technorati.

The Key Ingredients for all this to work are:
* Volume (= lots of users...)
* Technical Literacy
* Standardised Vocab

There is now sufficient information out there to find out everythhing there is to know about:
* People - Who
* Products - What
* Events - When
* Places - Where
* Policy - Why
* Procedures - How

Local Knowledge matters - and makes a difference.
* Check out New York 311
* Note that Local Interest leads to Global Perspective
* Geo-Tagging is becoming increasingly important.
* "My Neighborhood Statistics"

http://www.stevenberlinjohnson.com

Questions
* Free is important: Free as in "Speech" rather than "Beer"
* Skimming allows people to focus in on what we really want to know.
* Paul Miller, from Demos, asked about the future of Education...
* Chris Yapp from Microsoft asked how Einstein might have coped with a Blogging culture.
* Steve talked about the power of WebLoggers to come up with tools
that fix problems on the Web. eg: NoFollow, GoogleShare or the Lazy Web.
* Is the Web World diverging from the Real World? How should we deal with that?
* Does the Web leave enough time to do anything Real?
* Do Web tools encourage Peer to Peer grouping and thus allow people to disengage from the wider Society.
* Frank Geary from The Poetry Society. Can the Web help with Literacy?

And finally, from Steve Johnson:

Are we both more connected and more narrow than we've ever been.

Conclusion:

Can we find 1% in the Education Sector that can make a difference in terms of Public Benefit... We need to look at the Gift Economy.