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Sunday, July 30, 2006
INTERESTING LISTENING
Here's a podcast with Michael Schrage, of the MIT Media Lab, on the subject of education and technology. I've only listened to about a third of it so far, but it's pretty interesting, as Schrage's stuff usually is (see my earlier post excerpting some of his work here.)
7:46 AM
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
RERUN SEASON
I'm not sure whether or not I'll have Internet access for the next couple of days, so here are some old posts that I think are worthwhile reading.
CRITICS AND DOERS
(Originally posted 1/3/04)
A newcaster was on TV asking the question: "Have security officials over-reacted?" in reference to the delay of several international flights on suspicion of terrorist activity.
Of course, if a terror event had occurred, this same person would have been asking: "Have security officials been too slow to react?"
It strikes me that America today contains large numbers of people whose job is not to take actions or make decisions themselves, but to recommend, analyze, and critique the actions of others.
Within limits, this is fine. Every organization, and every nation, needs a few people whose role is to stand outside, to analyze, and to criticize. But we now have very large numbers of such people--journalists, consultants, professors (outside of the hard sciences), "analysts" of all descriptions. There are now so many of these "watchers," and they have in many cases become so arrogant, that they believe that their specialized and limited view of the world (a view focused on analysis rather than action) is the only acceptable one.
It seems to me that increasingly the cultural and political fault line in America is this: one the one hand, those people who must actually do things--usually under time constraints, almost always with incomplete information, and generally with at least some responsibility for the outcome--and, on the other, those people whose job is to analyze, recommend, and criticize--usually without time pressures and generally without any responsibility for outcomes.
BOOK REVIEW: On The Rails: A Woman's Journey
Linda Niemann
Rating: 5 Stars
(previously published under the title Boomer: Railroad Memoirs)
(Originally posted 10/30/05)
What happens when a PhD in English, a woman, takes a job with the railroad? Linda Niemann tells the story based on her own experiences. It's a remarkable document--a book that "is about railroading the way 'Moby Dick' is about whaling", according to a Chicago Sun-Times reviewer. (Although I think a better Melville comparison would be with "White Jacket", Melville's book about his experiences as a crewman on an American sailing warship. Which is still very high praise.)
Niemann had gotten a PhD and a divorce simultaneously, and her life was on a downhill slide. "The fancy academic job never materialized," and she was living in a shack in the mountains and hanging around with strippers, poets, musicians, and drug dealers. Then she saw the employment ad for the Southern Pacific railroad.
When I saw the ad in the Sunday paper--BRAKEMEN WANTED--I saw it as a chance to clean up my act and get away. In a strategy of extreme imitation, I felt that by doing work this dangerous, I would have to make a decision to live, to protect myself. I would have to choose to stay alive every day, to hang on to the side of those freightcars for dear life. Nine thousand tons moving at sixty miles an hour into the fearful night. (continued)
DECISION-MAKING IN ORGANIZATIONS
(Originally posted 9/12/04)
When a decision is made in an organizational context (as opposed to a decision by an entirely autonomous individual), additional layers of complexity and emotion come into play. The person who must make the decision is often not the person who has the information/expertise on which the decision must be based. Indeed, the information and expertise are often distributed across multiple individuals. These individuals may have their own objectives and motivations, which may differ from the objectives and motivations of the formal decision-maker, and which may conflict with each other. And the making of the decision may alter power relationships within the organization, as well as influencing the phenomena about which the decision is ostensibly being made.
The above factors are illustrated with crystalline clarity in the story of a seemingly very simple decision, which had to be made onboard a U.S. Navy destroyer sometime during the 1950s. (continued)
9:23 PM
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
JUST UNBELIEVABLE
There's a rather hackneyed saying to the effect that "Anyone who is not a liberal before the age of 30 has no heart. Anyone who is not a conservative after the age of 30 has no head." (Often attributed to Winston Churchill, but I believe it may have originated with Clemenceau.) Many of today's "progressives," however, seem to be missing the attributes of both heart and head.
Here are some examples of recent "progressive" behavior which seems to me to be missing the attributes of heart, head, or both:
The leader of the Dutch Socialist Party compares the Dutch resistance to the Nazis during WWII with the terrorists who are now killing Israelis--and killing American soldiers in Iraq. He doesn't seem to think there is much difference.
A very similar argument is made in a post on The Daily Kos, a website whose readers are much courted by many leaders of the American Democratic Party.
A Nobel peace laureate says she would like to kill George W Bush.
The Anchoress reports that her two sons were called "haters" when ordering dinner in a restaurant while wearing their Boy Scout uniforms. No doubt the perpetrator of this verbal assault considered himself a "progressive."
Feel the love.
5:59 PM
Saturday, July 22, 2006
SMART!
The Cracker Barrel restaurant chain is renting out audio books. You can rent the recording in one restaurant and return it at another. Rental price is something like $3.50/week.
I noticed an airport bookstore chain doing something similar, but I don't think that attempt is likely to be very successful. There are too many different air routes for critical mass to be easily established--unless the chain establishes a very high penetration across America's airports, there is little chance that you will be at an airport at which you can return the book when you want to. And even if you are at an airport that where the chain has a presence, it may be in a different terminal, or you may be in too much of a hurry to take time for returning books.
For an Interstate-highway-based restaurant chain like Cracker Barrel, however, a lending-library approach makes perfect sense. I would think it could bring about a meaningful increase in market share among travellers.
I doubt that I'd ever take advantage of this service myself; I'm not a big audio book fan--I'd rather talk with others in the car, or listen to music, or just drive and enjoy the scenery. But lots of people do seem to like them.
10:27 PM
QUICK UPDATE
I'm at a cabin in the Grand Tetons, WY. There is no TV and there are no phones in the rooms, and also no cell services...but, remarkably, there is an Ethernet jack in the wall!
The Billings Gazette, which I picked up in Sheridan on Wednesday, had a couple of items I thought might be of interest:
Peabody Energy, a large coal company, and Rentech, a company specializing in energy conversion processes, are evaluating sites in the Midwest and Montana for plants using the Fischer-Tropsch process to convert coal into diesel and jet fuel. The plants would range in size from 10,000 to 30,000 barrels of fuel per day. Montana governor Brian Schweitzer has been a strong advocate of coal-to-liquids technology. The economic and environmental viability of coal-to-liquids is a subject of enormous importance, which I will research and write more about at a later time.
There's an item on the high school curriculum in Casper, WY. I don't know what to make of this sentence--"But, earlier this month, the Wyoming Success Curriculum Task Force recommended instead that teachers and their methods be certified instead of requiring that students take specific courses." Surely this doesn't mean what it sounds like it means. In any event the article goes on the quote an Education Department official as saying "You're never going to be asked on the job to read Shakespeare." She goes on to say that courses should emphasize "rigor, relevance, and relationships," making sure that course materials are relevant to students' daily lives.
I'm afraid this kind of thinking is far too common, and not only in Wyoming. It should be obvious to the dullest of minds that skills are transferrable--that one might learn skills from reading Shakespeare that are useful in other contexts. As I've noted before, the well-known management consultant Michael Hammer has argued that the study of liberal arts is excellent training for future executives--and I feel confident that Mike Hammer knows far more about what goes on in actual corporations than does the typical education department official. But more importantly, education should not be only about job skills, as important as those are. People are not just employees, they are individuals, citizens, and parents. The idea that course materials should be relevant to students' daily lives is wrong: most people are already interested in their daily lives, and need to develop stronger interests in the world around them.
UPDATE: Re the idea of "making sure that course materials are relevant to students' daily lives," see this post.
8:34 AM
Thursday, July 20, 2006
THE MIDEAST CRISIS
The Rev John Krenson offers an interesting analysis of Israel's self-defense activities in the context of Just War doctrine.
Ever wonder what kind of people attend anti-Israel rallies in the United States? Pamela has pictures.
10:09 PM
JULY 20, 1969
On this date, American astronauts first set foot on the moon.
Thanks to Winds of Change for the reminder.
10:04 PM
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
QUICK UPDATE
I'm at the motel next to the State Game Lodge, in Custer State Park, SD. There is indeed a lot of game around here--saw a few buffalo this afternoon, and a herd of more than a dozen this evening around sunset. Also lots of pronghorn antelope, and a town of prairie dogs.
There's Internet service here, but only in the lobby and bar, so I'll keep it to a couple of short items.
A man from Kabul spent a year creating a gift intended as a "thank you" to President Bush for liberating Afghanistan. Read this very touching story here.
An interesting post at Reflecting Light on the current situation in the Middle East.
9:13 PM
Sunday, July 16, 2006
JUST UNBELIEVABLE
Via LGF: "Speaking on the television program This Week, George Stephanopoulos and Cokie Roberts just parroted Larry Johnson’s utterly false claim that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert had “no military service. No one challenged them."
Read more about Johnson's statement here.
Olmert's official bio is easily available on the Internet, and includes the following:
November 1963 – Began his military service in the 13th Regiment, Golani Brigade. During his service he suffered injuries to a leg and an arm, which required prolonged medical treatment.
The statements made on This Week represent an unbelievable level of irresponsibility, equating to what must be a complete breakdown of quality control at this network. This isn't analogous to an auto company shipping cars with doors that don't close properly--it's analogous to an auto company shipping cars with no engines installed.
3:58 PM
Saturday, July 15, 2006
THE B-SCHOOL DEBATE
Last year, Harvard Business Review carried an article by Warren Bennis and James O'Toole, suggesting that there are major deficiencies in the typical business school approrach to management education. A similar message was delivered in the book Managers Not MBAs, by Henry Mintzberg of McGill University. Bennis, O'Toole, and Mintzberg are all highly respected figures in the field of management studies.
Comes now Glenn Hubbard, dean of the Columbia Business School and previously chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, to defend the business schools against these criticisms (in Financial Times, 6/29.) His main argument seems to be that management is important:
For example, why did social conditions not change for the human race for thousands of years until England's industrial revolution in 1750? Why did that revolution begin with the Spinning Jenny in the mid-18th centruy and not in the mid-first century AD when Hero of Alexandria developed a steam engine? Columbia Business Schools's Bruce Greenwald says that human progress "appears to to have arisen largely from the appliation of sustained management attention to everyday enterprise."
and
Why, then, is the US adding productivity growth when so many other big economies see negative growth in productivity. Those who say the answer technology have spent too little time in tokyo, Seoul and Berlin. The fact is, technology is better in many other countries. So US companies did not not become more productive by simply buying faster computers. They became more productive by having managers and entrepreneurs who knew how to integrate these investments with new business models to raise productivity.
Of course management skill is important--very important indeed. And I don't hear Bennis, O'Toole, or Mintzberg questioning that importance. Rather, they are questioning whether the typical business school, in its present form, really represents an effective way of developing that skill. Simply asserting that "management is important" is not a reasonable way to deal with that critique.
The closes Hubbard comes to a substantive response is: "These abilities to think strategically are teachable; and the central classroom for teaching leaders to "pick these locks" is the business school.
The first worrisome thing about this sentence is that it focuses the role of executive management entirely on strategy, ignoring the role of execution and the degree to which strategy and execution are deeply intertwined in real business situations. ("Picking locks" is also a rather strange metaphor for business strategy.) And when Hubbard says "these abilities to think strategically are teachable," he is begging the question, which is specifically the degree to which these skills are acquirable in the classroom and--to the extent that they are so acquirable--the best methods for teaching them.
B-school education in the United States represents a large investment of human and financial resources. Bennis, O'Toole, and Mintzberg have raised some serious issues about the return on this investment, and they deserve a serious response. Hubbard's article isn't it.
Those interested in this topic may also want to read Management Education and the Role of Technique and Professor Drucker and the Business Schools.
9:33 PM
THE MIDEAST CRISIS
An analysis of a blatant example of BBC bias here; see also this example of moral equivalency.
Since the beginning of Israel's current military operations, the country has been accused of a failure of "proportionality." The accusations come from certain European leaders, from some religious leaders, and of course from American "progressives" and academics. Here are some thoughts on the "proportionality" issue from Betsy and from Neo-Neocon.
8:15 PM
Thursday, July 13, 2006
ON THE ROAD
...for the next 3 weeks--blogging will be intermittent. Meanwhile, here's some worthwhile reading:
All Things Beautiful on the latest crisis in the Mideast. (also this)
Via ChicagoBoyz, a salute to the employees of India's Western Railway and the cabbies of Mumbai. The railway resumed suburban service only four hours after the terrorist bombings, and:
On Tuesday, the cabbies of Mumbai rose to the occasion after seven serial blasts rocked the city. They pooled in the victims, kept their cool and braved the traffic and rain and made their way to the nearest hospitals. And, they did not put down their meter...
5:08 PM
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
THE B-SCHOOL DEBATE
Last year, Harvard Business Review carried an article by Warren Bennis and James O'Toole, suggesting that there are major deficiencies in the typical business school approrach to management education. A similar message was delivered in the book Managers Not MBAs, by Henry Mintzberg of McGill University. Bennis, O'Toole, and Mintzberg are all highly respected figures in the field of management studies.
Comes now Glenn Hubbard, dean of the Columbia Business School and previously chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, to defend the business schools against these criticisms (in Financial Times, 6/29.) His main argument seems to be that management is important:
For example, why did social conditions not change for the human race for thousands of years until England's industrial revolution in 1750? Why did that revolution begin with the Spinning Jenny in the mid-18th centruy and not in the mid-first century AD when Hero of Alexandria developed a steam engine? Columbia Business Schools's Bruce Greenwald says that human progress "appears to to have arisen largely from the appliation of sustained management attention to everyday enterprise."
and
Why, then, is the US adding productivity growth when so many other big economies see negative growth in productivity. Those who say the answer technology have spent too little time in tokyo, Seoul and Berlin. The fact is, technology is better in many other countries. So US companies did not not become more productive by simply buying faster computers. They became more productive by having managers and entrepreneurs who knew how to integrate these investments with new business models to raise productivity.
Of course management skill is important--very important indeed. And I don't hear Bennis, O'Toole, or Mintzberg questioning that importance. Rather, they are questioning whether the typical business school, in its present form, really represents an effective way of developing that skill. Simply asserting that "management is important" is not a reasonable way to deal with that critique.
The closes Hubbard comes to a substantive response is: "These abilities to think strategically are teachable; and the central classroom for teaching leaders to "pick these locks" is the business school.
The first worrisome thing about this sentence is that it focuses the role of executive management entirely on strategy, ignoring the role of execution and the degree to which strategy and execution are deeply intertwined in real business situations. ("Picking locks" is also a rather strange metaphor for business strategy.) And when Hubbard says "these abilities to think strategically are teachable," he is begging the question, which is specifically the degree to which these skills are acquirable in the classroom and--to the extent that they are so acquirable--the best methods for teaching them.
B-school education in the United States represents a large investment of human and financial resources. Bennis, O'Toole, and Mintzberg have raised some serious issues about the return on this investment, and they deserve a serious response. Hubbard's article isn't it.
Those interested in this topic may also want to read Management Education and the Role of Technique and Professor Drucker and the Business Schools.
3:40 PM
WHAT'S MISSING HERE?
Palestinian official Ismail Haniyeh has an op-ed in The Washington Post, whining about the current Israelis military operation and, unsurprisingly, attempting to play the victim card.
Scott Kirwin points out some pictures that should have accompanied this article.
12:50 PM
Saturday, July 08, 2006
INTERESTING NEW FUND
The Wall Street Journal (7/3) has a note on a new exchange-traded fund, the Claymore-Sabrient Stealth Portfolio, which will invest only in companies having little or no following among analysts. Within the universe of stocks covered by no more than one analyst, about 250 stocks will be selected using a quantitative screen focused on strong historical earnings growth and low prices relative to earnings. An index will be created based on these stocks, and the Portfolio will be constructed to track the index.
The WSJ article points to academic research showing that companies with little analyst coverage tend to deliver better returns than those with more coverage. Which makes a certain amount of intuitive sense--if you're looking for bargains, you're more likely to find them off the beaten track. The research indicates that investors tend to be overconfident in stocks having high levels of analyst coverage.
As always, nothing on this weblog should be considered as investment advice.
6:57 AM
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
THE FOURTH OF JULY
Hope you had a good Fourth!
Ali, writing from Iraq, has some words for Americans:
And allow me, one very grateful Iraqi on this day, the 4th of July to congratulate all Americans on their independence day that I truly celebrate with them. It's not just out of gratitude but also because I believe it's more than an Independence Day for America, for by being free and independent, the American people gave so many other nations their independence, and thus I see it as an independence day for all the free around the world. Happy 4th of July America and thank you for all your help and sacrifices, not just for us Iraqis but all free people that you helped them get their freedom, and thank you for being the symbol of freedom that gives hope to all oppressed people around the world.
Read the whole thing.
8:17 PM
Monday, July 03, 2006
DEFINING WEAPONRY DOWN
More than 1000 Qassam rockets have been fired at Israel by Palestinian terrorists: 83 were launched in June alone. Media coverage of these attacks almost always refers to the Qassams as "homemade rockets," as in this excerpt from an AP story: "The Israeli air-strike came in response to homemade Palestinian rocket attacks on southern Israel."
There are plenty of other examples: Googling "homemade" and'ed with the combined alternate spellings "Qassam" and "Kassam" yields 69,000 hits on regular Google, and 468 hits on Google News. I have rarely seen an old-media story referencing the Qassams that doesn't refer to them as "homemade." The general tone of these stories is to downplay the danger from the Qassams, as in this exerpt from an AP story: "Palestinians have been firing primitive, homemade Qassam rockets from northern Gaza at the Israeli town of Sderot. Most of them miss their target, and those that land cause little damage with their small explosive warheads. No one has been seriously injured by a Qassam rocket, but Israel's government is determined to stop the attacks." The Qassam is now not only "homemade" but "primitive," and is made to sound less dangerous than Fourth of July fireworks.
Regarding the "homemade" meme: the manufacturing of these weapons requires metalworking facilities. Fabricating the components of a Qassam apparently requires at least a lathe--and a fairly large lathe at that--and probably other machine tools as well. If these components are sometimes assembled at someone's kitchen table, that doesn't really make Qassam a homemade weapon. It would be accurate to refer to Qassam as "locally made," to distinguish it from imported weapons: calling it "homemade" is stretching things.
Articles referencing the Qassam rarely refer to its warhead, except occasionally (as in the above example) to downplay its power. According to Wikipedia, the Qassam models 1, 2, and 3 carry explosive payloads of .5 KG, 5-7 KG, and 10 KG, respectively. Those numbers translate into approximately 1 pound, 11 pounds, and 22 pounds. (For comparison, the U.S. M-67 hand grenade contains a charge of less than 1/2 pound of explosive.)
Here is an article, written in 2004, about the effects of the Qassam barrage on people in Israel. The article mentions that 4 Israelis had been killed by the rockets. That was a year and a half ago. Why is the AP making statements like "No one has been seriously injured by a Qassam rocket?"
It seems pretty obvious what's going on with all this: consciously or unconsciously, it's about the reinforcement of a narrative that seeks to paint the Israelis as oppressors and the terrorists as justified by their military weakness and "victimhood."
UPDATE: Today (7/4), a Qassam exploded in the courtyard of a school in Ashkelon. Entirely by chance, no one was hurt.
UPDATE 2: Although no one was injured, children playing soccer outside the school were thrown back by the force of the explosion. The AP report which "the school was empty at the time" is incorrect. More credible sources report that a large number of parents and students were present at the school at the time. Meryl Yourish has an extensive set of links.
3:54 PM
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