Posts
On Stephanie Flanders blog yesterday a great discussion began ... which headed in many different directions and resulted in lots of informed/insightful comments. I supported the view that traditional 'economics' is dead, and published this post to say so too ... and a number of people started to question to role of 'education' too - 'economic education' ... for instance take a look at the comment made in Post 52 (random_thought) below:
"... perhaps for 30 years now we have had an academic system that teaches students the knowledge that is required to make money out of the flaws in the economic system - not how to design a better economic system that doesn't have those flaws. How many students have studied economics in the hope of getting a well paid job in the City? And how many have been driven by the desire to fix the system and make the world a better place?..."
I thought this comment potentially offered some profound insight, and a great question too ... so I responded in the following way (Post 55) ...
"...Good points and well made ... The existing education system has arguably been re-enforcing levels of 'incompetence' / 'greed' for some time - and this is exactly the same in leadership / management ( and political science ? ) too ... the education system is also probably 20-30 years out of date now too ( I know for certain most MBA's are - as they are often referred to as 'Maybe Best Avoided' now, and I believe posts 13 and 51 probably give us an idea where we are with politics at the moment too ) ... I believe we are beginning to get to the 'roots' of the problem now - and starting to see just a few of the challenges ahead e.g. changing this, as well as evaluating / re-addressing our nations 'fundamental philosophies' and 'value systems' ...!"
Another commentator then asked ...
"... If you "know for certain" then you can supply the evidence for your claim. I'm sure that the staff and students of our Business Schools would be very interested to see it ..."
So I obliged, (see post 67 below), though there's obviously lots more evidence available too ...
"... Anyone who has bothered to study 'lean', 'lean management', 'lean management systems' (and Dr. W. Edwards Deming's work - nb quoted earlier) know that business schools are 1-2 generations out of date - in fact most people with an MBA have to unfortunately unlearn a lot of what they have learnt at a business school before they can start to learn what they really need to know (e.g. to scrap, rather than re-enforce, arbitrary targets, league tables, bonuses, management by numbers ...etc etc etc) ...
All you have to do is ask a few questions (e.g. what are the above?), look at current business school MBA syllabuses, and understand the differences between 21st century leadership / management and traditional leadership and management [e.g. take a quick look at table 2.39, P139, in the book below for instance] ... you'll find they are completely opposite, and you'll also find most business schools struggle to answer the basic questions above in any meaningful way (and find they are just as out of date as Wikipedia!).
I'm afraid 21st century leadership/management is mostly common sense, and very different to what we're accustomed to, and it's been mostly decoded now too (e.g. just take a look at "Lean World" ... it's available to read worldwide on Google Books*) ... all the Deans of Business Schools I've met and spoke to have read it and loved it, and the business students I lecture love it too ... it's a shame that business schools (all around the world) never properly researched it (or Deming's work for that matter - as they would have found they're inextricably linked) ... and/or never thought to tell students about it/write about it, as most people point out it's both profound ... and applies a lots of common sense ... which is arguably something we need a lot more of right now ...
... but the challenge today is not just one of education, but of politics and power (and the 'misuse' of 'power') too ... and that's yet another story again ... just take a look at http://poweromics.blogspot.com (and some of my posts here too e.g. P13 above) for instance ... but this will be eventually changing too, powered by the internet ..."
