5 ms·

While I think there is a lot of truth to this, I don't see how it can effectively be applied to our existing educational institutions. They've sort of become a

by jrs95 10y ago

While I think there is a lot of truth to this, I don't see how it can effectively be applied to our existing educational institutions. They've sort of become a self-serving bureaucracy at this point, so even without misguided policy pushing them in the wrong direction, I don't think doing the best work they can is actually their primary focus.

worldsayshi 10y ago
Naive response: Throw out the bureaucrats. Leave those with subject knowledge. Tell them to do their work to the best of their ability? Stop measuring things. Talk to them once in a while.
- BoorishBears 10y ago
  What about the bureaucrats with tenure?
  - pdimitar 10y ago
    Your question contains a good chunk of our entire world's economic and bureaucratic problems -- namely people in power with the emotional intelligence and experience of a chihuahua.
- dagw 10y ago
  Throw out the bureaucrats. Leave those with subject knowledge. My wife works in academia and all the 'managers' in her research department are experienced researchers that often split their time between management and research. And it just does not work according to her. They don't understand the job of a manager, deem it less important than their research duties and basically see dealing with 'minor' personnel issues as a waste of their time. To run any organization of a non-trivial size requires some structure and bureaucracy. And you need people to understand, set up and own those structures.
  - madez 10y ago
    Maybe the personnel issues are sometimes indeed minor and a waste of time. What are the symptoms your wife is observing?
    - dagw 10y ago
      Minor stuff like spending 3 weeks "unemployed" and without a salary because her boss couldn't be arsed/was too busy to sort out the paperwork, grant money almost getting lost in the shuffle, stuff like that. And even if you perceive a personnel issue as genuinely minor and you genuinely do consider it a waste of time, telling someone that problems they perceive as genuine are so insignificant to you that you don't even want to consider them, despite that being part of your job, is a great way to build resentment and destroy teams. A good manager should be able to quickly and efficiently handle minor issues without making people feel ignored and insignificant.
      - metaphorm 10y ago
        you're making the case for an administrative assistant, which is a very different role and set of responsibilities than a team of executives or managers.
        bshanks 10y ago
        No, this is not the solution; I've seen this sort of thing happen in academia even with professors with assistants (thankfully my own professors have never been like this). For example, the administrative assistant presents the professor with an employee timesheet that needs to be signed in order for some employee to be paid, and the professor says, "thanks, I'm busy now, just leave that here and don't bother me again" and then doesn't sign it, causing the employee not to be paid on time. The administrative assistant does not have the authority to sign it himself and does not have the authority to tell the professor what to do (and may be fired by the professor if they make themselves a bother by trying to nudge the professor into doing the paperwork). The problem here is not that the professor is too disorganized, the problem is that some professors either don't perceive managerial tasks as important, or they view their managerial duties as impositions.
- unfamiliar 10y ago
  Who's going to do this whole "throw out the bureaucrats" thing? Because as far as I can tell, bureaucrats are in charge of those decisions.
  - geodel 10y ago
    Put educationists and researchers in charge. They are never biased, hold dogmatic beliefs or politically motivated. So they will do just fine.
- stinkytaco 10y ago
  How do you determine they have subject knowledge? Without measuring, I mean?

by jrs95 10y ago

worldsayshi 10y ago

Naive response: Throw out the bureaucrats. Leave those with subject knowledge. Tell them to do their work to the best of their ability? Stop measuring things. Talk to them once in a while.

BoorishBears 10y ago
What about the bureaucrats with tenure?
- pdimitar 10y ago
  Your question contains a good chunk of our entire world's economic and bureaucratic problems -- namely people in power with the emotional intelligence and experience of a chihuahua.
dagw 10y ago
Throw out the bureaucrats. Leave those with subject knowledge. My wife works in academia and all the 'managers' in her research department are experienced researchers that often split their time between management and research. And it just does not work according to her. They don't understand the job of a manager, deem it less important than their research duties and basically see dealing with 'minor' personnel issues as a waste of their time. To run any organization of a non-trivial size requires some structure and bureaucracy. And you need people to understand, set up and own those structures.
- madez 10y ago
  Maybe the personnel issues are sometimes indeed minor and a waste of time. What are the symptoms your wife is observing?
  - dagw 10y ago
    Minor stuff like spending 3 weeks "unemployed" and without a salary because her boss couldn't be arsed/was too busy to sort out the paperwork, grant money almost getting lost in the shuffle, stuff like that. And even if you perceive a personnel issue as genuinely minor and you genuinely do consider it a waste of time, telling someone that problems they perceive as genuine are so insignificant to you that you don't even want to consider them, despite that being part of your job, is a great way to build resentment and destroy teams. A good manager should be able to quickly and efficiently handle minor issues without making people feel ignored and insignificant.
    - metaphorm 10y ago
      you're making the case for an administrative assistant, which is a very different role and set of responsibilities than a team of executives or managers.
      - bshanks 10y ago
        No, this is not the solution; I've seen this sort of thing happen in academia even with professors with assistants (thankfully my own professors have never been like this). For example, the administrative assistant presents the professor with an employee timesheet that needs to be signed in order for some employee to be paid, and the professor says, "thanks, I'm busy now, just leave that here and don't bother me again" and then doesn't sign it, causing the employee not to be paid on time. The administrative assistant does not have the authority to sign it himself and does not have the authority to tell the professor what to do (and may be fired by the professor if they make themselves a bother by trying to nudge the professor into doing the paperwork). The problem here is not that the professor is too disorganized, the problem is that some professors either don't perceive managerial tasks as important, or they view their managerial duties as impositions.
unfamiliar 10y ago
Who's going to do this whole "throw out the bureaucrats" thing? Because as far as I can tell, bureaucrats are in charge of those decisions.
- geodel 10y ago
  Put educationists and researchers in charge. They are never biased, hold dogmatic beliefs or politically motivated. So they will do just fine.
stinkytaco 10y ago
How do you determine they have subject knowledge? Without measuring, I mean?