Experience, expertise and degrees

Let me try again. My main point was what someone studied at 18-21 may Ā be irrelevant by the time they come to an important job twenty or thirty years later. It is quite possible for someone with a non technical/scientific degree to gain experience and professional qualifications later.

I am all in favour of people who know what they are doing running things. Most management tasks require teams of people with different skills. The Leader needs leaders skills, which are more about choosing Ā talented and qualified people, incentivising Ā them, establishing correct accountabilities, setting targets Ā and making ultimate decisions where need arises. The team may need a scientist, a technician, a stats and maths analyst, an engineer etc.

Having a relevant degree at 21 does not mean you can run something 20 years later. Someone without a relevant degree who is good at choosing people and leading may do well as they gain management experience.

If you are a professional you have to take exams. Equally important you need to keep up to date and keep practising as experience and evolution of knowledge matters. Medics, lawyers, finance professionals etc do this through Continuous professional development learning and testing sessions. I was certainly not proposing seeking medical advice from a non qualified person, but would be happy to see a Dr at a clinic or hospital run by a good manager whatever their degree. I took a professional qualification later in life and keep up to date on investment and economic issues daily.

65 Comments

  1. agricola
    December 19, 2024

    Yes you summarise the world of work very well. As a country I feel we have over emphasised the degree to the point where its aquisition had little relevance in the world of work. We have failed to realise the importance of the apprentership which can lead young people to the world of work in a most effective way , and that can in no way limit their path to great financial success and job satisfaction.

    1. Ian Wraggg
      December 19, 2024

      I left school at 15,+ I was lucky to be selected for an apprenticeship at Rolls Royce
      On completion I joined the Navy putting my expertise to work.
      In the meantime I studied for an HNC when you had to be able to read and write.
      Nearly all my life was dedicated to installing repairing and operating industrial gas turbines. I retired at 72 being a project manager for an international company.
      Degrees are massively overrated.

      1. Lifelogic
        December 19, 2024

        Indeed especially the ones in most of the subjects that people study nowadays. Perhaps 25% at best are worth the money and time taken.

        1. Ed M
          December 20, 2024

          Spot on.
          Sir Francis Chichester was born with a silver spoon however his father kicked him off to New Zealand when he was 17 or something to make a man of him. Francis began to make money as a stoker on the ship to NZ as well as box on the ship for extra money too. And then worked down the toughest mines in NZ. This was all great training for his future tough adventures in the air and then on the sea. And helped to finance his way too. The life of adventure. Whether you’re like Sir Francis Chichester. Or an entrepreneur such as Sir Richard Branson (who was useless at academic studies).

    2. Wil
      December 19, 2024

      I took an Engineering degree. Thereafter I found it to be of great benefit in my working life.
      Science is over rated, reality has too many variables for simple solutions to be of much value. Numeracy and common sense are what is required.
      Some things are too complex for the simple laws of physics, Climate is one of these systems. The belief that Climate Science can simplify a non-linear chaotic system to a couple of soundbite rules is the height of foolishness.

      1. Lifelogic
        December 19, 2024

        It is indeed as you learn in physics with chaos theory proper physicists know this. A flap of butterfly wing can change the world and all that. Or a tiny bit of grit on a tiny spiders leg can change totally the course and outcome of a game of snooker. Or similar for the lottery balls.

        Even if you knew all the starting conditions of the planet (which you never can) or the lottery balls predicting the climate in three year times or the lottery numbers in 15 second time is simply not remotely possible.

      2. Ed M
        December 20, 2024

        Engineering still a great degree. Although you need people with analytical and creative skills to make use of this science otherwise the science can be irrelevant (Steve Jobs was primarily a designer not an engineer nor scientist).

        Also, they should teach kids logic at school. My English teacher taught me two hours of logic (for S Level English) – or how to think logically based on philosophical logic. And it was easily the two best hours of education I ever received (other than what he taught me in English Literature and how to think properly). Looking back I wish I could have just studied logic (those two hours worth), English A ‘Level and GCSE Maths. The rest was more-a-less a waste of time (including my university degree) and money.

        1. Ed M
          December 20, 2024

          Also, let’s get kids coding.
          There’s a tonne of money to be made from creating new software (and you can start up a software company with ZERO money. All you need is a laptop).
          It all begins with being able to code.

    3. Lifelogic
      December 19, 2024

      Indeed and so often degrees in debatable value subjects for people with two Ds or and Es at A level or worse. Practical skills learned on the job and no student debts would serve them far better.

      1. hefner
        December 20, 2024

        Well, you might benefit from reading ā€˜The primacy of doubtā€™ by Tim Palmer. The subtitle is Ā“From climate change to quantum physics, how the science of uncertainty can help predict and understand our chaotic worldā€™.
        You might want to ask Father Christmas for it.

        1. Lifelogic
          December 21, 2024

          So will it predict the lottery balls or the snooker game? If so I would certainly read it but it obviously it will not? Perhaps the title should really have said ā€œsort of predict, on averageā€.

          1. hefner
            December 21, 2024

            It depends on the problem: each draw of a ball in a lottery is independent, already a snooker game is not after the first dispersion of balls.

            Assuming one could figure out laws defining the interactions between parameters, one would be better off using a Monte Carlo method with 50 draws (forecasts with the same model starting with very slightly different initial conditions). It would be certainly better than oneā€™s ā€˜expertā€™ opinion based on one draw.

            Thatā€™s what Edward Lorenz originally introduced in 1963-64 and has now been operational in a number of weather forecast centres for at least twenty years (Ā“The ECMWF Ensemble Prediction System: Looking back (more than) 25 years and projecting forward 25 yearsā€™, 26/08/2018, Tim Palmer, QJ Roy.Met,Soc. 145,51, 12-24 doi.org/10.1002/qj.3383).

            You should read it LL, you might realise that science has moved since the end of 70s-80s when you got your degrees. And that your views are at best old hat, at worst frankly irrelevant.

    4. IanT
      December 19, 2024

      I cannot see very much connection between the higher education & skills training being offered and the needs of the job marketplace. Blair turned our Technical Training Colleges into ‘Universities’ that now seem more focused on the business of importing students than providing the skills we need as a nation.
      Workers should be qualified for their role and that education should be available as an ongoing progression. Blair wanted 50% of our young to have degrees, so a 50/50 ratio – what about the other 50%? Pareto suggests 20/80 might make more sense and maybe ease the shortage of heating engineers, plumbers, electricians and other practical skills that we otherwise will have to import.

  2. Mark B
    December 19, 2024

    Good morning.

    I was always told that there are ‘leaders’ and their are ‘followers’. And while that might be true there are also people who know how to climb the ‘greasy pole’. I have also found that there are some people who, in order for them to succeed, others must be seen to fail. And this works ! Well at least for them. We also see people being promoted and hitting that glass ceiling. Once done they can act as a barrier to more able people. With modern employment laws and unions these barriers are hard to breakdown.

    What our kind host describes many here, including myself, would not necessaily disagree with, but ! That is in and ideal world and, from my experience, the world is less than ideal.

    As others here have said. A good manager / leader knows their limitations. They know where to get the best advice. But that advice has to be ‘professional’ advice and not one that is, shall we say, ‘loaded’. I am of course thinking of the SCAMDEMIC when, the advice and ‘model(s)’ were, in some peoples eyes, unprofessional and politically slanted. It takes great skill on the part of the manager / leader to filter this out and, as I said yesterday, one has to have an open mind.

    No science can be said to be settled.

    1. Lifelogic
      December 19, 2024

      Leaders need many skills mainly a working compass and an ability to get people to work together to go in that right direction.

      The last PM with a working compass was Mrs Thatcher and even she made many errors. John Major her largest one,

      Sunak has a maths A level and wanted to force maths onto people (even those with zero interest) up to 18. So has he worked out the scale of huge net harms done by the “Covid Vaccines” yet? The evidence of overwhelming. Time to correct your very “misleading” statement to the house Sunak.

      See the recent video Dr John Cambell “Important Public Letter” with Dr Malhotra.

      1. Lifelogic
        December 19, 2024

        Only a tiny handful of MPs failed to voted for the total insanity of Ed Miliband’s Climate Change Bill and Mays Net Zero insanity was nodded through without even a vote nor were any sensible costing provided. So were they are daft in thrall to this new insane group think religion or on just the make?

      2. Lifelogic
        December 19, 2024

        Also the Doctor Goes Public video also with Dr Malhotra.

    2. David Andrews
      December 19, 2024

      The late Professor Richard Feynman once said the laws of science were just guesses, to be replaced with better guesses when they could be supported by observations or experiments.

      It seems to me that running a business or running a country involves a mixture of calculations (of the known knowns), judgements and, at times, intuitive assessment of the potential implications of the unknowns or the imperfectly understood. It is essential to have a clear objective. Otherwise the choice between alternative strategies and actions required to achieve the objective becomes muddled. Preparation for this challenge can come in many ways, including observation of those who have done it, but the ability to think through the issues at hand seems to me to be essential. That is helped if advice from a variety of disciplines is at hand and engaged in achieving the desired objective.

    3. Lifelogic
      December 19, 2024

      The problem with much ā€œprofessionalā€ advice is very often the advice is what is best the fee earning professional or sometimes his mates – rather than what is best for the client. Especially with a large % lawyers. I have however found three lawyers that generally I trust. Rather the same with promises made by politicians to get elected.

      Engineers and accountants usually a bit more trustworthy I find. Load more cesarian birth in the US than the UK why might that be I wonder? Why did the vaccine regulator consultants push the net harm covid vaccines too?

  3. Lifelogic
    December 19, 2024

    Let me explain again that the people who choose to drop science and maths at 16 are rather rarely the types of people who are likely to understand much higher level mathematics, logic or science later in life or to return to these subjects they are not interested or often not capable. Listening to most MPs debating climate change and energy is usually a bad joke. People demonstrating publicly demontrating their total lack of understanding about energy. Even energy ministers and shadow energy ministers do not have a clue they often do not even know the difference between energy and power and their units.

    1. Lifelogic
      December 19, 2024

      Look at the so called climate and energy “expert” advisors like Chris Start, Emma Pinchbeck and Lord Debden (Gummer) for examples Law, Classics and History.

      1. Original Richard
        December 19, 2024

        Yes, you can add the Permanent Secretary of DESNZ, modern history, economics and social history, the CEO of NESO, legal studies and business administration, NESO Head of Strategy & Policy, business & law,

        It may be fine for the Governor of the BoE to have a degree in history rather than economics but I donā€™t think it works for departments and institutions which require a knowledge of science and engineering.

        1. Lifelogic
          December 19, 2024

          Clearly not fine with Andrew Bailey he is appalling.

    2. Lifelogic
      December 19, 2024

      Only a tiny handful of MPs failed to voted for the total insanity of Ed Miliband’s Climate Change Bill and Mays Net Zero insanity was nodded through without even a vote nor were any sensible costing provided. So were they are daft in thrall to this new insane group think religion or on just the make?

      1. Nigl
        December 19, 2024

        Someone so clearly bright as you reduced to umpteen daily repetitive posts trashing people who actually try to make a difference. Obviously easier to criticise than getting out of your armchair but also achieves precisely (net!) zero.

        I admire people who actually try even if I do not agree with what they are doing.,

      2. Mickey Taking
        December 19, 2024

        Group think encourages those who do not want to show their shortcomings by asking in depth questions. Being ridiculed in public is a threat they wish to avoid, so keep schtum.

        1. Lifelogic
          December 19, 2024

          Indeed so the group thing insanity wins out!

      3. Mike Wilson
        December 19, 2024

        I have been doing my own research lately on the climate ā€˜scamā€™. You talk a lot of nonsense about CO2. My conclusion is that you’d have to be a special kind of fool to ignore the risk. Whichever way you look at things burning fossil fuels is a dirty, polluting business. And, why take the risk? One can argue that the present government course is ill conceived – but to pretend, as you do, that you know better than the worldā€™s climate scientists, is surely arrogance on a colossal scale. Yes, wind and solar are unreliable but, some days, they give us 50% of our electricity. Yes, itā€™s at a cost. If it was left to you, weā€™d still be burning coal and our buildings and lungs would be black. Thank heavens that you, with all the maths and physics qualm you profess to have, are not in charge. You are the perfect example that justifies the discounting of educational qualifications.

      4. Original Richard
        December 19, 2024

        There are 5 powerful groups, often intertwined, pushing the fake climate crisis that 4 molecules of CO2 in 10 thousand instead of 3 has brought a climate emergency/breakdown/crisis which consequently requires the whole western world (not China, India et al) to transition to Net Zero:

        1) The UN to give a reason for a world government to combat a common existential threat.

        2) Communists to impoverish the West, whose success is an embarrassment, and to cause de-industrialisation and social disharmony to enable a take-over.

        3) Extremely wealthy elites who want to own even more and are upset with so many people having stuff, enjoying themselves and flying around the world on holidays. They prefer a feudal system where no-one leaves their village and hence the idea for 15 minute cities.

        4) Energy grifters.

        5) Doomsday cultists and Malthusians. And there are always the ā€œuseful idiotsā€ as coined by Stalin.

      5. ChrisS
        December 19, 2024

        They are not clever enough to understand the cost of the Net Zero project which will bankrupt us. Either that or they are just hoping for the best.

        The announceent that over Ā£100bn needs to be spent on the water system over five years is equally daft.
        We simply cannot take that much out of the economy on top of everything else. Whatever amount is raised by increasing bills, I suspect at least half of that vast sum will have to be borrowed.

        Labour is certainly going all out to bankrupt the country.

        1. Lifelogic
          December 19, 2024

          Correct

      6. Donna
        December 19, 2024

        They expected to benefit (in one way or another) from voting in favour of the lunacy.

    3. Original Richard
      December 19, 2024

      I agree, although there are obviously exceptions such as Lord Christopher Monckton. CP Snow back in the 1950s described the two cultures of science and arts and how science was considered inferior. Those that study science are trained to observe and analyse the data. Those that study arts are basically trained to be good at storytelling, which is why newspapers employ English literature graduates as environment editors.

      1. Lifelogic
        December 19, 2024

        +1 story telling and lying it seems. Or perhaps too daft to now they are not telling the truth.

    4. Lifelogic
      December 19, 2024

      Does anyone know a premier footballer who was not fairly good at football by the age of say 12? It is rather the same with maths, physics and many other skills like languages (which I am fairly useless at). There are many types of intelligence like:-

      Logical-Mathematical Intelligence
      Linguistic Intelligence
      Interpersonal Intelligence
      Intrapersonal Intelligence
      Musical Intelligence
      Visual-Spatial Intelligence
      Bodily-Kinaesthetic Intelligence
      Naturalist Intelligence
      Existential Intelligence
      Memory and rapid recall from memory
      Facial recognition and memory of visual images and colours…

      1. Mike Wilson
        December 19, 2024

        The one you have missed is emotional intelligence. Do you have any?

    5. Original Richard
      December 19, 2024

      ā€œEven energy ministers and shadow energy ministers do not have a clue they often do not even know the difference between energy and power and their units.ā€

      Yes, such debates continually take place in both Houses and their Select Committees. When it comes to energy policy the Permanent Secretary to DESNZ, who should know his brief, should be questioned for once by a knowledgeable individual. As far as I am aware no such possibility even exists.

    6. a-tracy
      December 19, 2024

      No Lifelogic you are incorrect. When you think about the great classical thinkers they were often philosophers as well as mathematicians. Great artists like DaVinci dually talented, his greatest talent was his curiosity. He received only basic instruction in reading, writing and mathematics.

      You particularly underestimate a lot of women in most of your posts, do you discuss your views with your own female relatives?

      1. Mike Wilson
        December 20, 2024

        Indeed. Einstein was also famous for his philosophical statements.

  4. Sakara Gold
    December 19, 2024

    Three FTSE100 energy firms have announced plans to invest Ā£70bn in the upgrade and extension of the UK’s power grid. National Grid, SSE and Scottish Power (who buy the surplus electricity from my 3.5KW solar panel installation) plans include Ā£11bn to maintain and upgrade the existing grid, building three new grid distribution projects, building 12 new major transmission substations, Ā£15bn to increase network capacity and an Ā£18bn contingency fund to cope with anything else Miliband and his team decide is necessary.

    These investments will make the grid more resilient and will dramatically reduce the curtailment payments made to wind farm operators when their output threatens to overload it. The investment will almost double the amount of energy that can be transported around the UK and additional links to the interconnectors will allow a dramatic increase in exports of our renewable electricity to customers in the EU

    These investments will generate over 15,000 well paid technical jobs and about 85,000 supporting roles during the build-out. Unfortunately, the fossil fuel majors have recently decided not to invest in more renewables or the grid upgrade, preferring to concentrate on drilling and extracting even more oil and gas. What a missed opportunity.

    Reply Who pays for all this? Spell out the big increases in consumer bills this means.

    1. Sakara Gold
      December 21, 2024

      @Sir John – reply

      As ever with so controversial a subject as the transition to cheap renewable energy, precise costings are hard to establish due to issues such as the rip-off standing charges, the increases in general taxation to pay for the technically and economically insane carbon capture and storage scam etc etc. But we can find some estimates in the previous government’s reports, so here goes

      Reduction in cost of wind farm curtailment payments ~Ā£750 million
      Reduction in import costs for gas ~Ā£27bn
      Increase in electricity export income ~Ā£13bn
      Increase in exports of cheaper manufactured goods due to input energy cost reduction – Ā£9bn

      Altogether it looks like there will be a reduction in consumer electricity bills of approx Ā£275 – Ā£350 pa once the grid upgrade is complete. To which one could add the increase in motor tax as more EV’s reach our roads, coupled with much cheaper green steel, ceramics, metal ore smelting, HVDC cable manufacture and other energy intensive industries

      Reply This is dreamworld forecasting. You need to add in the large extra costs of building and financing a huge expansion of the grid, the costs of providing little used back up gas fired generation, the high costs of importing electricity when there is little wind across Europe, the costs of the Ā£19 bn needless carbon capture and storage etc. Not even the government thinks bills will come down by Ā£300 anymore.This system will be dearer.

  5. Narrow Shoulders
    December 19, 2024

    Life long learning is very important, schools should be teaching the ability to learn and be curious as much as facts and theories.

    However it does seem that politics attracts people who study and think in a certain way. You question should maybe rephrased as to how do we ensure that people with a varied mindset (the fabled diversity) are attracted into the field.

  6. Berkshire Alan
    December 19, 2024

    Agree John.
    Academic or non-academic we all learn lessons from life’s experiences, other people and situations, as well as from early formal type education.
    The important thing to remember is the lessons that you have learn’t and experienced from not only your own, but others mistakes and successes.
    It is not simply knowledge that is impotent, but how you apply it to real life situations (business and personal) and look beyond the next simple stage of its application.
    Formal education is but just one step in a lifespan’s journey, as personal interests can change, the more you see, listen, and read.
    Many people change career throughout their lives, and can often produce better results than others who have remained in their chosen field, simply because they have a wider view of potential impacts, results and possible failure.
    My own career started as an indentured apprentice (5 years) in mechanical engineering attending technical college, day release and night school, progressed onto research and development in the car industry, then construction and sales, after I designed and built my own house.
    I learn’t a huge amount from speaking, engaging, and working with and for self made successful people, than I ever did from formal education.
    Formal education is important, but it is not the be an and end all, you learn the more impotent lessons from life and business experience.

  7. iain gill
    December 19, 2024

    too simplistic john

    the uk suffers massively from having the wrong kinds of people in the wrong kinds of jobs

    plenty of organisations are kept going despite the management team, not because of them

    the UK is not very meritocratic, and that is very stark when you work abroad

    our ruling class is dire, and this is all another symptom of that

    1. Mickey Taking
      December 19, 2024

      exactly. The very fact of a ‘ruling class’ says it all!

  8. Sharon
    December 19, 2024

    Talking to a young paramedic on the ambulance which came to collect a family member….

    She said, she’d got her degree, had done placements on ambulances, had now passed her exams… all she needed now was more experience to be the best she can be at her job! Wise woman!

  9. Sir Joe Soap
    December 19, 2024

    “My main point was what someone studied at 18-21 may be irrelevant by the time they come to an important job twenty or thirty years later. It is quite possible for someone with a non technical/scientific degree to gain experience and professional qualifications later.”
    MAY be irrelevant but often isn’t, because what they studied at 18-21 forms the basis for the way they think. It’s rather like saying somebody who learned say theology at 18-21 COULD be a Bond trader at 50. It’s possible but highly unlikely, because they’ve had to rewire their brain to an enormous extent. Yet somehow outside the private sector, and indeed in the upper reaches of the private sector, a degree in theology, for example, doesn’t preclude one from looking after the Post Office, or whatever, where numbers would seem to be important.

  10. Derek
    December 19, 2024

    Without specific knowledge, how would a would-be Manager know how to correct problems that may be evident to other experts?
    He/she would always have to rely upon the input of the relevant employees, which is how the current Government works today. Can we really say that each and every Minister is on top of his/her job?

  11. Ian B
    December 19, 2024

    Sir John
    All delivery of services or material goods work best when the team, and it is a team strive for the best of the best for itself and end product. The only key is customer satisfaction and loyalty which is earned. That highlights the structural problem now on how we have evolved into having what can only be described as society manipulation. That deviates from the desire for the best of the best.

    Having targets to suggest that there must be so many of this, or so many of that, as in diversity, equalities and inclusion not only does it not deliver for the customer, it doesnā€™t deliver for what we call the ā€˜teamā€™. The inevitable happens the customer, the consumer gets short changed, the quality of service goes down costs go up. Not only that it is insulting too the mainstream human being in this country and it is disingenuous to those employed to meet targets not fulfil a function.

    This the purity of Socialism, everyone is equal when you agree with me and do it my way. Or another way no one is equal, no one has the right to reach their full potential, the team is what I dictate it to be, not what is required. That is not Management, management works with not fights against.
    The whole of parliament has failed they allowed full time Socialist diktats to override common sense and logic. Even in Parliament we see the recruits (MPā€™s) manipulated by Gang Bosses to provide an outcome for their leader, even though for the most part it stops them fulfilling the promises they made their constituents.
    There is no management at the top, just dictators fighting to hold on to power. That is not how to create team GB or UK. Fighting against is not managing. There is no working with, to achieve and release potential for the country, just manipulation and fighting to ā€˜demandā€™ control. That certainly doesnā€™t work in industry and business.

  12. Ian B
    December 19, 2024

    Sir John
    Maybe un-intentional but there seems to be a tendency to suggest a degree equals intelligence and experience ā€“ but what it definitely doesnā€™t confer on anyone is that they are bright.

  13. James4
    December 19, 2024

    Yes – all young people starting out on a career path should engage in training programme or apprenticeship for a number of years and thereafter continue in periodic courses to keep up to date irrespective of university or college education before being handed the full running of things.

    Back in the 60’s and 70’s there were not so many young people going on to 3rd level education and instead entered the workforce after leaving with O-Levels or A- Level where a lot of career examinations for example In banking, insurance, police army etc were all in-house but then later came the rush to encourage 3rd level and companies started to give those with college degrees added weight, irrespective of the suitability of the degree, and then fast track them – and that is where we lost our way. Remember how well our hospitals were running when we had the Matrons in charge.

  14. Bloke
    December 19, 2024

    SJR states the matter clearly, with solid reasoning. Some others, including Lifelogic, add illuminating intelligent comments, yet regard university education in early life and professional qualifications on paper certificates as normally essential.
    The people who make the best leaders in government are those who make the RIGHT decisions about the most important actions to take, and may not be those who studied or previously ā€˜qualifiedā€™ in a particular subject, nor those who belong to a specific political party that those who dislike them favour instead.

  15. Christine
    December 19, 2024

    Wise words Sir John. In most cases obtaining a degree just shows a person has the intellect to absorb and regurgitate information. I know of many degree-level people who donā€™t have an ounce of common sense. Many of these sit in Parliament and the Lords. Proving yourself in the workplace and continuing to learn is a far better measure of ability. I would reform the Lords to be a proper scrutinising chamber where members are appointed because of their expertise in their field. Currently, very few Lords bring anything of value and are a big waste of public money.

    1. Derek
      December 19, 2024

      The Uni degree case demonstrates sufficient IQ to benefit from further education also applies to the 11+ case for Grammar Schools.

  16. mancunius
    December 19, 2024

    I absolutely agree that flexibility and curiosity of mind and a readiness to learn new things is far more important than the contents of a degree absorbed at 21, through the latter *may* happily cross-fertilize with the former.
    Most professions demand only a small area of knowledge and ability, and this restricts the mind. (What is worse, many become convinced that their specialization is a badge of distinction, which perpetuates their self-restriction.) Many in mid-life are hampered by mortgages, pension schemes and family commitments from breaking out into new professions: and when they do, the world of work has an innate suspicion of the multi-skilled and free-spirited, and without a network of influential contacts or ‘known’ status – or luck, or a fortunate educational background – they may find changing of horses in mid-stream quite a challenge, regardless of talent.
    I’ve been lucky enough to change my profession four times, but that’s largely down to the personal freedom I decided for myself at an early stage, and I do not mistake this personal set of values for an inherent social virtue.

    1. mancunius
      December 19, 2024

      typos: ‘absorbed at 21, *though* the latter may cross-fertilize…’

  17. Donna
    December 19, 2024

    “Most management tasks require teams of people with different skills. The Leader needs leaders skills, which are more about choosing talented and qualified people, incentivising them, establishing correct accountabilities, setting targets and making ultimate decisions where need arises. The team may need a scientist, a technician, a stats and maths analyst, an engineer etc.”
    —–
    Which is precisely why we have had one failing government after another for two decades. The Westminster Uni-Party now largely consists of one section of society: they are almost exclusively metropolitan; Oxbridge “educated;” wealthy, or at the very least comfortably off; little experience of life outside politics and closely associated career paths (media, local government, charity sector); PPE degrees, SpAd, Ministerial bag carrier.

    They are not representative of society or their Constituents.

    ALL voices need to be represented in Parliament and a great deal more real-life experience needs to be present for the country to properly function. And that’s where Reform comes in …… and hopefully the Uni-Party goes out.

  18. formula57
    December 19, 2024

    “Let me try again” – there you go once more, demonstrating the enviable qualities of patience, resilience and industry so needed in leaders and politicians and not, typically, taught (at least directly) on any degree course.

    I have long considered that a first degree alone is often an insufficient preparation for the rest of life and the serious, highly capable people I have encountered usually have continued their formal education through professional qualifications and/or higher degrees. Some of the serious become so though experience alone, although the quality not to say severity of their experiences are then critical.

  19. Roy Grainger
    December 19, 2024

    This discussion is valid for Physician Assiciates who donā€™t go through the full medical exams required by doctors but who ARE qualified to provide a specific range of medical services which can help reduce waiting lists and offload GPs. Needless to say many doctors absolutely hate this idea and actively lobby against them – keeping doctors in high demand through scarcity gives them leverage to increase their own salaries.

  20. Jim
    December 19, 2024

    I doubt the problem with our politicians is that they are ignorant or are hopeless managers or don’t have some specialist degree in this or that. I think the problem is political motivation – they will follow some favoured mantra and argue black is white that this mantra is the way we absolutely must go.

    Political motivation overides what most of us would call managerial common sense. To any sane person a notion may seem hopelessly out of whack with reality but if it suits the politics or the Treasury or avoids embarassment or criminal charges then however dishonest, that notion will be pursued.

    Add in a bit of pressure from think tanks, party donors and election fever and good old venality then the politics we have becomes clear.

  21. Keith from Leeds
    December 19, 2024

    I left school at 16 with no qualifications at all. Yet I learnt what I needed to know in every job, building my skills through experience. I went on training courses related to and learned from them about my industry. I have run small and large businesses with reasonable success. I would not claim to be an academic or intellectual, but I have always had common sense. That is the quality missing in so many of our leaders today. I have had both bad and excellent bosses and learned from both. You certainly don’t need a degree to succeed. My wife is a retired Nurse, and you don’t need a degree to be a good nurse, but the stupid government made this a requirement.
    Common sense and a bit of research tell you that Global Warming/Climate Warming/ Net Zero is absolute nonsense. Why are our MPs like sheep in believing it? Don’t they think for themselves?

    1. a-tracy
      December 19, 2024

      I agree Keith.

      One of the best skills is to be able to persuade people to perform well, keep to time deadlines, recognise each member of a groups key assets and deploy them, reward, discipline, a drive, a willingness to try new ideas, improve what you do, listen deeply and actively and DO. Just do instead of thinking and talking about what might be done.

  22. ChrisS
    December 19, 2024

    Theeves and TTK have done more damage to the economy than even I expected. It is no wonder that we have seen no growth, given what they have taken out of the economy ?

    And it’s getting worse by the week : Now we have Ā£104bn to be spent over five years on the water infrastructure, and they’ve allowed Minibrain Ā£40bn and probably a great deal more, to waste on his daft 2030 Net Zero plan.
    Where is all this money going to come from ? By 2029 will have interest rates at 6% to enable them to borrow enough to pay for it all.

    We hope we can survive until 2029 without the IMF being called in. Then we can elect a Reform-led government who will abandon net zero.

  23. Mickey Taking
    December 19, 2024

    And now for something that has been festering for years. Almlst hidden on the BBC website.
    The Post Office has spent Ā£132m of taxpayer money defending itself at the inquiry into the wrongful conviction of hundreds of sub-postmasters, according to the latest available figures. The revelation in the company’s annual report comes after the two-and-a-half years of evidence hearings for the inquiry ended this week.
    The figure covers the legal and running costs from its start up until 31 March 2024, but it does not include money spent after that date. Post Office chairman Nigel Railton said that the Post Office was “learning from the serious failings of the past”.
    More than 900 sub-postmasters were prosecuted for shortfalls in their accounts caused by bugs in Fujitsu’s Horizon IT system in what has been described as one of the most widespread miscarriages in British legal history.
    Many lost their livelihoods or were forced to make up shortfalls from their own money, while some former sub-postmasters took their own lives. The inquiry came after sub-postmasters fought for years to uncover the injustice.
    The Post Office’s figures for legal costs related to the inquiry do not include the money it has spent paying compensation to wrongfully convicted sub-postmasters. It also said it had made provisions totalling Ā£816m in “exceptional expenses” for the year to 31 March 2024, which includes the legal and running costs as well as the money to be spent on compensation and overturned convictions.

  24. Linda Brown
    December 21, 2024

    I think talking about the medical profession people should seriously think about looking to alternative health practitioners for help when they cannot gain satisfaction from the locums we seem to have to see these days. I trained in one of these professions when the mainstream medical facilities completely messed my body up. It helped me put my life back on a proper footing and I helped others to do the same. Who made the comment that if you have a disease see another person who has suffered from it and ask them how they dealt with it to help recover. I await the howls of disagreement but speak as you find. I am about to go to another holistic healer as I am in a mess (maybe from the jabs as seem likely from what I have read) and hope he can give me more positive help than I have received. Take responsibility for yourself and don’t rely on others. I do find that people think that they should not pay privately for other advice but this is stupid. Give up something else in your life and seek another way that might be right for you.

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