May 15, 2013 | Governance, Leadership, Personal Rant
On this Budget “morning after” where public spending is at 33.5% of GDP and rising, all the debate is about the detail, weather or not the “baby bonus” should be retained, the validity of the forward estimates given recent history, and increase in the personal tax rate of 0.5% tearily described by the PM as just a small increase in the Medicare levy.
To my mind, we have missed the point.
It seems to me that a real problem in this country of ours is that we have allowed a culture to evolve that punishes errors of commission, those errant outcomes from someone actually taking some initiative, doing something, but getting it wrong. Sometimes they are the result of circumstances beyond their control, sometimes they just misjudge, and yes, sometimes, are just plain stupid, but at least they got off their arses and did something.
By contrast, we seem to just put up with those who do nothing but follow the party line, do as they are told, accept the status quo no matter how dumb they think it is, and just park their brains at the door.
Not the image we hold of ourselves.
The reality is about as far away from the bronzed Aussie gazing into the sunset somewhere harsh, taking all life can deliver with a grin and a stoic resolution to persist.
Perhaps it is about time we started focusing some light on those who did nothing, took no responsibility for their actions, and just sucked at the teat delivered on a platter.
Our public sector consumes well over 33% of GNP, yet produces nothing. Much of the money is necessary if we are to be a civilised society, but not all of it. The lack of productivity in the public sector is a national disgrace. Layers upon layers of paper shuffling, process management with little regard to outcomes, and meaningless KPI’s chased by intelligent, educated people, many of whom would love the opportunity to make change, but are prevented from doing so by the inertia of the system and prevailing culture.
The greater error should be the one of omission, not commission. How do we empower the bronzed Aussie of our collective imagination?. We should be seeking better outcomes for the money spent, not just arguing about the amount spent.
Mar 19, 2013 | Personal Rant, Social Media
Privacy has been, and remains a key concern in relation to the use of the net, and particularly Social Media. Every time you log on you leave a trail, and as we increasingly log on with mobile devices, the data we offer to sophisticated users is true Big Brother stuff.
This leaked video showing RIOT software (Rapid Information Overlay technology) that turned up on the Guardian website is instructive, and scary, although I guess the old “I have nothing to hide” argument still holds.
I bet the crims do not use mobile phones, or at least the smart (and free) ones won’t, although it may not be likely that the police have the budget to do sensible stuff like deploy this sort of technology, too few press release opportunities for their political masters.
Mar 14, 2013 | Governance, Innovation, Personal Rant, Strategy
Leaving aside the fact that it is an election year, and rhetoric is the usual fare served up, there remains an economy to run.
Lots of space will be allocated to “Innovation” plans, the Manufacturing jobs announcements a few weeks ago, the Arts creativity and Innovation plan announced yesterday, big announcements, lots of largely recycled money that probably will not be delivered, and hot air expended, but what of the real dilemma?
Governments govern, they (attempt to) create repreatable processes that exclude variation and eschews risk, whereas innovation requires a high tolerance for risk and failure, the absolute opposite of the risk appetite of Government. Distinctly oil and water here!
How do we encourage and support startups, the innovation lifeblood of the economy? The stuff we can dig up and flog at commodity prices cannot in the long run be anything but a race to the bottom of the price curve, and we will lose, as we are unprepared to accept the labour, environmental and public oversight deficiencies of our less fussy international competitors.
At a time when our exports of services are declining, can we ignore the opportunities in tech startups and services? When Google puts its money where its mouth is, and gets together with a few entrepreneurs with a track record of success as they have with the Silicon Beach Action Group, should we listen?
Feb 18, 2013 | Collaboration, Governance, Leadership, Personal Rant
It is wonderful to consider the impact the Prime Ministers “A Plan for Australian Jobs” announcement over the weekend has had, already, on Australian jobs.
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- Multitudes of grateful bureaucrats have laboured mightily for months and months, crafting and re-crafting the words of the announcement to ensure it does not say anything that may attract any critical comment, and includes every existing program and hopeful announcement at least twice,
- Favoured consultants are rejoicing at the fees to date, and to come,
- Advertising and PR agencies wriggle to the bar to celebrate the coup of gaining “the account”,
- Engaged lawyers, consultants, bureaucrats, researchers, and grant trough dwellers, rejoice at the billion dollar bait now on the table.
But what about the rest of us, those who struggle to compete in the real world?
Lots of well meaning, multi-syllable words that ensure there is no accountability for anything, just continuous blather, platitudes and clichés. Oh, and the plan tells us they will spend a $billion of our money. It is after all, “our responsibility to assist in the structural adjustment process in the economy”. We, as obedient and loyal servants, should be grateful the Government has finally realised the parlous state of manufacturing in this country, and are doing something about it.
I read the plan, twice in fact because I thought I must have missed the important and insightful bit the first time through. You can save yourself a bit of time and read the summary, that is useful, but please consider the following whilst you do:
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- Minister Combet says in his introduction that the plan is “Supporting Australian industry to increase exports and win more business abroad”. Call me pedantic, but I thought increasing exports and winning more business abroad were the same thing, and besides, what has Austrade been doing for the last 40 years?. Having run a real business on contract for a Federal department, set up with the express aim of increasing agricultural exports with a budget of 6 million over 3 years, which attracted the ire of the “You cannot subsidise exports” Nazi’s in Canberra, I can only wonder what a billion is doing for their collective blood pressure.
- There is a fair bit of verbiage about “fostering clusters” in the report. There is no doubt that clusters can become innovation hotbeds. Everyone with a pig in the race points to the tech miracle of Silicon Valley, and the medical cluster centered on Boston, amongst a few others, but forgets that they took decades to evolve, (a bit longer than the average election cycle in the first world) and the evolution of successful clusters has had nothing to do with public investment beyond the provision of high quality public infrastructure, schools, universities, transport, and power. Every investment (to my knowledge)by a Government in an overt effort to build a “cluster” around the world has failed, or is failing in the absence of a long term investment in infrastructure.
- Oh the joy of a good acronym! The plan is full of them, some new, some recycled, but the gold standard is a beauty: G.O.L.D. standing for “Growth Opportunities and Leadership Development”. Wonderful isn’t it, must have come from an orgasmic Eureka moment for someone. Clearly, I am just being petty.
- A headline objective of this plan is “Creating a stronger, fairer, and simpler tax and transfer system and reducing red tape” Great sentiment, but all through the plan is articulated the need for more legislation, regulation, and creation of various advisory and oversight bodies. When I was at school, these sorts of additions would consume added resources, add complication, and create demarcation squabbles amongst agencies. Not a lot of “simpler, fairer” in this lot that I can see.
- This is the last whinge, perhaps the best, so congratulations if you have got this far. There is a graph 5.1 on page 23 of the report that shows collaboration across a number of economies, which is presumably there to demonstrate the value of collaboration, which the government wants to (correctly in my view) foster. The figures show Australia at about 18% (of what is not really clear to me) next door to Germany, held up as a poster child of manufacturing excellence, at 19%, and China, at 19.5%. The field is lead by a Black Caviar like stretch by Britain at 69%, but the last time I looked, the British economy was a basket case. Perhaps the graph is a mistake, showing the opposite of the Governments argument, or perhaps the situation has changed because the data is so bloody old, or perhaps my simple old brain has been scrambled by the clichés and acronyms.
Australian manufacturing is in a hole, and rule 1 of my rules of holes says that “once you realise you are in a hole, stop digging”. There is little in this plan that actually throws away the shovel, it just burnishes it for more use. The real challenge is the endless duplication, commercial naivety, turf wars, lack of gumption, and the assumption that all problems can be legislated away that infests our elected bodies and their bureaucrats that is the greatest hurdle Australian manufacturing has to jump.
Header cartoon courtesy TomGauld.com
Jan 31, 2013 | Change, Personal Rant
The good news is that at least part of the nasty, smelly, political wind coming our way in 2013 will be avoided by the Prime Ministers announcement yesterday of the September election date. The context of the statement, that she wanted to remove the uncertainty that accompanies an election date announcement, and allow people to plan for the year is nonsense. The only people whose lives are run by election cycles are the pollies and the befuddled bureaucrats supposed to do their bidding. The truth is that the loss of political initiative and flexibility afforded by being able to call the election at short notice, is outweighed by the costs of continual leadership speculation, the ugly spectre of by-elections labor would certainly lose, and the value of being seen as trying to be positive about the long term, and sensible policy development.
The bad news. This current shambles of a government will probably be replaced by the largely invisible, talentless, non entities of preening self indulgence that currently inhabits the opposition benches. The only one of them who appears to be able to make an intelligent argument, supported by facts, logic, and wit is Malcolm Turnbull, who it seems will struggle to keep his vitriol in check in the face of the rampant “ordinaryness” of his party and coalition colleagues.
Where are the John Buttons, Fred Dalys, Peter Walshs, Paul Keatings, Tim Fischers, Lindsay Tanners, and Jim Killens of past Parliaments when you need them. (most of these examples from my memory seem to be Labor???) Like them or not, agree with them or not, at least you knew they stood for something, what it was, and they were prepared to openly debate the merits with facts, listen to divergent views, and set out to turn them around through adult conversation and debate, albeit laced with humor, sarcasm and irony.
It is going to be a very long year!
Jan 16, 2013 | Change, Personal Rant, Social Media
As a kid, I built a series of model planes, mostly WW11 fighters, flown with 2.5 – 5 cc motors, on the end of a set of wires. Loved it.
I experimented with primitive radio controlled, built a Spitfire, and put some radio gear in it, some I had scrounged from older enthusiasts, a bit I had bought, at relatively huge expense, as the only money I had was earned refilling shelves in the local supermarket , 2 afternoons a week after school. The Spit’s first flight was a disaster, literally, and it ended as many real Spits did, as a burnt patch in the grass, ending the passion, although by that time I had started to see girls through different eyes, and the supermarket flying money suddenly had competition.
Well, a lot has changed from then, in the 60’s.
Chris Anderson, one of the great writers (Editor of Wired, writer of “The Long Tail“) and innovators, has commercialised what are now being called drones, but are really only modern versions of my Spit, with cameras onboard, and in the case of military versions, I suspect a bit of a bite. The stuff on his site, DIYdrones , is reviving the itch of a boy, but the 61 year old marketer is seeing enormous commercial and nefarious potential.
It seems to me that many familiar things from years ago are making a comeback in modern form, from the VW bug, to Malibu surfboards, and my “spit”. Only difference is the new ones outperform the old by a geometric factor.
