Archive for the 'Government' Category
Tom Flynn and the Parthenon Sculptures and other outrages
Wednesday, April 9th, 2008
artintelligence.co.uk
is the website of Tom Flynn Art Advisory Services. There are a large number of very interesting essays on a number of differnet issues facing museums including return of cultural property, the Churchill Museum at the War Cabinet Offices and so on. There is a blog which has been in abbeyance but is about to recommence. The website and blog both have lots of interesting commentary, most recently (April 2008) concerning the Parthenon sculptures and the UNESCO conference in Athens in March on the Return of Cultural Objects to their Countries of Origin. Tom has a post “Parthenon Marbles Case Overshadowed by Iraq Looting” on the museum security network about the Sculptures also.
This is a copy of the updated entry in the Links page of this site.
Generalisations and Transformations
Sunday, January 20th, 2008
In seeking to understand complex issues, we need rich data sets, not broad generalisations. So says Bill Lewis, founding director of McKinsey Global Institute, just a few years ago in “The Power of Productivity” (McKinsey Quarterly 2004 number 2).
Lewis asserts that the consensuses about economics at the end of the Second World War and at the fall of the Soviet Union have proved wrong. These consensuses at the end of the Second World War concerned infrastructure, technology, education and health care. After the fall of the Soviet Union the consensuses focused on inflation, price control, privatisation and corporate governance. In both cases it was believed resolution of these issues would advance economies, in particular the economies of poorer countries. In considering these “failures” Lewis draws an analogy with astronomy and cosmology.
The problem was, according to Lewis, that the consensuses were grounded in an analysis of economies at the aggregate level. That was like trying to learn about the physical universe by using only the telescopes of astronomy. Most real understanding in physics, however, has actually come from studying the interaction of the tiniest particles in the universe. In economics, Lewis says, it is necessary to understand why individual companies operate as they do, not national data sets and complex econometric tools that yield qualified answers at best.
Lewis proceeds to analyze some of the productivity data from around the world, drawing some challenging conclusions, particularly that economic growth principally flows from competition, not from education or technology or better governance and so on. The data which Lewis analyses comes from studies by the McKinsey Global Institute of individual companies.
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Of more specific interest are two articles in the McKinsey Quarterly in 2006 dealing with change management and managing organizational performance on the basis of evidence. Both are topics which I have previously dealt with. Both articles contain information of relevance to museums. (There are also interesting conclusions in a number of papers in the 2007 issues of the McKinsey Quarterly and these will be summarized in a forthcoming post.)
The McKinsey studies show that the most successful transformations of business performance occur when executives mobilize and sustain energy within their organizations and communicate their objectives clearly and creatively.
Strong organizational performance is really fueled not by isolated interventions but by a combination of three or four carefully selected complementary ones, what McKinsey calls management “practices”. Managers, according to McKinsey researchers, should concentrate most of their energy on a small number of practices that, introduced together, typically produces the best results. Doing more doesn’t add much value and involves disproportionate, not to mention wasted, effort.
Many executives struggle to design structures, create reporting relationships, and develop evaluation systems that make people accountable—in other words, that require them to take responsibility for the results of the business. However “companies seeking to improve in this area are much more likely to succeed if they concentrate on giving individuals clear roles rather than resorting to other options, such as consequence management.”
“… executives who set broad, stretching aspirations that are meaningful to their employees have a better chance of achieving the outcome they want than do executives who resort to conventional, dominant, or detailed top-down leadership… the best way to promote high-performance behavior in organizations is to emphasize openness and trust among employees.”
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There is an important point relevant to these findings. It is that if we are going to be concerned about understanding the workings of individual enterprises and we are gong to demand management based on evidence, as indeed we should, then the ongoing dominance of what is called New Public Management (NPM), needs to be more than seriously questioned. NPM seeks to have public activity decreased and, if at all, exercised according to business principles of efficiency. It is based on the belief that all human behaviour is motivated by self-interest and, specifically, profit maximization. Governments pursuing NPM have failed to deliver a more effective state better serving the citizenry, they have failed the accountability test! One of the bases of NPM is self-interest. Self interest was one of the three key themes of eighteenth century Scottish moral philosopher and pioneering political economist Adam Smith. But this term is used in the context of NPM in a way quite different from that in which Adam Smith employed it in his treatise, “The Wealth of Nations“.
The reaction to the run down in services, the decline in infrastructure and the perceived problems of the State’s infrastructure which we see in many western industrialised countries outside continental Europe, derives, it is asserted, from the failure of the bureaucracy to function effectively and of politicians to correct the failures. This affects the majority of museums as well as arts and heritage organizations. The translation of the best of business practice to nonprofits, not the translation of the profit-making motive of business, has been a central theme in the pages of this site.
Making government more businesslike has simply involved a set of assertions, not any real understanding. That is not the approach Atul Gawande, award-winning professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School, surgeon and author, took in exploring what makes a good doctor and how hospitals can be improved. Gawande says, “I would love to know who really are the best in the kinds of operations I do, who had the lowest complication rates, the highest survival rates? And if I knew that, I would go and watch them and I’d learn from them”.
The problems with NPM and the mistranslation of Adam Smith’s work will be taken up in a forthcoming short note.
Continue to article.
Enterprise Systems: Centralized control or Let genuine expertise flourish
Friday, November 16th, 2007
Despite the evidence to the contrary, some people still believe that leadership means giving direction rather than putting in place the processes which encourage above average performance by staff.
Centralized control is based on the proposition that people generally can’t be trusted and that only those at the top of the hierarchy have the knowledge and experience to make the right decisions. However, those at the top frequently do not have the most up-to-date information and what information they do have may not be relevant to the local situation at all. It turns out that co-ordination is most successfully achieved, not by managers enforcing rules and regulations, but by managers attending to building the organization’s culture, by emphasizing trust and seeking above average performance. Increasingly, flexible teams are recognized as necessary, indeed as the only workable proposition The standards in such groups are set by the members of the group themselves on the basis of what they understand to be best practice from their own observations. Remember the exhortation from James Collins and Gerry Porras that successful organizations build strong cultures.
In recent discussions I had with museum people in Australia about relations between museums and indigenous peoples the issue of centralized control – the unreasonable expectations of politicians and senior bureaucrats – was brought to the fore. Government representatives expect that once material like human remains is returned, the job has been completed and the responsibility of the museum has been met but indigenous people consider this to be the start of a relationship which stretches into the future. Governments obsessed about control rather than values will never succeed!
These issues are dealt with by Simon Head, Senior Fellow at the Rothermere American Institute at Oxford University. His most recent book is The New Ruthless Economy: Work and Power in the Digital Age. (August 2003).
(The audio of an interview on the Brian Lehrer Show on New York Public Radio with Simon Head can be heard here.)
In the New York Review of Books for August 16, 2007 (“They’re Micromanaging Your Every Move”) Head reviews three books, The Social Life of Information by John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid (Harvard Business School), Bait and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream by Barbara Ehrenreich (Owl Books) and The Culture of the New Capitalism by Richard Sennett (Yale University Press).
Head reminds us of issues dealt with in his book which centres on the use of what are called “Enterprise Systems” or ES to control the work even of professionals such as computer specialists and doctors. ES is the method used to run call centres and retail stores like Walmart. (There are numerous articles about Walmart and its management practices.) Continue to essay.
Prime Minister Tony Blair speaking on the Arts March 6 2007
Tuesday, March 20th, 2007
On March 6, British Prime Minister Tony Blair spoke gave an important speech at Tate Modern on the arts. The intended speech is reprinted in full in the Guardian.
Here are some highlights - the first several introductory paragraphs and then statements referring specifically to museums. Not the least interesting statistics are those concerning the increases in attendances at the National Museums since admission was made free, including increases from particular socio-economic groupings which are historically less inclined to visit museums.
There are also interesting observations about “arms length” administration and funding rather than control.
These statements can surely be used in advocacy in Australia.
Years ago, before coming to government, I said that we would make the arts and culture part of our “core script”. In other words, it was no longer to be on the periphery, an add-on, a valued bit of fun when the serious work of government was done; but rather it was to be central, an essential part of the narrative about the character of a new, different, changed Britain.
When I said this all those years back, I think there was a certain amount of scepticism. But at last week’s Downing Street seminar in advance of this speech, one participant said we would look back on the last 10 years as a “golden age” for the arts. I will come on to why that has happened in a moment.
But the important point to realise is why I said it. I didn’t say it because I thought we, as a government, were of great importance to you, the arts, but rather because you, the arts, were going to be of fundamental importance to the country.
The reason for this will be spelt out in the policy reviews shortly to be published across government and is utterly critical to understanding why arts and culture matter to a modern nation like Britain.
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So when more children get access to the joy of art, it is not the art alone that they learn; it is the art of living, thinking and creating. They may never be, probably won’t ever be, an artist or a dancer or a designer, but in whatever job, in whichever walk of life, they will carry an idea that is not just about the buying and selling, but about what makes the ordinary, special. When people on low incomes can visit museums free of charge, and see great works of art, they take something of the inspiration with them. A nation that cares about art will not just be a better nation. In the early 21st Century it will be a more successful one.
It is worth a brief counter-factual exercise. Imagine what the world would have been like if we had continued with the funding regime and the policies that we inherited. Many of the country’s finest regional theatres would have closed or would exist as shadows of themselves, on a diet of light drama. Many orchestras would have gone to the wall. There would be no new programmes for art education. Museums, far from being full, would have gradually diminished in importance as charging reduced the audience to the middle class. I’m not sure there would be a British film industry, or at least not one nearly so healthy, or the same huge success at the National Theatre.
Instead government funding has doubled since 1997 and is now done on a more stable 3-year basis. Free admission has meant that there are 42 million visits each year to museums and galleries.
We have been able to run very effective policies to keep ticket prices down. In the case of national museums, of course, entry is free.… visits to national museums have risen by almost 30 million.
Between 2002/03 and 2004/05 the number of people from lower socio-economic groups visiting government-sponsored museums increased by almost 30%. The Renaissance in the Regions programme has helped attract almost three quarters of a million new visitors from communities that would not traditionally attend a museum.
The tourist benefit shows the British model in action. Seven of the ten most popular tourist attractions in this country are government-sponsored museums and galleries. 28% of visitors to the London theatre come from overseas.
Increasing numbers of British arts organisations and artists now tour internationally. The British Museum’s exhibition in Tehran provided an opportunity for the Foreign Secretary to visit at a sensitive time. The Arts Council’s international fellowship programme and its Artists Link Programme with the British Council in China have created some great international exchanges. The British Museum and the V&A have also announced an unprecedented programme of collaboration with China. Exhibitions from the British Museum have also been helping build civil society in Kenya and Ethiopia.
I think the results have been spectacular. When you are searching to show how things have changed you are usually seeking a policy that somehow embodies it.
Perhaps it is free entry to museums. But actually the crucial thing is not the policy but the fact that, as Nick Serota said to me recently, museums now just “feel” different. They have a different atmosphere.
Global Climate Change
Monday, February 5th, 2007
It is a truism to say this has become a major issue! It is, however, an extraordinary feature of the modern world that, despite a huge and increasing scientific literature leading increasingly to the conclusion that the world’s climate is warming and becoming more unstable and that it is our activities which have contributed to this, especially since the beginning of the industrial “revolution” and its reliance on fossil fuels, people are still prepared to deny these conclusions.
My contribution was an attack on the ridiculous views advanced in December 2004 by free trade advocate, climate change sceptic and consultant to the developing world Alan Oxley.
“Global warming is happening right now” On Line Opinion Monday, January 31, 2005
“December 2004 saw the partial collapse of support for the United Nations’ Kyoto Protocol at the Buenos Aires Conference of the Parties. Only limited and informal talks were agreed on for the future. As environmental groups objected to the “obstructionism” of the US attempts to kill off the Protocol altogether, Alan Oxley, well known Free Trade advocate and opponent of the Protocol gleefully reported, “The United States, China, India and the rest of the developing countries have taken over the UN climate process and sidelined the Kyoto Protocol”. More, “… the Howard government is now in the international mainstream of climate change policy”. And, “The science used to justify the Treaty has been steadily unwinding”.
“In fact, European countries are enlarging their carbon trading, science reveals increasing evidence of warming, and Britain’s Tony Blair is committed to progressing solutions to warming described as “in the long term, the single most important issue facing the global community” and to involving the US in finding solutions. Saudi Arabia will endorse the Protocol even though it will lose billions of dollars as a result of emission reductions by industrialised countries. Meanwhile, the US Administration has removed or watered down protection for the environment, promoted high energy use and ignored inefficiencies. Australia is simply following along after the US wherever it goes…”
It is absolutely imperative that governments, business, the scientific community and we, as ordinary people, do everything we can to reverse the trends. We are told that while it is unlikely that action now will have have much effect in the next few decades, it may alleviate the situation later. It is not reponsible for people to say, as the Hon Malcolm Turnbull, recently appointed Minister for Environment and Water, did, that there is little Australia can do but adapt to it.
The “Stern Report” for the British Government made important points about pricing carbon emissions: the reaction of some was to protest that any imposition of prices would lead to economic decline, job losses and more. This is despite many studies showing that moves to alternative and renewable energy sources and more efficiencies in energy use would be economically positive.
The latest report by the International Panel on Climate Change “The Physical Science Basis: a Summary for Policymakers”, was released February 2, 2007 in Paris and adopted in a line-by line review by the governments of 113 countries, including the United States. The Report is here. It is worth going to the Report and examining the graphs of increase in concentrations of CO2, methane and nitrous oxide.
Too many groups in the community which have attained influential views are too reluctant to face the consequences of inadequate action now. How will their reluctance be viewed by our chidren and grandchildren, should they survive? And too many people are not listening closely enough and are too prepared to make their own broad claims, unsubstantiated by the evidence, about the views and positions adopted by others, for instance on issues such as nuclear energy. Calling for debate about nuclear energy does not constitute endorsement of nuclear energy.
Too much argument centres around exaggerated claims about negative economic impacts of taking remedial action, searches for single solutions to the phasing our of coal and oil and the assertion that little effect will flow from actions of smaller countries like Australia until large devleoping nations like China and India take action. There is insufficient attention to the savings to be made by increasing efficiency in the heating and cooling of buildings of all kinds, the gains from more efficient public transport, especially off-road transport.
An example of on going denial is yet another item on how the world is not warming on the site of Jennifer Marohassy which has links to the Fraser Institute in Canada. You may care to read the comments on the post as well!
Undoubtedly there will be further posts on this issue.