There are times when you just want to say something and this something was caused by two things - first - attending Sir Paul Callaghan's lunchtime talk in Dunedin yesterday about the sustainable development of New Zealand's business sector [the content is here] and second, reading this morning that Air New Zealand is one of the world's top five airlines.
Sir Paul presents a set of measures in his presentation that show that NZ is one of the most unequal societies in the OECD in terms of income distribution, but also one of the most democratic. It has one of the best school systems and one of the worst child endangerment rates. One of the least corrupt societies but with one of the worst imprisonment rates - worst meaning the proportion of the population incarcerated.
He is interested in destroying the mythologies that hold us back from achieving significant economic growth and that send such a high proportion of our educated graduates to live and work overseas. That means creating the kind of businesses which can achieve sufficient scale to provide the kind of national income per capita that supports a sophisticated society and provides jobs that smart people want.
I've done a lot of research in the past three years among businesses, investors and exporters and I know we suffer from a scale problem - on a number of levels.
In terms of business scale we have a lot of small to medium sized businesses and not many global giants. Well, one. In terms of the quality and scale of our scientific output it's very good - but about as large as that of a single major overseas city. Say, Boston or Edinburgh. Our economy is the size of Delaware.
What's more, as a small but highly developed island nation in the South Pacific we defy easy pigeon-holing.
Typically small island nations are in the world's economic long tail - one of 150 countries you never hear about except as tourism destinations or earthquake locations.
Well, we do that too - but a lot more besides. The 'lot more besides' is the hard sell because it doesn't fit the general rule. People look to Asia, US and Europe for high tech innovation and design expertise, but we do that here, really well.
We don't even know ourselves how well we do it. Perhaps we should have called ourselves the Switzerland of the South Pacific after all.
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Perspective on the Earthquake
Today my firm [which is actually mine] made a reasonably large donation to the Student Volunteer Army .
As I wrote to a couple of colleagues today - "I made a donation to the student volunteer army this morning - 10,000 of them who apparently clean up streets, remove liquefaction and rubble. I thought the best thing was to help the majority have as great a sense of normality as possible – less than 2000 physically injured but probably 400,000 distressed and dislocated".
I know the usual thing is to give to the immediate supporters and rescuers - and it's great that many people will do that - but on Tuesday 22 February I was on the phone with my daughter as she walked down one of the four avenues of Christchurch - and I just want her and all the people walking those streets on that day with that mix of fear, disbelief and courage to have something that says "it's going to be fine."
These students, doing what they can, using the simplest human tools of connection and organisation to achieve their aims, are helping to make it fine. And fast! You see Haiti a year on looking as devastated as it was on the day of its earthquake. That won't be the case in Christchurch. There may be quite a few gaps [hopefully gravelled with a couple of park benches and a tree] but I think it will look fairly tidy.
Second, I decided I would like to go and live in Christchurch in the future.
In my head is the image of the Napier earthquake and how it led to the building of amazing buildings in Napier - the cutting edge of the 1930's and, with Miami, one of the treasure troves of the Art Deco style. I wonder how that happened?
Leap-frogging over the present devastation as if it was a mere moment in time [which it is] I'm envisaging this fantastic safe, most modern city in the world outside Singapore, Shanghai and Dubai, with an amazing eco-friendly, people-friendly, earthquake proof [important] New Zealand twist.
Thursday, January 13, 2011
Perspectives
I find myself torn between a view of humanity as just another plague upon the surface of the earth - threatening to eat itself out of a habitat - and as a marvelous complex blend of intellect and emotion whose every achievement is worthy of exploration and analysis.
A marvelously complex over-achieving little plague of humans?
I don't think you can divorce study of our stellar progress and finer feelings from the fact that just like rats, locusts and fleas, we seem doomed to compete and starve ourselves into a more sustainable relationship with the earth.
Not many finer feelings there.
Under that scenario, the 'fittest' who would perhaps survive a population crunch of the one we're heading for would also be the most aggressive people, or those who can survive on the least amount of food and water and outlast the others. GI Joe and Anorexic Barbie?
The reality is that the rate of growth of our population is as much about the growth of the length of a single life as it is about the number of children we have.
If the average lifespan is 30 years rather than 70 or 80, the rate of population growth is massively lower- because there's really only two generations around at any one time. Contrast this with our population where the fastest growing demographic is 85 plus - that means four or even five generations alive at once, all burning fossil fuels and drinking fresh water.
A marvelously complex over-achieving little plague of humans?
I don't think you can divorce study of our stellar progress and finer feelings from the fact that just like rats, locusts and fleas, we seem doomed to compete and starve ourselves into a more sustainable relationship with the earth.
Not many finer feelings there.
Under that scenario, the 'fittest' who would perhaps survive a population crunch of the one we're heading for would also be the most aggressive people, or those who can survive on the least amount of food and water and outlast the others. GI Joe and Anorexic Barbie?
The reality is that the rate of growth of our population is as much about the growth of the length of a single life as it is about the number of children we have.
If the average lifespan is 30 years rather than 70 or 80, the rate of population growth is massively lower- because there's really only two generations around at any one time. Contrast this with our population where the fastest growing demographic is 85 plus - that means four or even five generations alive at once, all burning fossil fuels and drinking fresh water.
It's just like compound interest really.
Thursday, January 6, 2011
Beginning
I'm setting up this blog, not just for now but for my future life. 12 years running my own firm has left me fulfilled on many levels - and yet not.
I've been a social trends researcher for many years - long enough for some of my earlier predictions to be tested by reality.
In 1997 I predicted that by 2007 we'd be carrying all our books in a single digital reader - while it was the shape of a laptop or a kindle or an iPad, it was way fatter - completely missed the whole move to slim lines.
And I predicted to a postal organisation that the last personal letter would be sent by post in 2017. . . so that one's on track, at least in this country.
Adding it all up I do better than the 20% hit rate that is apparently normal for prediction, but the fact remains that prediction is hard and ultimately silly because most of us just look at a prediction and go - hmmh.
There's probably less than a thousand people in the world that can actually use a prediction properly - to design products or services to come on stream in the future. And most of them don't really need any help.
What my social trends research has left me with is a clear understanding of how people operate. So I've found it increasingly easy to say things like: people aren't like that / this isn't going back to how it was / cycles are usually actually spirals .. and stuff like that.
So I hope to be able to use that skill to help people to ground today's decisions in the realities of human nature.
I've been a social trends researcher for many years - long enough for some of my earlier predictions to be tested by reality.
In 1997 I predicted that by 2007 we'd be carrying all our books in a single digital reader - while it was the shape of a laptop or a kindle or an iPad, it was way fatter - completely missed the whole move to slim lines.
And I predicted to a postal organisation that the last personal letter would be sent by post in 2017. . . so that one's on track, at least in this country.
Adding it all up I do better than the 20% hit rate that is apparently normal for prediction, but the fact remains that prediction is hard and ultimately silly because most of us just look at a prediction and go - hmmh.
There's probably less than a thousand people in the world that can actually use a prediction properly - to design products or services to come on stream in the future. And most of them don't really need any help.
What my social trends research has left me with is a clear understanding of how people operate. So I've found it increasingly easy to say things like: people aren't like that / this isn't going back to how it was / cycles are usually actually spirals .. and stuff like that.
So I hope to be able to use that skill to help people to ground today's decisions in the realities of human nature.
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