tag:theconversation.com,2011:/ca/topics/competence-17333/articlesCompetence – The Conversation2023-07-16T09:58:13Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2092622023-07-16T09:58:13Z2023-07-16T09:58:13ZSouth Africa’s public protector has a vital watchdog role. Researcher offers tips on how the selection process can be improved<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536831/original/file-20230711-23-s0daqk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Public protector Busisiwe Mkhwebane at her impeachment hearing in Cape Town.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Lombard/Gallo Images via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The end of apartheid in South Africa in 1994 made it necessary to establish several institutions to underpin the country’s new constitutional democracy.</p>
<p>The office of the public protector was one of them. It was established in 1995 to exercise oversight over governmental power. The constitution grants the public protector autonomy to <a href="https://www.oxford.co.za/book/9780195991376-south-african-constitutional-law-in-context">investigate</a> improper government conduct and maladministration. The aim is to enhance government accountability and responsibility, thus safeguarding the public interest. </p>
<p>The term of the third incumbent, Busisiwe Mkhwebane, who was appointed in 2016, has been mired in <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-public-protectors-job-is-to-make-sure-people-stick-to-the-law-not-to-change-it-79931">controversy</a>. She has faced serious criticism and calls for her removal amid allegations of <a href="https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2019-07-23-now-that-the-concourt-has-found-the-public-protector-both-dishonest-and-incompetent-will-parliament-axe-her/">dishonesty and incompetence</a>. She was suspended on 9 June 2022 and is the subject of an <a href="https://pmg.org.za/committee-meeting/36572/">impeachment inquiry</a>. </p>
<p>It’s not the first time the office has been caught up in controversy. Lawrence Mushwana, the second public protector (2002-2009), was <a href="https://www.corruptionwatch.org.za/sas-public-protectors-the-legacies-part-two/">perceived</a> by some as biased towards the governing African National Congress. This raised doubts in some quarters about the institution’s independence and impartiality.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/storm-around-south-africas-public-protector-shows-robustness-not-a-crisis-120902">Storm around South Africa's public protector shows robustness, not a crisis</a>
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<p>The controversies and their impacts show how important it is to make the right appointment to the position. </p>
<p>I have been teaching and <a href="https://journals.co.za/doi/abs/10.10520/EJC-1a7adf489e">conducting research</a> in organisational psychology and theory for the past decade. My diverse research interests in the areas of professional employee recruitment and selection have provided me with valuable insights into best practices.</p>
<p>In a joint <a href="https://sajhrm.co.za/index.php/sajhrm/article/view/1207">2021 study</a> we examined the recruitment and selection process of South Africa’s <a href="https://www.pprotect.org/">public protector</a>. In our view the <a href="https://www.parliament.gov.za/press-releases/media-statement-committee-nominate-next-public-protector-calls-nominations-or-applications">process</a> is deeply flawed. It needs an overhaul to ensure it is transparent, professional and free from political bias. </p>
<p>In particular, enlisting the expertise of professionals would make the recruitment and selection process more robust, transparent and fair. </p>
<p>Our analysis highlights the need for a comprehensive approach to the process. It must involve multiple stakeholders and expertise from fields such as law, human resources, and work or organisational psychology.</p>
<p>Fixing the flaws will improve competence and public trust in the public protector’s office.</p>
<h2>The public protector</h2>
<p>The public protector is one of six institutions created by <a href="https://openbooks.uct.ac.za/uct/catalog/download/25/32/1275?inline=1">Chapter 9</a> of the South African constitution. The office investigates improper conduct in state affairs and public administration.</p>
<p>It is <a href="https://constitutionallawofsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Chap24A.pdf">entrusted</a> with monitoring state officials and agencies to promote an effective, ethical and accountable public service. The office plays a vital “<a href="https://constitutionallawofsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Chap24A.pdf">government watchdog</a>” role in safeguarding the public interest.</p>
<p>Given the public protector’s crucial role in combating corruption and maladministration, the selection of a <a href="https://pmg.org.za/committee-meeting/22629/">“fit and proper”</a> candidate is paramount. Making the <a href="https://journals.co.za/doi/full/10.4102/sajhrm.v19i0.1207">right appointment is key</a> for the institution’s effectiveness and integrity.</p>
<h2>Flaws in the recruitment process</h2>
<p>The constitution <a href="https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.4102/sajhrm.v19i0.1207">outlines</a> the appointment procedures for and functions of the public protector. But it lacks specific guidelines for the recruitment and selection of a suitable candidate. This raises concerns about the fairness of the process and potential political influence. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.4102/sajhrm.v19i0.1207">Public Protector Act, 1994</a> also outlines the requirements for appointment. But it too does not provide a clear definition of what constitutes a “fit and proper” person for the role. It lists qualifications such as legal expertise, administrative knowledge and cumulative experience of 10 years in the administration of justice, public administration or public finance.</p>
<p>It doesn’t explain why it emphasises 10 years of experience, or why these specific criteria are important. </p>
<p>The act does not promote transparency in the appointment process. Instead of following a professional recruitment and selection approach, it leaves this to a committee of the national assembly. The committee consists of representatives of various political parties. </p>
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Read more:
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<p>Filling the committee with politicians compromises the professional ethics of recruitment and selection. The committee lacks qualifications in human resources or recruitment. It has no training on the process. Yet, it recommends a candidate to be appointed by the president.</p>
<p>The committee has no clear guidelines or criteria for choosing a fit and proper person for the position. It relies on interviews and personal judgments, leaving room for bias and subjective decision making. The committee does not provide its rationale for the qualities considered during the shortlisting of candidates. </p>
<h2>What needs to happen</h2>
<p>Clear guidelines, competencies and expert input should be established so that a qualified and suitable candidate is appointed for this important role.</p>
<p>The recruitment process should adhere to best practices in human resources. It should use scientific methods to assess candidates’ knowledge, skills and abilities. </p>
<p>Human resources experts can provide insights and expertise in developing the selection criteria, based on job analysis and competency frameworks. They can help develop standardised methods of assessment, including competency-based behavioural assessments. These can be used to evaluate candidates’ qualifications, integrity, reliability, diligence and other required characteristics.</p>
<p>Work or organisational psychology experts would use structured interviews, comprehensive reference checks, and blind or anonymous assessments.</p>
<h2>Effectiveness and integrity</h2>
<p>The recruitment and selection process for a new public protector <a href="https://www.parliament.gov.za/press-releases/media-statement-committee-nominate-next-public-protector-calls-nominations-or-applications">started in May</a>. The current incumbent’s term expires in October. The public protector is appointed for a non-renewable seven-year term. </p>
<p>The appointment directly affects the country’s governance and accountability of public officials. </p>
<p>Selection of unsuitable candidates compromises the effectiveness and integrity of the office. </p>
<p>Our research highlights the urgency of addressing these procedural issues so that the public protector can fulfil its role of protecting the public interest, promoting transparency and upholding democratic principles.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/209262/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sandiso Bazana does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Past controversies and their impacts show how important it is to make the right appointment to the position.Sandiso Bazana, PhD Candidate/Research & Teaching Assistant, Grenoble Ecole de Management/Lecturer in Organisational Psychology, Rhodes UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2088372023-07-04T02:16:52Z2023-07-04T02:16:52ZShould terminally ill young people be able to choose voluntary assisted dying? The ACT is considering it<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/535235/original/file-20230703-246284-7e1hli.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=17%2C4%2C2977%2C1985&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/little-girl-sick-her-hand-hold-771736510">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The ACT Labor-Greens government is currently considering legalising voluntary assisted dying, as has recently occurred in all six Australian states. But the results of community consultation on the <a href="https://hdp-au-prod-app-act-yoursay-files.s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/5016/8791/2515/FINAL_Listening_Report_VAD_for_publication_on_YourSay_-_27.06.23.pdf">topic</a> suggest the ACT’s proposed legislation may differ in significant respects from the <a href="https://eprints.qut.edu.au/238547/">model</a> adopted by other Australian states and territories. </p>
<p>One controversial difference is the <a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/teens-as-young-as-14-could-access-voluntary-assisted-dying-in-the-act/news-story/44dfd2f135c71e2f88d4603275ed794b">proposal</a> to allow people under 18 to access voluntary assisted dying if they have a terminal illness. </p>
<p>The ACT proposes not setting a minimum age requirement for access to voluntary assisted dying. Instead, as is the case with other areas of medical treatment, the decision-making capacity of people under the age of 18 would be assessed on a case-by-case basis by medical practitioners. </p>
<p>If they are assessed as having the maturity to understand the nature of their medical condition, and the nature of a decision to seek assistance to end their life, they would be able to be considered for voluntary assisted dying.</p>
<h2>ACT could be the first</h2>
<p>There appears to be some support within the ACT for this proposal. In a <a href="https://yoursayconversations.act.gov.au/voluntary-assisted-dying-in-ACT">survey</a> of almost 3,000 ACT residents conducted in February this year, some 32% of respondents supported a minimum age of 18 for people to be able to access voluntary assisted dying – suggesting the majority don’t see it as required. </p>
<p>However, it has already elicited <a href="https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/horrified-act-government-may-offer-euthanasia-for-teens/video/d18fc11b451b16a8518e74e83c2f2dff">impassioned commentary</a>, <a href="https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/politics/senator-james-paterson-argues-euthanasia-is-never-completely-safe-as-act-considers-access-to-terminally-ill-teens/news-story/2afc4e0cec0d240b069debe7519c3df6">debate</a> and <a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/low-barr-archbishops-concerns-vad-will-lead-act-standard-to-the-gutter/news-story/6e460bfb70796cc915501412cdb717d5">expressions of concern</a>.</p>
<p>If passed, the ACT would become the first Australian jurisdiction to allow access to voluntary assisted dying by people under 18. </p>
<p>Internationally, only three countries – the <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/international-perspectives-on-endoflife-law-reform/extension-of-the-belgian-euthanasia-law-to-minors-in-2014/C32C0050B67BF4EE16020BA320B0B415">Netherlands, Belgium and Colombia</a> – permit minors to access voluntary assisted dying or euthanasia. Canada is currently considering a <a href="https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/44-1/AMAD/report-2/page-135#33">proposal</a> to expand its assisted dying law to “mature minors” deemed to have decision-making capacity. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/voluntary-assisted-dying-is-legal-in-victoria-but-you-may-not-be-able-to-access-it-208282">Voluntary assisted dying is legal in Victoria, but you may not be able to access it</a>
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<h2>Suffering doesn’t discriminate by age</h2>
<p>During <a href="https://yoursayconversations.act.gov.au/voluntary-assisted-dying-in-ACT/listening-report-now-available">community consultation</a>, many ACT residents felt an age requirement would be arbitrary. </p>
<p>Young people, just like adults, may also be suffering intolerably from an incurable terminal illness. Age limits are only an approximation of a person’s capacity to make one’s own decisions in important matters of life and death. </p>
<p>However, the absence of age limits can also lead to significant variations in access, depending on the views of the medical practitioners involved in making the decision as to a young person’s capacity. </p>
<p>In Belgium, where <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2016/09/17/health/belgium-minor-euthanasia/index.html">no minimum age</a> is stipulated (provided children understand the decision they are making), children as young as 9 and 11 have been granted access to euthanasia.</p>
<p>In the <a href="https://www.government.nl/topics/euthanasia/euthanasia-assisted-suicide-and-non-resuscitation-on-request">Netherlands</a>, children must be aged 12 or over to request euthanasia. In <a href="https://wfrtds.org/worldmap/colombia/">Colombia</a>, in most cases a child must be aged 12 or over, although in extraordinary cases children aged between 6 and 12 may demonstrate “exceptional neurocognitive and psychological development” and an advanced concept of death appropriate for a 12-year-old child. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/535234/original/file-20230703-117502-cex7d1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=45%2C18%2C5961%2C3989&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="child with bald head in blurred in background of medical setting with toys on shelf" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/535234/original/file-20230703-117502-cex7d1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=45%2C18%2C5961%2C3989&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/535234/original/file-20230703-117502-cex7d1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/535234/original/file-20230703-117502-cex7d1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/535234/original/file-20230703-117502-cex7d1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/535234/original/file-20230703-117502-cex7d1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/535234/original/file-20230703-117502-cex7d1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/535234/original/file-20230703-117502-cex7d1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The ACT would be the first Australian place to approve voluntary assisted dying for minors.</span>
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<h2>Checks and balances required</h2>
<p>The ACT government noted allowing young people to access voluntary assisted dying requires <a href="https://hdp-au-prod-app-act-yoursay-files.s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/5016/8791/2515/FINAL_Listening_Report_VAD_for_publication_on_YourSay_-_27.06.23.pdf">extra safeguards</a> to balance the autonomous rights of young people against their right to special protection and the rights of families. </p>
<p>Parental consent is required in addition to the child’s consent for all children in Belgium (except emancipated minors), and for children aged under 16 in the Netherlands and under 14 in Colombia.</p>
<p>For children aged 16 to 17 in the Netherlands, and 14 to 17 in Colombia, parents are informed and consulted about the young person’s decision. But ultimately the decision is that of the child. </p>
<p>If the ACT proceeds down this path, legislation will need to address difficult questions, including whose wishes prevail if a young person and their parents are in conflict. </p>
<p>Some jurisdictions, including Belgium and Columbia, require extra consultations above those required for adults, to confirm a young person’s capacity to make the decision to end their life. </p>
<p>Other supports may include access to child and family counselling throughout the voluntary assisted dying request and assessment process, or independent review of the child’s eligibility assessment.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/voluntary-assisted-dying-will-soon-be-legal-in-all-states-heres-whats-just-happened-in-nsw-and-what-it-means-for-you-183355">Voluntary assisted dying will soon be legal in all states. Here's what's just happened in NSW and what it means for you</a>
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<h2>How many young people could choose voluntary assisted dying?</h2>
<p>There is not likely to be a great need for young people to access voluntary assisted dying in the ACT. </p>
<p>In Belgium, only four children are reported to have accessed euthanasia in <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/international-perspectives-on-endoflife-law-reform/extension-of-the-belgian-euthanasia-law-to-minors-in-2014/C32C0050B67BF4EE16020BA320B0B415">nine years</a>. In the Netherlands, 17 cases have been reported over a <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40656-022-00554-3">20-year period</a>. Although cases of terminally ill young people seeking access to VAD are likely to be <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-04-29/rhys-habermann-and-voluntary-euthanasia/100062384">exceptional</a>, they will occasionally arise. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/dutch-government-to-expand-euthanasia-law-to-include-children-aged-one-to-12-an-ethicists-view-203961">Dutch government to expand euthanasia law to include children aged one to 12 – an ethicist's view</a>
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<h2>How else could ACT laws be different?</h2>
<p>Some other departures from the <a href="https://eprints.qut.edu.au/238547/">Australian model</a> proposed by the ACT government are likely to have a far greater impact than the inclusion of minors. </p>
<p>The proposal not to specify a timeframe to death will open the door for people diagnosed with a terminal illness to seek voluntary assisted death several years before their anticipated passing. In other countries, such as Canada, this has been interpreted to allow people to access voluntary assisted dying in the early stages of dementia, before a person loses capacity. </p>
<p>Another proposal with far-reaching ramifications is whether a request for voluntary assisted dying can be made in an <a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/teens-as-young-as-14-could-access-voluntary-assisted-dying-in-the-act/news-story/44dfd2f135c71e2f88d4603275ed794b">advance directive</a>. If enacted, this would allow for the euthanasia of a person with advanced dementia, in compliance with their previous request. </p>
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<h2>Under consideration</h2>
<p>At this stage, these proposals simply summarise the views of the ACT community. The next step is for the ACT government to develop its preferred model law to legalise voluntary assisted dying in the territory. </p>
<p>A bill is likely to be introduced in late 2023. It will then be considered by a parliamentary committee, before being debated in the ACT Legislative Assembly some time next year. That gives the ACT government time to consider what safeguards and supports should be included if children or young people are to be permitted to access voluntary assisted dying there.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208837/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Katrine Del Villar was a member of the team from the Australian Centre for Health Law Research at QUT which was commissioned by the Queensland and Western Australian governments to prepare mandatory training for medical practitioners on the voluntary assisted dying laws in those states. </span></em></p>The decision-making capacity of people under 18 would be assessed on a case-by-case basis by medical practitioners.Katrine Del Villar, Postdoctoral research fellow, Queensland University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1983312023-02-16T06:10:44Z2023-02-16T06:10:44ZWhy young people in every sphere – not just business and politics – should learn to lead<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/510075/original/file-20230214-24-m5xy8p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/crowd-anonymous-people-walking-on-busy-594270185">Babaroga </a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Leadership is most commonly held to be the ability to motivate others to achieve set goals. For some, this means being heroic and special. The world stood still when Nelson Mandela died. His achievements alone – the freedom fighter turned political prisoner, the first black president of South Africa, the Nobel peace prize winner – <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/page/biography">would qualify</a> him as a great leader. </p>
<p>For others, leadership is synonymous with management. But although these words are often used interchangeably, they <a href="https://www.proquest.com/openview/9e519b2df53655fd0f5f39c35480c1ac/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=37083">don’t</a> actually mean the same thing. You might well have had firsthand experience of a manager you would not necessarily choose to follow, but whom you must obey simply because they are in a position of authority and you don’t want to lose your job. </p>
<p>My research <a href="https://doi.org/10.1108/JSBED-05-2017-0160">shows</a> that what sets a leader apart from a manager is an extraordinary form of influence. And far from being the sole preserve of business and politics, every collective – no matter the profession or activity – needs someone at the helm. </p>
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<img alt="Quarter life, a series by The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/451343/original/file-20220310-13-1bj6csd.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><strong><a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/quarter-life-117947?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=UK+YP2022&utm_content=InArticleTop">This article is part of Quarter Life</a></strong>, a series about issues affecting those of us in our twenties and thirties. From the challenges of beginning a career and taking care of our mental health, to the excitement of starting a family, adopting a pet or just making friends as an adult. The articles in this series explore the questions and bring answers as we navigate this turbulent period of life.</em></p>
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/the-sharing-economy-can-expose-you-to-liability-risks-heres-how-to-protect-yourself-191560">The sharing economy can expose you to liability risks – here’s how to protect yourself</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/jacinda-ardern-resignation-has-people-wondering-when-to-quit-but-thats-the-wrong-way-to-think-about-burnout-198192">Jacinda Ardern resignation has people wondering when to quit – but that’s the wrong way to think about burnout</a></em></p>
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<h2>Core leadership skillsets</h2>
<p>At every stage and in every sphere of life, people need someone who can champion their values and fight for their needs. This means that even a 20-year-old in their first low-paid job should think about striving to gain leadership skills – and research identifies four main skillsets to develop.</p>
<p>Entrepreneurial skills involve identifying opportunities where others see problems or confusion, and being able to figure out how best to exploit them. Crucially, it means not being afraid to take risks. In 2018, Greta Thunberg risked jeopardising her school results when she started her lone school strike for climate, aged 15. The <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/14/greta-thunberg-nominated-nobel-peace-prize">2019 Nobel peace prize</a> nominee has gone on to galvanise a global youth activist movement. </p>
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<img alt="A woman in a striped top against a pale blue background." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/510299/original/file-20230215-22-5wwrsv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/510299/original/file-20230215-22-5wwrsv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/510299/original/file-20230215-22-5wwrsv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/510299/original/file-20230215-22-5wwrsv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/510299/original/file-20230215-22-5wwrsv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=942&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/510299/original/file-20230215-22-5wwrsv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=942&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/510299/original/file-20230215-22-5wwrsv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=942&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/new-york-ny-november-19-2019-1565548465">Lev Radin</a></span>
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</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1048984305000652">Technical skills</a>, meanwhile, are the competencies and analytical abilities to excel within your field. The literary and intellectual mastery that Nigerian author and feminist thinker <a href="https://dro.dur.ac.uk/34441/">Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie</a> has achieved was made plain in 2021 when she was <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-59514598">recognised</a> as one of the BBC’s 100 women of the year. </p>
<p>Interpersonal skills are the third set – the ability to understand and work with people. Being a good and compassionate communicator means you are able to make better decisions and build more effective teams. Mahatma Gandhi’s profound empathy, paired with his willingness to <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/nishacharya/2019/10/02/mahatma-gandhi-at-150-lessons-on-leadership/?sh=7dafeb98d7c1">live</a> like the people he sought to help, made him an excellent role model. </p>
<p>Last, conceptual skills allow people to process and analyse complex situations and generate new ideas. This means you are able to plan strategically and creatively solve problems. Martin Luther King inspired millions of people with his <a href="https://theconversation.com/mlks-vision-of-love-as-a-moral-imperative-still-matters-89946">unwavering vision</a> – a clear picture of a nation’s future, which he was able to effectively communicate to his fellow citizens. </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vP4iY1TtS3s?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
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<p>These leadership skills are transferable. Even if you change direction in your career, you take them with you. Before he ran for presidential office and served as US secretary of housing and urban development, <a href="https://achievement.org/achiever/benjamin-s-carson/">Ben Carson</a> was a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/the-story-of-the-surgery-that-made-ben-carson-famous--and-its-complicated-aftermath/2015/11/13/15b5f900-88c1-11e5-be39-0034bb576eee_story.html">pioneering</a> surgeon, the youngest chief of paediatric neurosurgery in the US. He has since founded a prominent policy-focused thinktank. </p>
<p>Carson achieved these professional milestones despite coming from a disadvantaged background. His story showcases how being a leader <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-68672-1_4">involves</a> setting your own goals (envisioning), putting in the work to achieve them (determination and decision-making), and seizing opportunities (risk management). </p>
<h2>Heroes and mentors</h2>
<p>One of the best ways to cultivate leadership skills is by learning from the successes – and failures – of the people you admire. Oprah Winfrey <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/oprah-winfrey-remembers-mentor-maya-angelou/story?id=23901061">cites</a> the author Maya Angelou, whom she met early in her career in the 1970s, as her greatest mentor. </p>
<p>Part of being mentored is learning to develop skills you already have. As Winfrey has said of Angelou: “‘When you learn, teach. When you get, give’ is one of my best lessons from her.” </p>
<p>Investing in personal growth is equally important. <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/jls.21327">Read books</a>, do further training – make a conscious effort to diversify your sources, challenge yourself and keep learning. Take note of your strengths and weaknesses, and tailor your learning accordingly – put plans in place to address those gaps. Stay curious and humble and be methodical in tracking your progress. Remember, no one becomes a leader overnight and nor do they ever reach perfection. Politics is full of people in positions of leadership who lose their way.</p>
<p>Self-reflection is key. Ask yourself why you want to be a leader. Those who seek to wield authority purely for self-gratification often fail. Leadership is best framed as <a href="https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/why-leaders-lose-their-way">serving</a> whomever you propose to lead.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198331/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christian Harrison does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The conceptual, technical, entrepreneurial and interpersonal skills that make a good leader are crucial to every profession and activity. Developing them will enrich your life.Christian Harrison, Reader in Leadership, School of Business and Creative Industries, University of the West of ScotlandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1986772023-01-31T10:05:33Z2023-01-31T10:05:33ZSouth Africa’s dysfunctional universities: the consequences of corrupt decisions<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507045/original/file-20230130-14-707210.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The integrity of the academic project should underscore universities' work at all times.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">xtock/Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>What happens when those responsible for managing universities cannot trust each other to act with integrity? In a nutshell, as I discuss in <a href="https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/Corrupted/?K=9781776147946">my new book</a>, Corrupted: A study of chronic dysfunction in South African universities, dysfunction is the consequence.</p>
<p>This is the situation playing out in some South African universities – sometimes with fatal results. In early January 2023, a protection officer who was guarding Fort Hare University vice-chancellor Professor Sakhela Buhlungu was <a href="https://ewn.co.za/2023/01/07/fort-hare-vc-at-safe-location-after-bodyguard-killed-in-assassination-attempt">shot dead</a> in an apparent assassination attempt. The shooting has <a href="https://www.news24.com/news24/southafrica/news/university-of-fort-hare-killings-higher-education-institutions-becoming-a-cradle-for-criminality-20230110">been linked</a> to <a href="https://www.siu.org.za/siu-authorised-to-investigate-four-contracts-and-degrees-at-the-university-of-fort-hare-and-five-public-works-and-infrastructure-tenders-including-parliament-properties/">ongoing investigations</a> into corruption at the university.</p>
<p>This appears to be just one example of how eroded trust has led to conflict among university managers that’s spilled into the public domain.</p>
<p>The principal conclusion I reach in my book is that chronic dysfunction in a sample of South African universities can be explained by two intertwined factors. One is institutional capacity. This is the expert ability to lead, manage and administer universities. The other is institutional integrity – the steering academic values that buffer universities against instability. Where both capacity and integrity are weak, dysfunction is inevitable. </p>
<h2>Integrity matters</h2>
<p>Individual integrity involves a person acting honestly and doing the right thing. It means consistency in the values that connect words and actions.
An <a href="https://satoriproject.eu/media/1.e-Institutional-Integrity.pdf">institution with integrity</a> has been described as: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>an organisation that defines and acts within a strong code of ethical conduct and positive values.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It doesn’t tolerate deviance from the code by its employees or partners.</p>
<p>Universities with high levels of institutional integrity vigorously pursue their core mandate. This is rooted in a strong sense of academic values. It is the glue that holds functional universities together and focuses their operations. Those academic values also steady an institution in turbulent times. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507043/original/file-20230130-22-jvpwxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507043/original/file-20230130-22-jvpwxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507043/original/file-20230130-22-jvpwxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=916&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507043/original/file-20230130-22-jvpwxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=916&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507043/original/file-20230130-22-jvpwxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=916&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507043/original/file-20230130-22-jvpwxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1151&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507043/original/file-20230130-22-jvpwxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1151&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507043/original/file-20230130-22-jvpwxu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1151&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<p>Such values centre on high-quality teaching, higher learning and cutting-edge research. Together these values advance social and human development. They are prominent on management’s weekly meetings agendas, on senate’s term meetings and on council’s quarterly meetings. Everything revolves around the academic project.</p>
<h2>The case of student protests</h2>
<p>One of the most important functions of academic values is to hold the institution together in times of challenge. For instance, how does an institution react when the integrity of the academic degree is at risk because of a prolonged shutdown?</p>
<p>In 2015 and 2016, students embarked on <a href="https://theconversation.com/student-protesters-must-move-beyond-hashtags-to-real-change-51138">historic protests</a> at campuses across South Africa. They demanded free and decolonised higher education. The press for free higher education arose because degree studies were becoming more expensive. This excluded more and more people from university. The decolonisation movement at formerly white universities protested that the curriculum was too European, the professors too white, and the institutional culture too alienating. </p>
<p>In response to the disruptions, the better-resourced, formerly white universities quickly transitioned to emergency remote teaching to ensure that the academic year was not lost. This highlights the importance of academic values to those institutions.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/after-protests-it-cant-be-business-as-usual-at-south-africas-universities-50548">After protests, it can't be business as usual at South Africa's universities</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>By contrast, in 2021, after a dysfunctional university specialising in the health sciences <a href="https://www.heraldlive.co.za/opinion/2021-11-11-how-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-smu/">was shut down</a> by routine protests for months on end, the students received their degrees as if nothing had happened.</p>
<p>The academic project was seriously compromised. But there was little institutional concern about the integrity of the degrees.</p>
<p>It is quite possible to see a structure or an organisation and to misrecognise it as an institution of higher learning. It would be easy to be fooled by the symbolic functions – like graduation – and administrative routines – such as registration – of university life and mistake these for a university. As I have <a href="https://repository.up.ac.za/bitstream/handle/2263/340/Jansen%20%282005%29d.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y">argued elsewhere</a>, a university ceases to exist when the intellectual project no longer defines its identity, infuses its curriculum, energises its scholars, and inspires its students.</p>
<h2>When integrity is undermined</h2>
<p>The crisis of dysfunctional institutions commonly arises when universities make compromised decisions on everything from tenders for infrastructure to appointments of key personnel. Such decisions compound foundational weaknesses and increase the risk of systemic failure. This is how institutional dysfunction begins and is sustained: through the breaching of institutional integrity.</p>
<p>The institutional integrity of vulnerable institutions is weakened, for example, through the decisions it makes about personnel appointments and promotions. Critical skill sets are compromised by populating crucial positions in administration with friends and family members. In one instance, as I document in the book, a whistle-blower at a serially dysfunctional university gave the new administrator “a list of all the family members appointed by the vice-chancellor”. Action was promised. None was taken.</p>
<p>The integrity of the academy is undermined even more when people who would not enjoy such elevation at an established university are promoted to senior academic positions in the name of equity. </p>
<p>And the governance of an institution is placed at serious risk through the appointment to council of junior members who have never governed anything in their lives. A university council is the most senior body responsible for governance. It should consist of senior people from professional fields with the experience to govern a higher education institution.</p>
<h2>Tackling the crisis</h2>
<p>There is no shortcut to restoring the institutional integrity of a chronically dysfunctional university. </p>
<p>It requires the appointment of smaller, professional councils without political interference. It demands competent leaders who are not beholden to political parties or factions. These leaders must hold strong convictions about the importance of academic values in the gradual rebuilding of a university.</p>
<p><em>This is an edited excerpt from <a href="https://witspress.co.za/page/detail/Corrupted/?K=9781776147946">the book</a>, Corrupted: A study of chronic dysfunction in South African universities (Wits University Press, 2023).</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198677/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jonathan Jansen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Where both capacity and integrity are weak, dysfunction is inevitable.Jonathan Jansen, Distinguished Professor, Stellenbosch UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1743682022-01-09T13:14:45Z2022-01-09T13:14:45ZFeeling powerless in the COVID-19 pandemic? 4 principles of self-determination can help you take back some control<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439450/original/file-20220105-25-pguqm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=414%2C31%2C3049%2C1980&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A man wearing a protective mask rides his bicycle past a face mask mural during the COVID-19 pandemic in Toronto. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Omicron wave seemed to come like a rising tide — slowly, then suddenly, <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8488493/omicron-covid-hospitalizations-jan-4-2022/">in all directions and all at once</a>. Inside the health-care system, <a href="https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/head-of-william-osler-health-system-says-situation-slowly-getting-better-following-code-orange-1.5727178">skeleton crews</a> face impossible workloads and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/20008198.2021.1984667">moral distress</a>. </p>
<p>Outside of it, people are feeling the weight of things like <a href="https://www.cihi.ca/en/covid-19-resources/impact-of-covid-19-on-canadas-health-care-systems/the-big-picture">deferred care</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annepidem.2021.07.010">deprioritized essential workers</a>, <a href="https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/11/1/e042871.abstract">online learning</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257728">doomscrolling</a>. People are sick not just with COVID-19, but with isolation, inequity and polarization. </p>
<p>So it shouldn’t be a surprise if the recent announcements of <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/covid-19-ontario-jan-3-2022-ford-public-health-measures-1.6302531">shuttered schools</a> and <a href="https://montrealgazette.com/news/covid-19-here-are-the-new-restrictions-in-quebec">renewed restrictions</a> have some people feeling it’s all just too much to sustain.</p>
<p>But there is a way through difficult stages of the pandemic. It’s possible to counter helplessness and build power by creating a sense of purpose and community amidst the confusion of COVID-19. </p>
<h2>Self-determination</h2>
<p>As a researcher of <a href="https://doi.org/10.3399/BJGPO.2020.0153">social prescribing</a> — the act of using health-care visits as a starting point to reconnect people with health-promoting community services — I want to share some steps we can all take today to get back to the basics of health promotion, using self-determination to help exert more control over our own individual and shared experiences.</p>
<p>Self-determination is a widely used approach in <a href="https://www.who.int/teams/health-promotion/enhanced-wellbeing/first-global-conference">health promotion</a> that derives from <a href="https://doi.org/10.3138/9781442623873-014">two distinct bodies of research</a>: in psychology, about how we build well-being in our own lives, and in political science, about how together we govern the things that are most important to us. </p>
<p>The idea, in both traditions, is that by applying just four principles at <a href="http://doi.org/10.1177/1745691612447309">individual</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-75201-9_10">collective</a> levels, people can increase control over and improve the conditions for their health and well-being.</p>
<h2>Autonomy</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439452/original/file-20220105-25-srpbwu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A person walks past a street mural of a health-care worker in PPE flexing a bicep" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439452/original/file-20220105-25-srpbwu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439452/original/file-20220105-25-srpbwu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439452/original/file-20220105-25-srpbwu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439452/original/file-20220105-25-srpbwu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439452/original/file-20220105-25-srpbwu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=520&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439452/original/file-20220105-25-srpbwu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=520&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439452/original/file-20220105-25-srpbwu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=520&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">When it feels like so much control has been taken away, making a small decision of their own can help someone rediscover their autonomy.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>First, there is a need to rediscover autonomy: the ability to make decisions for yourself. When it feels like so much control has been taken away, making a small decision of your own can help you shift from worrying about “what’s the matter with me” to taking action on “what matters to me.” </p>
<p>In social prescribing, participants don’t wait for someone else to make a treatment plan. They voice their own well-being priorities and are supported to take more control over their own health goals. </p>
<p>This can start with something as small, but healthful, as <a href="https://www.euro.who.int/en/publications/abstracts/what-is-the-evidence-on-the-role-of-the-arts-in-improving-health-and-well-being-a-scoping-review-2019">picking up a drawing pencil</a> or going for <a href="https://www.apa.org/monitor/2020/04/nurtured-nature">a walk in nature</a>, or something more intensive like <a href="https://doi.org/10.1089/pop.2020.0154">accessing support for housing</a> or <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/hsc.13516">volunteering with others</a> in your community. </p>
<p>Politically and at the community level, fostering autonomy can look like ensuring people have support to make <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abd2107">local economic decisions</a>, supporting <a href="http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2021/hl/bgrd/backgroundfile-173574.pdf">local public health and community organizations</a>, or ensuring <a href="https://www.torontoblackcovid.com/">vaccine outreach</a> is both scientifically accurate and culturally meaningful.</p>
<h2>Competence</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439454/original/file-20220105-15-1f4cn8v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A couple walk past a colourful inspirational mural reading 'Keep on keeping on'" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439454/original/file-20220105-15-1f4cn8v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439454/original/file-20220105-15-1f4cn8v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439454/original/file-20220105-15-1f4cn8v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439454/original/file-20220105-15-1f4cn8v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439454/original/file-20220105-15-1f4cn8v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439454/original/file-20220105-15-1f4cn8v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439454/original/file-20220105-15-1f4cn8v.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">During times of collective crisis, people can feel powerless in the face of forces larger than themselves.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Next, we need to value competence: our ability to influence outcomes and to show ourselves and others what we are capable of. </p>
<p>During times of collective crisis, people can feel powerless in the face of forces larger than themselves. In social prescribing, participants are supported to get back in touch with their own power, focusing less on what they can’t do and more on what they can, by <a href="https://www.cfp.ca/content/67/2/88">doing something they’re good at</a>. </p>
<p>For communities, valuing competence can mean taking a strengths-based or <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-821573-9.00005-9">asset-based approach</a> that recognizes the unique capacity and expertise within a community — such as <a href="https://www.toronto.ca/community-people/health-wellness-care/covid-19-wellness-during-the-pandemic/covid-19-seniors-vulnerable-people/">trusted relationships</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003141280">local ecological knowledge</a> and <a href="https://www.redcross.ca/blog/2021/2/doctor-from-ecuador-helps-lead-red-cross-response-to-covid-19">under-recognized training</a> — rather than focusing on community deficits.</p>
<h2>Beneficence</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439453/original/file-20220105-15-v3ejr7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A person seen from behind takes a picture of a mural depicting a white dove parachuting COVID-19 vaccine vials" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439453/original/file-20220105-15-v3ejr7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439453/original/file-20220105-15-v3ejr7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439453/original/file-20220105-15-v3ejr7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439453/original/file-20220105-15-v3ejr7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439453/original/file-20220105-15-v3ejr7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439453/original/file-20220105-15-v3ejr7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439453/original/file-20220105-15-v3ejr7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Regardless of our own constellations of ability, health and privilege, we all have something to give that can have a positive impact on others.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Closely related to a sense of competence is finding beneficence: the sense of having a positive impact on others. There is a demonstrable <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?hl=en&lr=&id=CgDhJ-_sqFcC&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=%22giver%27s+glow%22&ots=NRQF8Rwliu&sig=E94mNgNdFkcEKSSi9eYlF2Pe-zc&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=%22giver's%20glow%22&f=false">giver’s glow that comes from helping</a>; regardless of individual constellations of ability, health and privilege, everyone has something to give. </p>
<p>In social prescribing, participants who express a desire to give back are supported to take the lead in volunteering to help others or designing and implementing new programs and services. At a broader level, fostering collective beneficence might look like <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.579164">prosocial communications</a> approaches that remind us of how COVID-19 precautions help others, or opportunities to help others <a href="https://vaccinehunters.ca/">access vaccines</a> and supports.</p>
<h2>Relatedness</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439455/original/file-20220105-13-14phmse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A cyclist passes a painted mural depicting cartoon panels of people in face masks talking on the phone, checking in on neighbours during the pandemic." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439455/original/file-20220105-13-14phmse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439455/original/file-20220105-13-14phmse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439455/original/file-20220105-13-14phmse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439455/original/file-20220105-13-14phmse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=333&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439455/original/file-20220105-13-14phmse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439455/original/file-20220105-13-14phmse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/439455/original/file-20220105-13-14phmse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=418&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Feelings of loneliness and social isolation have grown during the COVID-19 pandemic.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Eric Gay)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Finally, we need to value relatedness: the sense of connection and belonging with others and the world around us. Feelings of <a href="https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/211124/dq211124e-eng.htm">loneliness and social isolation</a> have grown during the COVID-19 pandemic, with significant <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2020.113648">impacts on health</a> and well-being. </p>
<p>In social prescribing, participants are afforded the time and space to develop relationships: with a community connector who listens, with friends and family, or with other participants who may have something in common. </p>
<p>Collectively and politically, recognizing relatedness can look like supporting policies that accommodate people as both <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13876988.2020.1846123">workers and carers</a>, ensuring the shared protection of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMp2103614">global vaccine equity</a> or taking action on the ecological and climate pressures that increase the risk of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s42398-021-00165-x">zoonotic diseases</a>.</p>
<p>Self-determination means deciding for ourselves, feeling proud of a job well done, giving to others and feeling we belong. Social prescribing can’t be everything to everyone, but what it has shown is individual and collective well-being, psychological and political self-determination are deeply intertwined. </p>
<p>Starting with one phone call, walk in the park, poem or gift does make a difference, and can help kick-start the ability to get through these challenging times — together.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/174368/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kate Mulligan consults for the Canadian Red Cross, National Collaborating Centre for the Determinants of Health and Pan American Health Organization. Her prior work on social prescribing received funding from the Ontario Ministry of Health. She is a member of the Toronto Board of Health.</span></em></p>People can counter the helplessness felt during the pandemic and build power by creating a sense of purpose and community amid the confusion of COVID-19.Kate Mulligan, Assistant Professor, Social & Behavioural Health Sciences, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/826632017-09-20T03:13:50Z2017-09-20T03:13:50ZScience communicators must consider short-term objectives while keeping their eyes on the prize<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186679/original/file-20170919-22701-1ay2gj7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Planning a communication strategy isn't unethical.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/female-manager-putting-his-ideas-writing-466269749">Have a nice day Photo/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Most scientists say they got into science to <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2009/07/09/section-6-scientists-and-their-careers/">make the world a better place</a> and recognize this means sharing what they learn with a range of other people. But deciding to engage also means deciding what to communicate, and it’s at this stage that things get complicated.</p>
<p>Scientists’ most important communication decision may be figuring out their goals. Do they want to help shape local, state or national policy discussions? Do they want to influence individual behavior, such as diet choices, medical decisions or career paths?</p>
<p>Big-picture goal choice is, however, relatively simple, as it likely originates from scientists’ research, resources and personal preferences. </p>
<p>As public engagement researchers, we suggest the quality of science communication actually hinges on a second set of decisions. Scientists need to figure out what specific, immediate objectives they want to achieve through their communication efforts. </p>
<p>In our view, objectives are a bit tricky because they’re often left unstated and defy easy metaphors. In planning a dinner, they’re not the specific dishes you choose (we’d call those “tactics” or “activities”) and they’re not the goal of a satisfying meal. Instead, you set objectives in the planning phase when decisions are made to start with something savory and light, move on to something satisfying, and finish with something sweet and fun. </p>
<p>The importance of objectives emerges from the fact that communication doesn’t, for example, directly affect whether someone supports genetically modified food. Instead, increased support might be predicted to come from communication that changes individual and collective beliefs and feelings about things such as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2014.02.006">risks, benefits and decision-makers</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0963662517728478">Our new study in the journal Public Understanding of Science</a> sought to understand what might lead a scientist to prioritize different objectives, particularly those associated with policy views.</p>
<h2>Focusing on objectives</h2>
<p>For a science communicator, prioritizing specific objectives means deciding where to put effort. </p>
<p>Objectives often include increasing an audience’s knowledge and excitement about science. It could also mean wanting people to recognize a shared identity, or scientists’ competence or desire to make the world a better place. Reframing how someone thinks about a topic might also be a communication objective. </p>
<p>Effectively achieving these types of objectives appears to influence an audience’s <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228620.013.380">support of particular policy measures</a> that are informed by science.</p>
<p>Someone interested in <a href="https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=9BQWCgAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA95&ots=edH57kwRb0&sig=S_qgQgtpp6JISAHSLMM5JUgnHW8#v=onepage&q&f=false">changing behavior</a>, on the other hand, might focus on other objectives. A scientist might want to change someone’s beliefs about what others think or do, or a person’s ability to behave a particular way. Maybe the scientist would like to change how an audience thinks about the likelihood some behavior will have an impact, or their perceived risks or benefits around an activity. </p>
<p>In the case of trying to garner support for GMOs, a focus on objectives might mean prioritizing messages or behaviors that communicate that scientists respect and listen to public concerns alongside messages related to risks and benefits.</p>
<p>But when do actual scientists value these various objectives? <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0963662517728478">In our survey of scientists</a> from across multiple disciplines, we found the best predictors of how much scientists prioritized an objective are the degree to which they’d previously thought about it and the degree to which they see it as ethical. </p>
<p>The degree to which scientists feel an objective can make a difference also seems to be important, along with beliefs about what colleagues think.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186618/original/file-20170919-22604-dfrj54.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186618/original/file-20170919-22604-dfrj54.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186618/original/file-20170919-22604-dfrj54.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186618/original/file-20170919-22604-dfrj54.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186618/original/file-20170919-22604-dfrj54.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186618/original/file-20170919-22604-dfrj54.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186618/original/file-20170919-22604-dfrj54.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186618/original/file-20170919-22604-dfrj54.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">There’s more to effective communication than just downloading information in one direction.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/nicmcphee/2229714614">Nic McPhee</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Why focus on objectives?</h2>
<p>While sharing knowledge will always be a primary role of science communicators, <a href="https://www.nap.edu/catalog/23595/science-literacy-concepts-contexts-and-consequences">the social scientific consensus</a> is that increasing scientific knowledge is unlikely to substantially increase support for science-related policies or change individual behavior.</p>
<p>On <a href="http://sites.nationalacademies.org/cs/groups/pgasite/documents/webpage/pga_176867.pdf">politicized issues such as climate change</a>, those with the most scientific knowledge are sometimes the least likely to support science-based policy.</p>
<p>In a study from a few years ago, however, <a href="https://www.nap.edu/catalog/23595/science-literacy-concepts-contexts-and-consequences">we interviewed science communication trainers</a> and found that most training rarely broached the topic of objectives. Instead it focused almost exclusively on helping scientists transmit knowledge clearly and in way that was appealing.</p>
<p>Our current study suggests that training might specifically highlight the range of objectives that communication can achieve and how they might be pursued ethically.</p>
<p>And an interesting thing about prioritizing objectives is that doing so can help guide the third step of science communication: the tactical choice of what to actually say and do while sharing knowledge.</p>
<p>For example, <a href="https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=LG-NAgAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA68&dq=info:ucqpJHmTEeQJ:scholar.google.com&ots=Nqs973GfRV&sig=xQfW2SLqlQfguaWwpls7rNVPXg8#v=onepage&q&f=false">the social psychology literature on fairness</a> shows that people value having a voice in decision-making, even when they don’t get what they want. Science communicators might therefore prioritize ensuring that people with whom they engage believe they have the potential to be heard. </p>
<p>Our sense is that one of the most important roles of <a href="https://www.nap.edu/read/12434/chapter/1">dialogue-based public engagement</a> – a key element of any <a href="https://www.nap.edu/read/23674/chapter/4?term=%22public+engagement%22#25">contemporary science communication plan</a> – is that they it can facilitate both actual and perceived listening. Much of the improvisation training pioneered by the <a href="http://www.aldakavlilearningcenter.org">Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science</a> emphasizes the importance of listening to one’s audience with empathy. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186669/original/file-20170919-22701-18ci7dc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186669/original/file-20170919-22701-18ci7dc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/186669/original/file-20170919-22701-18ci7dc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186669/original/file-20170919-22701-18ci7dc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186669/original/file-20170919-22701-18ci7dc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186669/original/file-20170919-22701-18ci7dc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186669/original/file-20170919-22701-18ci7dc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/186669/original/file-20170919-22701-18ci7dc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Actor and author Alan Alda advocates training researchers to engage in mutually respectful conversations as they communicate about their work.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Conor Harrigan, Stony Brook University, Courtesy of the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Similarly, we know from <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/111/Supplement_4/13593.full">research on trust</a> that it’s helpful for those seeking support to have a reputation for caring about the needs of others. So if scientists have pursued a topic out of a desire to improve the world, it may help to prioritize communication that conveys that message.</p>
<p>One of the positive things about an emphasis on storytelling in science communication (as in <a href="http://www.randyolsonproductions.com/writing/writing_index.html">the work of Randy Olson</a>) is likely that including a narrative lets scientists talk about their motivation.</p>
<p>Even little choices such as dress and the effort put into designing an attractive and appropriate talk may help shape beliefs about warmth, competence, identity and other potential objectives.</p>
<p>The difficulty is that prioritizing discussion or personal stories means less time for sharing facts. And well-designed, carefully planned communication takes resources. Not everything can be a priority.</p>
<h2>Being strategic isn’t unethical</h2>
<p>In the past, when we’ve written about <a href="https://theconversation.com/science-communication-training-should-be-about-more-than-just-how-to-transmit-knowledge-59643">strategy in science communication</a>, some people have argued that what we suggest amounts to <a href="https://theconversation.com/science-communication-training-should-be-about-more-than-just-how-to-transmit-knowledge-59643#comment_992037">unethical advertising or public relations</a>. Indeed, we teach in those areas so some readers may use this as prima facie evidence of nefarious intent. </p>
<p>But the fact that strategic communication professionals pay attention to the potential effects of their communication choices doesn’t mean the science community should ignore such effects. </p>
<p>It seems obvious that no one should talk about motivations he doesn’t really have, say she is listening when she is not or frame issues in ways that defy logic.</p>
<p>The point is simply that better-quality communication seems likely to occur when communicators make careful choices about objectives that are honest and for which there is <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/110/Supplement_3">social science evidence</a> <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/111/Supplement_4">of effectiveness</a>.</p>
<p>Put differently, our expectation is that scientists are more likely to achieve their goals if they think more deeply about the choices they make along the way and avoid ad hoc communication that isn’t grounded in a careful consideration of the short- and long-term impact of their words and activities.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/82663/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF, Grant AISL 1421214-1421723. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.
</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF, Grant AISL 1421214-1421723. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.</span></em></p>Scientists who engage with the public may have goals about influencing policy or behavior. But they also need to think about the short-term objectives that will help get them there.John C. Besley, Associate Professor of Advertising and Public Relations/Ellis N. Brandt Endowed Chair, Michigan State UniversityAnthony Dudo, Assistant Professor of Advertising and Public Relations, The University of Texas at AustinShupei Yuan, Assistant Professor of Public Relations, Northern Illinois UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/774962017-05-22T15:32:12Z2017-05-22T15:32:12ZThe tyranny of competence: why it is bad for us to be ‘good enough’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169986/original/file-20170518-12217-hivmf3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Will this do?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/coffee-latte-art-making-by-barista-540147232?src=GjkDFBfhUsJrs75cnfN2nA-1-14">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Our modern working lives are ruled by the concept of competence. <a href="https://www.reed.co.uk/career-advice/competency-based-interviews-what-you-need-to-know/">Competence based interviews</a> are used to decide if we should get a job. If we do get the job, we are then trained to achieve <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/436073/cscf_fulla4potrait_2013-2017_v2d.pdf">competency in the workplace</a>. And we might lose that job if we don’t maintain at least a <a href="http://employment-practice.blogspot.co.uk/2010/09/dismissal-for-incompetence.html">competent performance</a>.</p>
<p>The idea that lies behind competence is quite simple: that one can specify what people should do in behavioural terms, and then measure whether a person has succeeded or failed in meeting that task. </p>
<p>This approach to how work and education should be organised started in the <a href="http://www.cabinetmagazine.org/issues/4/slaughterhouse.php">slaughterhouses of Chicago</a> at the end of the 19th century. It was then used in the car production lines of Ford at the beginning of the 20th. Nowadays the idea of competence can be found in every sector of the economy, from manufacturing to finance and retail.</p>
<p>We rarely pay a second thought to whether the idea of measuring and achieving competence is a good one or not. In fact, the whole edifice of competence is a controversial one that doesn’t provide a sound basis for thinking about how people learn and work. Because although machines can be competent, humans cannot.</p>
<h2>Grounds for complaint</h2>
<p>Humans do not learn and work in ways that can be captured through the concept of competence. Take the example of a barista in a coffee shop who is being trained to make coffee. </p>
<p>The job title of “barista” suggests a degree of skill and craft in making a beverage. However, in the main, baristas in large coffee chains are trained through <a href="http://www.cityandguilds.com/qualifications-and-apprenticeships/hospitality-and-catering/hospitality-and-catering/7102-barista-skills#tab=information">competence based qualifications</a>. One part of these qualifications is to produce a cup of coffee to meet a minimum standard. It might have to achieve a certain taste, aroma and appearance and to be served in a particular way with no spillage. This might seem perfectly reasonable, but there are two reasons why such an approach to training baristas does not work (and why many independent coffee shops argue for a different, more individual approach to the drinks they serve).</p>
<p>First, the production of a cup of coffee to a certain standard is a binary outcome. The barista can either produce a coffee of a certain standard or they cannot. If they happen to produce the best cup of coffee in the world, with the finest taste and the best flavour, it does not matter, as competence based training does not reward exemplary performance. It can only determine if the standard is attained. </p>
<p>Likewise, producing the worst cup of sludge in the world which was tipped onto the floor would be a fail in the same way as producing a cup just below the standard. There is no room for skill, artistry or improvisation in competence. In fact, competence is not interested in the process of producing a coffee at all – only the final binary outcome.</p>
<h2>I, Robot?</h2>
<p>Second, if the barista does produce a coffee to a certain standard, competence is not interested in why the barista can do that. Competence is simply about ticking a box, not about looking at how the person learns and how they have come to acquire that skill. It treats people as empty, hollow shells with no activity going on within. Competence is not a human form of learning. All other prior forms of learning, from classical ideas of pedagogy to apprenticeships, have assumed a human subject who undergoes some form of physical, mental or spiritual change.</p>
<p>But humans are not machines that simply produce binary outcomes. They have bodies and minds which change through learning. Humans can meet competences but competence does not suit how humans work and learn. It dehumanises people and makes them the equivalent of dumb and soulless, machines. We can’t be competent if we are to retain our human characteristics.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169993/original/file-20170518-12231-vlnbh5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/169993/original/file-20170518-12231-vlnbh5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169993/original/file-20170518-12231-vlnbh5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169993/original/file-20170518-12231-vlnbh5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169993/original/file-20170518-12231-vlnbh5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169993/original/file-20170518-12231-vlnbh5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/169993/original/file-20170518-12231-vlnbh5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Your competence test results are here …</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/nice-girl-robot-working-office-409741570?src=v7bg244OWBP3O3IbYdksfw-1-31">Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>Paradoxically, competence itself makes it less likely that learners or workers will consistently meet a certain standard. By rewarding performance which is just good enough, competence rewards a strategy of just doing enough to get through. This makes it more likely that people will sometimes fail to meet that level of performance as it rewards minimal attention to the task.</p>
<p>Yet we are increasingly forced to fit the mould of competence in our schools and workplaces. As I argue in <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/gb/book/9783319551098#otherversion=9783319551104">my recent book</a>, such an approach diminishes us as people in terms of ignoring craft, improvisation and even our thoughts. We are not empty machines that simply produce binary outcomes. If we want to be truly human in our learning and our workplaces we need to be exemplary, creative and idiosyncratic. Learning and innovation involve failure in aiming for something that is exceptional. By definition, such things simply cannot be judged by the criteria of competence where the mediocre is the gold standard.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/77496/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Preston does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Competence is not a human trait. Let’s leave it for the robots.John Preston, Professor of Education, University of East LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/406692015-05-27T10:16:15Z2015-05-27T10:16:15ZWanted: good leaders for government. Must have people, not just technical, skills<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/82995/original/image-20150526-24740-1a6woin.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Great leadership blazes a way for others to shine. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/cat.mhtml?lang=en&language=en&ref_site=photo&search_source=search_form&version=llv1&anyorall=all&safesearch=1&use_local_boost=1&searchterm=leadership&show_color_wheel=1&orient=&commercial_ok=&media_type=images&search_cat=&searchtermx=&photographer_name=&people_gender=&people_age=&people_ethnicity=&people_number=&color=&page=1&inline=83753758">Ruslan Grechka/Shutterstock </a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In early 2014, President Obama accepted the resignation of Veterans Affairs (VA) Secretary Eric Shinseki. A retired general and a decorated combat veteran, Shinseki had been appointed with great fanfare to the post in 2009. Five years later, he resigned amid reports of scandalously long waits for medical service by veterans. </p>
<p>An interim <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/05/21/a-guide-to-the-va-and-the-scandals-engulfing-it/">report</a> by the VA’s inspector general found VA supervisors had instructed clerks on how to falsify reports about wait time in a misguided effort to meet goals that they had been instructed to set. The supervisors may have had solid technical skills in health and medicine, but they lacked the people or organizational skills needed to set realistic goals and make sure those goals were achieved. </p>
<p>The result: Shinseki departed in disgrace. </p>
<p>The Shinseki case underscores a key issue in management – that technical achievement or even competence does not always make for great leadership. Technically competent leaders may set outstanding goals; unfortunately, in this case, these also proved to be unachievable ones.</p>
<p>At a time when leadership is needed in all sectors of society, particularly in the political realm, we should examine what research tells us about requirements for effective leadership.</p>
<h2>Not enough great leaders in the federal government</h2>
<p>In a Gallup Business Journal <a href="http://www.gallup.com/businessjournal/106684/where-leaders-government.aspx">article</a>, Mike Mears, a former CIA executive, describes how the federal government has great leaders, but not enough of them, and particularly not enough in the supervisory ranks. He explains that this is the “critical edge where management meets employee.” He notes that when he asks government agency leaders whether they would select a candidate known to be a bad leader with great technical skills or an exemplary leader without the requisite technical skills, they sheepishly say they would pick the bad leader.</p>
<p>It’s not that technical competency in leaders is a bad thing. But effective leadership requires a combination of leadership competence as distinguished from <a href="http://www.emeraldinsight.com/action/doSearch?AllField=Rynetta%2C+R.+W.%2C+Charlotte%2C+D.+S.%2C+%26+Hubert%2C+S.+F.+&SeriesKey=lodj">technical</a> competence. </p>
<p>I recently completed a study for the Law and Policy program at Northeastern University that surveyed US government employees as to how they perceived 28 leader behaviors on a 1-5 <a href="http://www.simplypsychology.org/likert-scale.html">Likert Scale.</a> I asked the respondents to consider how these behaviors would affect their own performance and morale. Two of the questions inquired about leader technical competence. </p>
<p>A histogram of the responses resembles the typical normal curve, with a peak at the center of the Likert Scale on the question of performance (see Figure 1), and leans toward the adverse end for perception of effect on their morale.</p>
<p><strong>Figure 1.</strong> Histogram on US Government perception of leader technical competence.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/79672/original/image-20150429-7107-1vp72r2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/79672/original/image-20150429-7107-1vp72r2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/79672/original/image-20150429-7107-1vp72r2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/79672/original/image-20150429-7107-1vp72r2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=380&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/79672/original/image-20150429-7107-1vp72r2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/79672/original/image-20150429-7107-1vp72r2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/79672/original/image-20150429-7107-1vp72r2.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Competency Graph.</span>
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<h2>Conclusion: leadership skills are more important to employees than technical competence</h2>
<p>I drew two initial conclusions from these findings relative to hiring and educating leaders: first, leadership skills are far more important in improving performance and morale than technical skills, and second, employees generally perceive leader technical competence as irrelevant to performance and adverse to their morale.</p>
<p>I wondered why employees view technical capabilities as essentially irrelevant to job satisfaction and work performance. I found two studies that helped explain my results. <a href="http://www.ccsenet.org/journal/index.php/ass/article/view/27940">Zakaria and Taiwo (2013)</a> focused on a number of skills including people (or leadership) skills and technical skills. Their research found that improved team performance correlated more with people skills rather than with a leader’s technical capabilities. </p>
<p>In a 2008 study, <a href="http://www.emeraldinsight.com/action/doSearch?AllField=hysong&SeriesKey=jmd">Sylvia Hysong</a> attempted to prove how important technical skills were to leadership. Instead, she discovered that they had little relationship to good leadership. Hysong did find that technical skills were valuable to managers as a source of credibility and a means to identify with employees. In the end, Hysong concluded that technical skills should not be the most important criterion in selecting organizational leaders. </p>
<p>This leads to my other conclusion: some technical skills are necessary as a source of credibility and a means to relate to employees.</p>
<h2>Why leadership skills are so much more important than technical skills</h2>
<p>More often than not, employees know what support they need from leadership to do outstanding work. I was interested in understanding what specific leader behaviors employees would perceive as improving their job performance and morale. My study found that government employees viewed 11 leadership behaviors as very helpful to morale and job performance and 11 behaviors as strongly antagonistic to morale and job performance — none of which were technical skills. </p>
<p>Here are two of the eleven behaviors, one viewed very helpful and the other viewed as very adverse. The first led to the VA scandal and the second could have prevented it.</p>
<p>• (Not helpful at all) Establishing goals that are important to the leader without considering whether they are achievable</p>
<p>• (Very helpful) Takes into account follower preferences when developing achievable work goals</p>
<p>The need to de-emphasize technical competence from required leader skills may seem counterintuitive, but as Voltaire once said, “common sense is not so common.” </p>
<h2>David Marquet’s story: from worst to first in the US Navy</h2>
<p>There is a wealth of anecdotal evidence on why refocusing from technical to people skills can be so powerful. David Marquet, a former nuclear submarine captain, provides one example in his 2012 book, <a href="http://www.davidmarquet.com">Turn the Ship Around!</a>, which detailed how he turned one of the worst submarines in the US fleet into one of the best. Marquet describes how the US Navy spent months on technical training for its most advanced US nuclear submarine. When the captain of the USS Santa Fe retired, the US Navy assigned Marquet to be his replacement. </p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/83002/original/image-20150526-24766-bt5wc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/83002/original/image-20150526-24766-bt5wc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/83002/original/image-20150526-24766-bt5wc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=906&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/83002/original/image-20150526-24766-bt5wc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=906&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/83002/original/image-20150526-24766-bt5wc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=906&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/83002/original/image-20150526-24766-bt5wc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/83002/original/image-20150526-24766-bt5wc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/83002/original/image-20150526-24766-bt5wc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<p>The nuclear submarine had outdated technology for which he had no training and boasted the worst performance record in the US fleet. Poor morale and low performance plagued the ship’s crew. The fact that the new captain lacked this technical competency forced him to depend on his crew and encourage them to work on their own. His role changed from leading a ship to leading a ship’s crew. Marquet’s crew came to depend on him for leadership and team-building rather than technical competence.</p>
<p>The USS Santa Fe quickly rose from the worst-performing nuclear submarine to one of the best in the US Navy.</p>
<p>Establishing achievable goals may seem obvious to the mediocre leader, but not to the technically competent bad leader, who believes that he or she is pushing for excellence when, in fact, a pink slip will be a more likely outcome.</p>
<p>Public policy should take these finding into account. Human resource organizations like the US Office of Personnel Management need to emphasize leadership skills over technical ones in leadership candidate pools. Those doing the hiring need to reject the notion that candidates with a lot of experience in their area will <em>always</em> make a good leader or that leadership can be learned “on the job.” </p>
<p>This small shift in approach may produce more leaders like Marquet and avoid debacles like that at the VA.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/40669/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael J Cote does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The best person for a job may not be the one who best knows how to do the work but the one who can get the best work out of others. A scholar examines the nature of leadership.Michael J Cote, Doctoral Candidate in Law and Policy, Adjunct Faculty Member , Northeastern UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.