None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

[Thailandnotes]

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/15/op...gewanted=print

“Privacy also makes us productive. In a fascinating study known as the Coding War Games, consultants Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister compared the work of more than 600 computer programmers at 92 companies. They found that people from the same companies performed at roughly the same level — but that there was an enormous performance gap between organizations. What distinguished programmers at the top-performing companies wasn’t greater experience or better pay. It was how much privacy, personal workspace and freedom from interruption they enjoyed.”

“During the last decades, the average amount of space allotted to each employee shrank 300 square feet, from 500 square feet in the 1970s to 200 square feet in 2010.”

[oddlots]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

Nice. Values turn up in the data. I knew there had to be a bottom somewhere.

We'll bounce along that bottom forever undoubtedly, but I'm willing to cling to whatever wreckage I can find.

[Starving Steve]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

In the American K-12 public schools, school districts demand that teaching be done in groups, called co-operative learning. If a student chooses to work outside such a group, that student is forced by the teacher to join the co-operative learning groups. If the teacher lets students work outside such groups, the principal harasses the teacher.

And the worn-out argument for co-operative learning groups is that employers demand co-operative projects, so no-one can withdraw into their cubbie-hole. Everyone has to participate, or so the argument goes.

So here we are now. We are at the other extreme where independent learning, independent effort, and creativity are squelched.

Imagine Issac Newton or Albert Einstein in a public school in America and seated at a co-operative learning table. Bored-to-tears, they fall asleep in class and are ultimately failed.

[goodrich4bk]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

In the American K-12 public schools, school districts demand that teaching be done in groups, called co-operative learning.

Yeah, Steve, these groups are called . . . classrooms.

I have sent three children through American public schools and have never come across any such "co-operative learning". Once or twice a year, one of my kid's teachers would assign a "group project" that gave students an opportunity to collaborate, just as they are expected to do when they get a job. I hardly think this is a problem, nor do I think such infrequent collaborations are causing smart people to drop out. Care to provide something more than anecdotal evidence to support your latest theory?

[jiimbergin]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

Yeah, Steve, these groups are called . . . classrooms.

I have sent three children through American public schools and have never come across any such "co-operative learning". Once or twice a year, one of my kid's teachers would assign a "group project" that gave students an opportunity to collaborate, just as they are expected to do when they get a job. I hardly think this is a problem, nor do I think such infrequent collaborations are causing smart people to drop out. Care to provide something more than anecdotal evidence to support your latest theory?

+1

[wayiwalk]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

In our school district in New Jersey, "top rated" by several magazines and winner of other stupid national awards, we have seen lots of group projects, including "peer review" of students work by other students become part of the process (and replace actual teacher feedback).

There recently has been push back from many parents, but in some classes we have seen as much group work as individual work that follows teaching. I like to see the group efforts in school, but in our district they have gone too far.

[goodrich4bk]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

In our school district in New Jersey, "top rated" by several magazines and winner of other stupid national awards, we have seen lots of group projects, including "peer review" of students work by other students become part of the process (and replace actual teacher feedback).

There recently has been push back from many parents, but in some classes we have seen as much group work as individual work that follows teaching. I like to see the group efforts in school, but in our district they have gone too far.

I applaud your involvement in your local school. I believe parental involvement is the most important factor in student success, and certainly the one over which we have the most control. That said, Steve was suggesting that our entire country's educational system had been overtaken by peer evaluations when my experience is the opposite. I am sure schools vary, as they should given local involvement. Still, I see no evidence that we are lacking a sufficient number of Einsteins or Edisons in the world, which is Steve's stated worry.

[LorenS]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

My kids are in school right now. This article is not too far off the mark.

My kids complain about the slackers a lot. I've told them to get used to it, those slackers turn into first class parasites as they grow up.

[charliebrown]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

Being an indepent thinker, and my son as well, I see more and more group projects coming home from school. Yes it is important to work in groups, but it is also important to work individually, especially if that is what you are wired to do.

I am an engineer and many times tough problems lie outside the box, which is where group think lives. Most of my major break throughs here are through quiet, comprehension of the internals of the system and the external inputs it is exposed too. If the problem where easy group think would solve it.

My son is like me and a quiet carefull thinker. He has much more group projects than I did 35 years ago.
I hope our interaction is enough to overcome the group dynamics in school.

I am feeling like a dinosaur though.
There is less and less demand for deep problem solving skill and more and more demand for people who can come up with quick band-aids. "Just Reboot". I think the pendulum has swung too far toward group think.

[wayiwalk]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

Being an indepent thinker, and my son as well, I see more and more group projects coming home from school. Yes it is important to work in groups, but it is also important to work individually, especially if that is what you are wired to do.

I am an engineer and many times tough problems lie outside the box, which is where group think lives. Most of my major break throughs here are through quiet, comprehension of the internals of the system and the external inputs it is exposed too. If the problem where easy group think would solve it.

My son is like me and a quiet carefull thinker. He has much more group projects than I did 35 years ago.
I hope our interaction is enough to overcome the group dynamics in school.

I am feeling like a dinosaur though.
There is less and less demand for deep problem solving skill and more and more demand for people who can come up with quick band-aids. "Just Reboot". I think the pendulum has swung too far toward group think.

Yes - I work with scientists and engineers in very collaborative projects (cross disciplinary, etct). It is the deep thinkers, though, who carry the largest burden and do the best work.

I have no idea how to best develop this sort of thinking in school....I guess the best way is to make sure we are recognizing it for its value and not shunning it. I think my kids (at least 2 of them) fall into the "quiet, deep thinker" mode (no surprise, both my wife and I are also engineers) and we have had our struggles with the schools that are looking for strengths on the verbal side. Oh well. The world does need more BS artists!

But getting back to the original post - I came across a terrific article in Forbes at the end of last year that identified several metrics for management - the one that really caught my eye was work flow.

I discussed the article with a bunch of my staff and it was the one metric that also really rang true them. You can find the article with this link:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/bruceupb...-need-to-know/

[davidstvz]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

I think it's a chronic problem for deep thinking at work. I'm a sometimes programmer (a sys admin / manager / phd student in computer science) and I pretty much can't even abide the thought of even starting to work (or continue work on) any serious programming projects if I'm not sure I will have a couple of hours uninterrupted. It takes 15 minutes to just rewrap my head around the problem before I can pick up where I left off. Any interruption will pretty much derail my work. Somewhere I read a big article about the style of work manager thrive on (constant switching between a variety of important but simple tasks) vs. engineers (deep thinking about a single task for a long time) which mostly said this sort of thing, only for a dozen or two paragraphs.

[lektrode]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

as a sometime 'deep thinker' (seems to happen more frequently after reading EJ and a few others around here ;)
i find that when faced with the unexpectedly complex question, i get my best answers _after_ i stop thinking about it.
funny that, eh? will be hours or days later, typically just after awakening in the middle of the night, or as i'm driving in an atypically relaxed fashion (i dont deal well with traffic jams) the answer just seems to pop into the head, like the proverbial light bulb suddenly turning on... have often been fascinated by this phenom... i definitely am NOT a groupthink type

[charliebrown]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

me too, last week I had been working on a problem for two weeks. Customers were reporting a certain malfunction, but the symptoms appear weeks or months after the initial break, and by that time most of the system logging has "rolled" off. I had been trying to simulate the problem in our laboratory for a week, but then it just hit me like a ton of bricks last Friday on the drive home. And to really give me anxiety was the Monday was MLK day, and Tuesday I had to go out of town, I was just wanting so bad to go back and test my hypothesis. Yesterday came my relief when my hypothesis was confirmed, and then some.

I think the problem still needs to be teased every day to keep the juices flowing, but the answer often comes when you are not thinking directly about it. I suffer from occasional insomnia, and sometimes it is when I'm lying in bed trying to doze off. Walking also seems to give these flashes of insight too.

[charliebrown]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

Yes, that is it!

I guess the best way is to make sure we are recognizing it for its value and not shunning it.

Recognize it as a gift, and nurture it. Others have different gifts. I couldn't sell a generator to a man in a black out.

In the early part of the 20th century, left handedness was strongly discouraged. Lets not go down that path with deep thinking.

I do also realize that these people need to be pulled into the other side to see what life is like in that world.
Just like we are unaware that air is all around us unless we move, by being challenged in different environments we see that others are different and learn something of ourselves that we would not know if left to our sleepy cacoon.

[wayiwalk]

Re: None of us is as dumb as all of us...here's the proof

Thailand notes - I've just read the NY Times story more carefully - thanks for posting this. Interesting that the articles author has a book coming out - "“Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking.” I hadn't seen that before and in a draft of a post I made reference to myself and kids as being introverts....glad to see someone addressing my cause!