It has been described as a ‘brilliantly bold’ initiative, as ‘audacious’, and a ‘game-changer’. This is the proposal by Mark Zuckerberg, principal shareholder in Facebook and his wife, Priscilla Chan, a paediatrician, to invest $3 billion in a programme to cure all diseases by 2100… Why discourage a well-intentioned donor by asking hard questions or… Read More »
Professions and Metaphors: Understanding Professions in Society edited by Andreas Liljegren and Mike Saks has just been published. It includes a chapter in which I review the history of the ecological metaphor in the study of work, occupations and professions. The book as a whole explores the way that two traditions have contributed to our… Read More »
During a recent visit to Hanoi, co-editor Mary Byrne McDonnell presented a copy of The Sage Handbook of Research Management to Nguyễn Quang Thuấn, the President of the Vietnamese Academy of Social Sciences. The story and photos can be found here (in Vietnamese).
Let’s deal with the bad news about becoming a research manager first. Research management is hampered by the old-fashioned approaches taken by many universities, great researchers don’t necessarily translate into great managers, and there’s not a lot of outside resources to help prospective managers excel. But there is hope! In the hour-long seminar, Robert Dingwall discusses the… Read More »
A response to the Stern Review of the 2014 REF – and why portability matters to all of us. Economists generally prefer markets to planning – so what have Lord Stern and his colleagues got against a well-functioning market in academic talent, other than it challenging the authority of managerial elites? When did wanting to… Read More »
Sage have now confirmed that this will be at 4pm BST – or equivalent wherever you are – on Tuesday 2 August. Please register at https://t.co/lWgHovhx2k Let’s hope for better luck with the technology this time. Don’t forget that this webinar accompanies the Sage Handbook of Research Management. There is a discount code for webinar… Read More »
Apologies to anyone who tried to participate in the Sage webinar on 21 July. There was a catastrophic technological failure on the part of the service provider. This is likely to be rescheduled for 2 August at 16:00 BST but please look out for confirmations.
As Ian McBride has commented in The Guardian, one of the strange features of Britain’s EU referendum is the resignation with which the losers have accepted the outcome. 16 million voters – 48 per cent of those participating – voted to Remain. Their voices have been completely silenced by the national media and political elite.… Read More »
When Dingwall Enterprises Ltd was launched in 2010, we created a basic web presence, with the help of James Dingwall. As the business has developed, we needed to extend this to reflect the growing record of achievement in consulting and other work. We have now completely redesigned the site to give a full picture of… Read More »