I am here to work – Honest

I thought I should explain (briefly!) what it is I am doing here.

I was awarded the scholarship to study the challenges faced by organizations in the public sector or nonprofit sector where commercial operations have been introduced. I wanted to explore the tensions that this causes – with the commercial sector who may view this as anti-competitive activity; it can conflict with an organization’s ethos and culture, creating internal organizational tensions; and it may create problems in ensuring that organizations meet public sector governance and public accountability requirements. This work will build on my experiences at the Ordnance Surveys in Great Britain and Ireland (north and south), my policy role in the sports, museums and recreation sector in Northern Ireland, and more recently in dealing with governance and accountability issues when a government created company collapsed. 

Although I was accepted by Fulbright last year, I was asked to defer my departure for a while, due to ongoing work on the Northern Ireland Events Company, (I have been winding up the company’s somewhat complex affairs). I was also leading within DCAL on its Organizational Change Programme, or at least getting it under way. I am expected to return to DCAL at the end of my time here in the US (July) so if I am to do something else, and I would really like to try something else – I must decide soon.

I intend to use the Fulbright scholarship to explore opportunities beyond the specific area of study and research. Therefore I am developing my cultural knowledge, professional and career aspirations, whilst ensuring a balance with my personal life.

(I can hear my conscience say "Sounds like he means a holiday, but doesn't want to call it that").

This means making the most of the place – going to see as much as is possible, and experience as much as I can in the time available – but time is short! Harvard really is a magnificent place, and its libraries alone are astounding (see earlier Blog entries!) and the sense of purpose, public service and endeavor is almost tangible. I have also found the history of Boston as the cradle of Independence, particularly interesting, and am trying to visit all of the sites of relevance. A visit last weekend to the official J.F. Kennedy Museum and Library gave a very interesting insight into this truly inspiring world leader, and on Sunday we went to the site of the Battle for Bunker Hill – the first true battle in the War of Independence. Visits to Salem, famous for its Witch trials, and Plymouth where the Mayflower landed, where they have reconstructed the original village of this first settlement and a native American Indian village of the same era, are still planned, and we want to go Whale Watching as well. Oh, and eat as much seafood as is possible….

("See ... told you it was a holiday").

But only 3 weekends left, and all that work to do as well.

("Oh dear, I don't hear any sounds of sympathy anywhere").

I have been asked to make a presentation to the the Alumni Association of the Federal Executive Institute (senior US Federal civil servants) in Washington DC in early May – basically on Leading Change in Northern Ireland– hopefully I can do this subject justice. We will be moving down to Washington DC at the start of May, where I will be based at the Smithsonian Institution, and explore their approach to commercialization. – but more of all this later…..

("sounds like its an excuse to enjoy yourself - but don't pretend it is anything else, cause no one will believe you!")

make money without doing evil

As the ship was sinking his father placed Harry’s Mother and her maid on the lifeboat, and the young man and his father, in an act of Edwardian gentlemanliness expected of the time, stayed aboard while his Mother and maid were rowed to safety.  The young man loved books, and had begun a significant collection, including a first folio of Shakespeare’s works in his collection.  He had always wanted a Gutenberg Bible, but that came later, 

Books, and more books; five floors above, and four floors below - we were taken down four flights, and along a corridor, through fire and flood proof doors - doors that could have stopped the Titanic from sinking, perhaps (?), into cold dry air.  “Books like the cold” our guide, Sarah, said.   “Here it is”, she says, triumphantly, having entered “Methodist”, “dancing”, and “drinking” in the Hollis on-line catalog and telling us about her Methodist Aunt spitting out the wine she had mistakenly drunk at a family wedding.  “This is”, she said, “a riveting read”, and nervously giggling she asked “how could such things be bad?”, the rebellious librarian emerging from a somewhat plain cover.  Too many books read, no doubt, underneath the sheets by torchlight, late at night?   Perhaps more shocking to her was the fact that Google had scanned this book, free of charge, and made it available back to the library. Google's mission is to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.   The slowness of the library to embrace the new media noted as a missed opportunity, perhaps?  But the book is now available on-line, for free at the moment, to everyone without entering a library.  “How could such a thing be bad?”.  The actual, physical (not virtual) book found undamaged from Google’s attack on the traditional printed word, we return back from whence we came.  

Sarah confides that the budget deficit at Harvard has brought about redundancies.  The University’s priority is for Professors and Computers, but not those that help others access the knowledge held.  She is, after 30 years, to lose her job.  Her positive approach about the future, her qualifications, experience and divorce settlement all providing a solid foundation for a brighter future, but the fear and uncertainty in her eyes cannot be hidden.  

Back in the grand entrance hall, faintly reminiscent of the grand staircase in the Titanic, a picture of Harry Elkin Widener can be seen at the top of the staircase, through a doorway, within the recreated wood paneled library.  A Gutenberg bible (one of only forty in the world) takes pride of place, in a glass case, not accessible to anyone in its physical form, except for the white gloved archivist, with Edwardian protocol, occasionally turning a page.

Journey to enlightenment.

The advert on the ‘T’ says “follow the path to enlightenment” with a picture of three gowned and mortar-boarded people smiling and walking together already on their journey to enlightenment.  My own journey to Harvard and enlightenment leaves every weekday, Monday to Friday, from the Joy Street apartment.  Today the sun is shining, and I head into the light, bright crisp air, towards the light of knowledge.  I head downhill out of historic Beacon Hill, with its steep brick paved and gas lamp lined streets, to Cambridge Street, a far more modern, fairly typical American street, with restaurants, laundry, and liquor stores.  I  turn left along Cambridge Street past Ladder 24 Fire Station, past the flower shop, and the people all rushing to work at this time in the morning.  Many cars travel slowly into town and work; a helicopter is taking off from the roof of Massachusetts General Hospital, having brought an emergency patient for treatment, and the occasional ambulance rushes, siren howling, to or from the hospital, on an urgent mission.  I cross the road, and into the glass covered station entrance, attached to the side of an old brick and steel viaduct, which carries the train across the Charles River on the Longfellow Bridge.  The Chief Inspector is standing there, looking stern and official, arms crossed and legs apart, dominating his entrance to his Massachusetts Bay Transport Authority (MBTA) domain.   Only last week he helped me and Anji get our “Chaawr-lee” card (Charlie card) - the sternness is a veneer, he is there to help - a man with knowledge and wisdom to those willing to learn; a professor and a mentor with a willingness to share his knowledge to aid others’ journeys.  Thanks to him I have the card that gives me access, and touch it to the pad, and the electronic gate opens and lets me through like a regular Boston commuter.  Past another flower-seller, and up the escalator.  A busker is playing classical music on a flute, he’s a regular, and some of the travelers shout a  hello to him, but give no money.   The official authoritative voice on the tannoy says “Attention passengers, the next red line train to Alewife is approaching”, and as promised it arrives, climbing out of the tunnel onto the viaduct, and into the station.  The doors close, and the train, with its promise of enlightenment, crosses the Charles River, and then drops back into the underground tunnel, stopping at Kendall / MIT, and Central before reaching Harvard Square. 

Off the train, I climb out of the darkness through the barriers and up the slope, past the underground bus station, where the buses collect passengers on the 77 to Arlington Heights and the 75 to Belmont Centre, via 700 Huron Avenue - each bus using overhead electric power assistance whilst underground.  I go up the steps, and cross the road and into Peets Coffee shop for my morning Cappuccino.  The cafe is Californian, with the relaxed coffee house atmosphere and smells, students and professors sit around, some reading, others on laptop computers, yet more chatting.  The barista is quick and efficient, calling my name and handing me a coffee: I leave and head down past the inevitable Irish pub and enter the Hauser Center, to figure out how the hell I get to this enlightened educated place that Harvard is - now that I am here - no one to help me, I am on my own, with all of Harvard’s resources at my feet - I just have to to find my own way....

Tadpole Playground, Frog Pond and squirrels

3rd April 2009.

Eight in the morning, cold and a Belfast-like mizzle is in the air.  A pile of snow still sits in the middle of Frog pond, the cold air and snow hinting at the skaters pirouetting across the ice just a few weeks ago on the pond during the winter.  Now all is grey and damp.  These 50 acres a training ground for yogi-bear style Park Rangers – three of their trucks are within view, but no bears.  There is a gangster in a Stetson and black overcoat on his mobile phone, and a lone china man, performing slow motion kung fu poses as he does his Tai-Chi down one of the paths.  In the corner stands a magnificent memorial to the 54^th Massachusetts Regiment: the first all Black regiment, refused their pay until it was the same as the white soldiers’ – it took two years.  The inscription applauds their courage and sacrifice for their nation.  The officers were white, and the inscription applauds their courage and belief in their men.  Another monument commemorates the victims of the Boston massacre, when 5 colonials were shot by British troops.  An echo of troubles in a damp Derry, on a bloody Sunday.

50 acres of parkland - two days later (today, Sunday) the sun shines, and the trees are starting to bud. What a different place.  After a brunch in a small bistro, a walk in the park.  Beautiful weeping willows over a small lake, curious, inquisitive squirrels come very close, the promise of food.  People out enjoying the sunshine, and spring is in the air....

Staggering amounts of Money

Can you imagine what sixty-six Billion dollars looks like?  What could you do with just a 1/1000^th of it?  $66 million!  But $66,000 million!    It costs less than a quarter of that to run Northern Ireland each year, its schools, roads, art galleries and social services for one and a half million people. But what would you do with that sort of money?  What if you started a business and in 20 years you earned enough money to be so rich that you could put half of that amount aside, and still live the life of the fabulously rich.  Or give $31 billion of your own personal fortune to someone else to spend on good causes.  

Microsoft earned Bill Gates enough money for him to start his foundation with half of the $66 Billion.  Another man, called Warren Buffet, decided not to start his own charitable foundation, but preferred to give his money to Bill, and Bill’s wife Melinda, to spend on their chosen charities, that is curing Malaria and helping child poverty – with $66 billion.  

Harvard University has discovered that it is short $8 Billion in its budget for this year.  That is half of what it costs to run Northern Ireland!   There are a series of crises budget meetings taking place around the University as they all figure how they are going to cut expenditure.  Harvard is a charitable foundation as well, investing a huge amount of money to enable it to support education, knowledge, and the ideal of its motto “Veritas”, or truth.  One way it does this is to provide financial support to help pay 2/3’s of the $60,000 per year fees.  27,000 people applied for Harvard scholarship grants this year, more than last year’s.  However, only 1/10^th will be successful – that is 2,700 people, leaving 24,500 disappointed applicants.

I wonder if $66 Billion is enough to cure Malaria?

The good, the bad, but no ugly (yet)

Sitting here in the apartment watching a retrospective of ER prior to the last programme in the last series; it was heavily advertised on the radio all day. I have to admit there are some things that the US does well, and appears to continue to do well. In the 1970’s we had some god-awful US TV serials ("Starsky and Hutch", the "Six Million Dollar Man" and others for example, springs to mind); then in the late 1970s the Hill Street Blues hit the screens in the UK, and a gritty, reality TV drama, and the credibility of US tv changed, almost overnight. Today we continue to get good TV, through "The Sopranos", and "The Wire". There is, however, a lot of crap on the 100’s of other channels that are available – the trick is to cut through the dross. Sorry. Still haven’t cracked how to do that! Too many adverts as well!

Late this afternoon I went to a lecture called “Mission Critical Investments in non-profits”. If ever there was a title to put you off, this was one. The Americans have a knack of making things sound, well, complicated. But, I’m the new boy, so went along, and I was one of 12 there. It was delivered by a finance expert from the Heron Foundation, involved in investing millions of dollars in good causes, and making a return on this investment. The American way is not only about making money, it is also about helping the less well off, and supporting good causes – the US is big into philanthropic causes, and they put a huge amount of money, time and effort into it. However, this was about making money through investment in good causes and using this money to invest in other good causes. Is this the better side of the American Way?

Map Nerd's Paradise

There are over 80 Harvard libraries with over 15 million titles - or is that 80 million titles in 15 libraries – in either case it is a remarkable number. I went to two today to check out how I can get in, and what to do to use them, and then discovered a third. All of the libraries are catalogued on-line, and my Harvard Id and PIN number is an ‘access all areas’ pass to search, download electronic copies of papers, and to take books out from the libraries. There are also a whole range of talks, seminars and workshops on a variety of subjects, ranging from politics, women’s rights to self improvement in communication (public speaking) and interview techniques. Whilst looking for the entrance to the second library I found the Harvard Map Library, and it had a small exhibition of maps of Rhode Island – “Taking the Measure of Rhode Island: A Cartographical Tour” telling the story of the cartography of the smallest US State (apart from Washington DC that is), and the story of the people who surveyed and drew them. Seventh heaven for a map nerd! With the map drawn by Surveyors in the 1750’s, and quotes from their ‘poetic’ journal telling of rests under orchard trees, and drinking wine at an inn, and the drinking of sweet beverages to celebrate completing their survey (typical Surveyors!). Or the tale of another surveyor who went bust drawing another map, because the State only bought 7 printed copies of the map, and he had to sell the original copper plates later to make ends meet, only to discover that the purchaser asked someone else to update and publish the new map – he sued for copyright breach but lost on a technicality. And then the sale of ‘subscriptions’ to pay for the work – some subscribers would get their name mentioned, others who paid more got to tell of their business and more. An excellent little exhibition bringing to life the maps from a time when this land was newly discovered, and had to be organised and laid out, and all its resources understood and located. And then there were to original globes made by Mercator himself, sitting in a glass display cabinet, one of the earth, the other of the heavens, and the only two known to be in North America. (Told you it was for Map nerds!).

See http://hcl.harvard.edu/news/2009/rhode_island_maps.html