Merry Xmas and an adventurous 2012!

Yes, a picture from our own collection, taken in Pingyao, China in 2010 on our travels. For those of you who wonder about it: the haircut is real, no photoshop! It was high fashion amongst kids then....or is that parents:-)?

For sure 2011 was a year full of experiences. I've travelled a road over the course of this year that has given me much, so much to think about. For all I like about being a freelancer what I definitly dislike is the being alone. Of course I work in a network. I have close friends and very close colleagues who give me support, feedback and who help me to develop. But having colleagues is special. Being part of a team, helping to build a team, that is so incredibly special. And for some reason that seemd the common denominator of all my projects this year! The universe provides I believe?! So thank you for allowing me to strengthen your ranks Science Center Delft, educational department of NEMO, The European Library (and through them Dublin Core), Europeana, Erfgoed Nederland and my first client ever and longest client DEN. Thank you for the companianship you gave me, the chances and the trust in me you handed to me so confidently. I have many blogs to write including a couple of views from the backoffice. But that will be something for tomorrow or early 2012. For now for me is a time for thank you's and I could not possibly go into my Christmas holidays without having said them loud and clear. So here you are: thank you. I look forward to seeing you next year!

Sheer happiness

It's been a while since I last blogged here. Nothing but good news though. Actually: the best. Upon our return from our fateful journey through the east we threw a lot of balls up in the air. EthicsEnterprise together with my mate Elisa Dijkhuis, Picnic in the Park and also I reopened MK5060. And all are taking off now it seems. Which is slightly miraculous to me. But above all a confirmation that I made the right choice somehow.

At the start of this year I was in doubt as to what I wanted to do. I seriously thought and even acted upon an urge to find colleagues and a steady job. Mainly because of personal development reasons. I had a couple of chats and made a U-turn back to being self employed. Wholeheartedly. As that is the form that seems to allow me to follow the paths that feel right to me even though they do not seem to make any sense to the outside world. And come to think of it: usually they don't make any sense to me:-) I just tend to take a road that opens itself as it feels right. Of course I make plenty of mistakes, but hey: I get to apologise and mend them as well.

That U-turn back to self employment for now seems to be the true path. Really. And that is what I so much want to share. EthicsEnterprise has brought me the colleague I longed for and the opportunity to explore and expand my background in ethics. Discovering new roads. Finding our way in voicing our very own Ethics Enterprise sound. Which is a wonderful road of personal development as well as a development in partnership. MK5060 is well and truly reopened. I cannot express enough thanks to those who helped me to do so: science centers, library organisations....well: you know who you are. I thank you from the bottom of my heart. How cool (or rather: WARM) is it when you decide to re-open and people call you with the message that they would like to help you get back on your feet. When people continue to do so. Offering warm surrounding to work with truly wonderful people.

Yes, a pause here. Because that is what happened. I am in awe.

Picnic in the park is my (and our, as in my and my husbands) most recent undertaking. For now we're seriously but simply exploring where that road will lead us. Letting it grow organically, planning ahead a bit but not to much and mainly being focussed on maintaining the quality of our products. With step by step professionalisation. Focussing on our dreams of connecting preservering recipes through the ages and throught cultures.

Believe me: for the life of me at the start of 2011 I had not dared to dream that this year would turn out this way. Is it bussy? Heck, yes. And sure, it has it's ups and downs. Time is short with so many things needing attention. When the pressure gets on I can become truly very Dutch, very straight. At times loosing the precious balance between quality, time and cost. But somehow with all people with whom I have the pleasure to work together, it seems to work out just fine.

Jeez, this is almost an evangelical post. But I just had to share it with you: I am so truly right where I want to be with all the balls up in the air. I really hope that we can keep it up for years to come this way. With everything growing in its own right direction.

Maybe this simply is a premature Christmas-thank-you feeling I realised when riding home on my bike. Maybe. Maybe not. What the heck. The beauty of happiness is that you multiply it when you share it right? So here's my two cents worth!

Jan Lee Martin Futures Foundation RIP

Via the mailing list of the World Futures Studies Foundation I just received the sad news that Jan Lee Martin in Sydney, Australia has passed on, apparantly peacefully in her sleep. We had the pleasure of meeting her in Sydney a good ten years ago now.

In 1999 we moved to New Zealand, not knowing wether it would be for a bit, a bit longer or possibly forever. But knowing for very sure that it was one country we wanted to know, to experience, to smell, to breathe. We wanted to live and work there and just ride the waves of life down under. Having graduated for my MA with a studies on the future of digital services to consumers, I thought futures studies would be a good angle to get to know people. And hence I searched and found New Zealand Futures Trust (now: Futures Thinking Aotearoa) and one evening taking the time difference into account I called the Futures Trust office and got of to a brilliant, warm start with Yvon Curtis whom today we are honoured and proud to call a dear friend. Actually more than that: she feels like family. Back then after a great time together we decided to move on the Australia. Whilst being down under, why not explore the lot? We were free, no strings attached and as hungry as we are now to explore and discover. So Yvon referred us to Jan Lee, saying that we absolutely had to meet her as she was a driving force behind the Australian Futures world.

We moved to Sydney, lived nine lives at once with our jobs in CBD and for the Dutch Olympic Team and indeed met up with Jan Lee. One inspiring woman! She was warm, hospitable, receiving us in her house, sharing stories about her travels to Europe and we discovered that we above all shared a deep and almost limitless hunger for Big Questions and integration of fields. But also her story of selling her business without actually retiring inspired me. As I remember her it was a woman driven by passion and a good hunger for development, one of those truly ageless wise people who just kept working. Tirelessly and with a sense of humor.

It was a meeting of "one night only" but it was a night to remember. A talk that still inspires. Thanks Jan Lee.

FIRST LEGO League Open European Championships: the view from the judging room

Greetings from all teams in the Chinese and Taiwanese tradition

Friday and Satury Delft was the host of the FLL OEC 2011. An incredible event for many reasons. I was lucky enough to participate as a judge on one of the project presentation judging teams. The view from the judging room is a special one. Teams coming in singing. Offering you their trembling and somewhat sweaty hand. Your hand being equally fuelled with tension. Because you never know what will come, only for sure that it will surprise you. The teams launch into presentation on topics you've hardly heard off or thought about. Epilepsy, stem cells, mini robots that are injected into the bloodstream to destroy blood cloths, minimally invasive methods to beat cancer....But also topics closer by to the kids: the flat feet of the Happy Feet team from India, the incredibly well thought through device of the Brasilien SESI team that allows people to exercise under medical supervision in the free exercise grounds in Brasil, the team from Peru who had developed a pregnancy monitoring device using a simple mobile phone thus enabling women high up in the Andes as well as women living in the city to get the benefits of telemedicine. I cannot even recall what we got in front of our judging tables, from China to Australia, from the USA to Singapore and everything in between. Backed up by fans, families and friends that had trailed along from all over the world. 

What makes it especially incredible is that through science and technology cultural, language and political borders are surpassed. Or better: are debunked. They simply do not count any longer. Friendships are formed across language barriers. Inventions are admired across political sensivities. It's magical. The stuff happy times and good memories are made of.

greetings from all teams!

Being a judge on such an event is really tough. Because basically you are asked to judge varieties of greatness, varieties of ingenuity, of learning experiences and varieties of great fun. Entities that do not quite fit boxes on the form: good, average, room for improvement or excellent. A number of times I felt like a proper historical artefact. For example when a 13 year old blankly tells you that the app they programmed is in the android app store but that the performance will be greatly enhanced with the new android platform that will come out this summer. Or when a database of 1500 types of food is presented to you, all indexed to enhance the life of diabetic patients. Or when three girls are measuring brain waves to explain how you can see an epileptic attack coming on. 

I had many moment where I felt utterly awed by the body of knowledge that was researched but above all by the passion by which is was researched and presented. Sometimes so strongly that I could litterally feel the air vibrating by the enthusiasm of the team. Anybody who truly believes that wisdom comes with the ages I invite to come to one of these happenings, and have yourself proven otherwise: cynicism comes with the ages. And at times pure stupidity, when you see what is produced here. The question I am left with: when does cynicism kick in? Why can't we keep the spirits of unity and brotherhood across borders up when we grow older? What precisly is so hard about trusting and appreciating the other? How is it that what sets us apart at some point in life becomes the focus of attention rather then what unites us? While we all grow tender when we see kids uniting across borders? An amazing dichotomy that has me seriously puzzled whilst looking back on a marvellous weekend.

Thanks to all the organisers, teams and volunteers involved: we had a blast! 

For live images see the MK5060 YouTube channel. And below some photo impressions.

Also see the blog of official FIRST LEGO League correspondent Khaled Marashdeh. 

Saudi Arabian style!

Happy feet won a prize

never too old to train your cuddly dragon

Member of the Thai team

Asklepios from Turkey

Brasil

Woody collects signatures

Under pressure

"Under pressure everything becomes fluid" is a famous Dutch saying, which I hereby undoubtedly translated completely wrongly in English :-) It is something we say when the pressure is so high that the timeline determines everything and that you just work-work-work to get the job done. In practice pretty much without thinking.

With every project I manage and conference I design I am becoming increasingly convinced that quite a few people actually consciously let the pressure build to such an extent that they feel they can let the process take over their decision capability. Which is convenient. Because if you can point a finger to the deadline and the incredible pressure you were under to actually reach this deadline, the finger of responsibility does not point to you. In other words: people put their own responsibility on the shoulders of the rather anonymous process. Because if you take responsibility, if you make conscious decisions, you can decide wrongly. And you are responsible.

I have to admit that this development worries me. Is it the recession that makes people insecure about keeping their jobs and thus fuels an increasing responsibility avoidance in a rather sophisticated way? Is it over all insecurity about what is good? Something else? Whatever the cause, I am positively baffled by what people see as utterly unplannable. As far as I'm concerned it's all about finding the right balance. The right balance between planning and seizing opportunity, between planning and allowing for inspiration. It's the same when chairing a group session. I am becoming increasinly allergic to the adagium of some professional chairs who eagerly state: "well, it hall has to come from the group you know". Right, if so, then why on earth do we need a chair?

Sure, we are only humans and being a philosopher and an ethicist I am actuly aware of our vulnerability. As an experienced project manager I am fully aware of the role of coincidences and events that were unplanned. But when it comes to preparation I side with those who say that success is where preparation meets opportunity. Without the preparation the opportunity will not come neither be ceased. Now tell me, have I accidently exchanged my bright pink sun glasses for looking at the world by a pair of ink black ones? Or is there some rhyme and reason to my muttering?

From communication to participation

http://asymptotia.com/category/energy/

Went to a thinktank meeting. Subject: how can we better communicate the value of science. Or would that be the relevance of science? My feelings the day after are mixed. Mainly because I feel again the discours was caugt in a sender-message-receiver framework and it was very much guided by a marketing line of thinking. How can we send better? What should we send? To whom should we send? What are our goals? Science is so broad and diverse, can we actually communicate it? The bright side to me: it was all in good spirits with everybody aiming for a good, positieve exchange of thoughts and ideas. And much came to the table.

But why do we always somewhere along the lines get caught in the tranmission model when it comes to science communication, I wonder? Are we right there where society is? I wonder but I am inclined to say that we are not. I have a nagging idea that we could well be underestimating our audience. I think that we all pretty much understand that we are no longer outside a shop window (to use one of yesterdays analogies) looking at the science and technology on display, trying to figure out what suits us best. Rather we are in the midst of that shop. We are in it and of it. These are philosophical terms, whether everybody will use those same words to phrase our position: probably not. But that does not mean that it is not understood, I'd say. It does however mean that we really need to reframe our way of work and our way of thinking, talking and acting vis-a-vis science communication.

And that is exactly what I like about Naturalis - and by the way also about the Science Centre Delft, which is aiming for true interaction between the science community and the visitors as well (had some great pictures, but unfortunately iPhone is broken...). Because these institutions are going in full gear towards a participatory model of science education. In which the visitor is both part of the experience and creates his or her own experiences. In fact: in which the visitor helps to shape the institutions. Actively. By deeds, thoughts and actions. This is the fundamental shift I was talking about in my last blog. It's no longer a defined vision of what science is or what a museum is that is thought through and then shaped and communicated. What is presented is rather: this is the work that we do here, help us, experience, participate. An open invitation to visitors to make up their own minds. To shape their own experiences and follow their own interests by asking questions, participating in indexing the collection (in the case of Naturalis) and through their own interests and participation shape their view of science.

It is I feel a much needed turn. Because to keep on fine tuning the message, the relation between the message and the audience, to change the sender...it's all variations on the same theme that I feel do no longer fit the current day and age in which participation is key. Sure, it's about channels, messages and audiences. But channels, messages and audiences are more and more becoming one. The medium is the message, the audience is the sender and the sender is receiver and the medium and vice versa. The question is how to participate in that changing and evolving field. And that is I'd say through fundamentally changing our own mindset and way of work towards a participatory way of working. In which we do not control or even have the directors role. But in which we just present ourselves, as we are, doing the work that we do. And by extending an open invitatin to others to work with us, to experience with us, to get a sense of what has at some stage ignited our passion.

My, it was food for thought hey, yesterday! Anybody ready to help develop this line of thought?  Preferably at some stage into a line of action:-)?Because I'm thinking, searching, trying as well here, feeling I'm onto something, but maybe not yet able to write it down correctly.

Naturalis live science

Live Science in Naturalis

Thursday I went to Naturalis as they opened what might in commercial terms be called their concept store. A science work street, inhabited by employees of Naturalis who do their work in front of the public. Their work of conserving, cataloguing, charting, organizing. At first sight it reminded me of the Darwin Centre of the Natural History Museum in London: exhibiting the process of science, working with interactive displays that allow visitors to be part of the exhibition, the fact that the subject is life sciences....But up close I realised that Naturalis is actually going further. Much further. In the Darwin Centre the process of (life) science is made visible through interactive exhibits including short movies in which employees of the Natural History Museum tell about their work, the relevance of their work and their passion for their work. In Naturalis you can actually see the people at work. Live and in real life. You can talk to them, ask your own questions, assist them in the cataloguing...In short: it's truly interactive. It's not an exhibition made with interactives, in pointed fact it's not even an exhbition anymore. It is an interactive process of which you - the visitor - are a full part of it all - crowd sourcing Naturalis style. I was impressed. Truly impressed. Both by the concept and the operationalisation thereof, but also because having worked with Naturalis I think I have somewhat of understanding of what an enormous change this is for this institution. A complete turn around, from an institution which presented everything 100% finished, researched, thought through to now creating an open ended experience with many unknown and in a way uncontrollable variables. A fundamentally new way of thinking, of working, of looking at the concept of a science center/natural history museum and a new way of looking at science education. Especially the latter has captured my philosophical interest. My hat is off for Naturalis and I will follow with much interest! Some pictures and short movies taken with my iPhone (although it cannot beat the real experience). For the movies please go to my newly opened YouTube channel as I found it totally hopeless to try and upload movies on blogger. Takes forever and a day.

Finding my own way...or not?

I'm a philosopher (of science and technology to be precise) and an ethicist. So you'd think I would be able to steer myself out of dilemma's and would be able to reason my own way out of difficult questions. Sorry to disappoint. I find myself in a difficult spot. I am adament that I will focus MK5060 more on questions related to science and technology education and communication and on shaping, forming and giving a head and a heart to cooperations between knowledge institutions. Connections that I believe are essential for a fertile future, in fact: connections that are the only way forward. As each institution on its own will not be able to cope with the demands of times, peoples and cultures to come. Anyways, before I go into a long winded blog about this, let's return to the point of this blog entry.
Because where are my limits? Do I have any limits to the services I provide when it comes to enabling these cooperations? Because it sounds all pretty highbrow and I notice that many people - including myself if I don't watch me! - have the connotation of in sector cooperation: libraries with libraries, schools with schools etc. Or at best cross sector, where e.g. libraries cooperate with schools and museums. Out of sector cooperation is rarely on the charts, although it should be. And if so, it can take many forms including sponsorship.
You're guessing the point: a dear client has asked me to assist in fundraising. Now should I or should I not take this on? I am inclined to as I am very reluctant to put boundaries on my services as long as they fit the - rather broad - framework. So why am I in doubt? Because there is still this hopeless gap between content and form, between strategy and operationalisation. Fundraising combines the layers, it cuts straight through organisational boundaries and it is a true form of cooperation, of forming partnerships, across sectors and branches it connects people and organisations. But is still seen as operational. So actually I am wondering: how does that frame me and my services if I take this on? And simultaneously in writing this I realise that I am not inclined to consent to existing boundaries, to judge myself by standards other people may use. To allow myself to be put into boxes created by others that I do not agree with in the first place. My, it's all clear now! Thanks for reading and listening, let me know if you have any thoughts. But I think I sorted myself out. All you need to sometimes do is talk out loud. I guess.

Don't let schooling get in the way of (science) education

Through twitter this article on the value of free choice learning for science got my attention. This study is ground breaking as it covers both the concept of free choice learning (thus going past the old paradigm of formal, non-formal and informal learning, Dierking and Falk are pioneers in this field I think) and the productivity of this way of educating/learning. As such it is one of the first and few studies that I know of that actually shows how strongly and deeply a science museums can influence the publics knowledge on attitudes about science and technology. And moreover how this type of education can overcome barriers of education, economy, race etc. I would be interested if this is a unique trait of science museums (or science centers) or whether this is a trait of education outside schools anyway. Because if so this would mean a new road ahead for schooling and education. A road in which maybe even at some point schools will be part of museums as an interactive exhibit on teaching and learning. An exhibit that shows how we once thought the educational process should be organised:-) This article also fuels profound questions on whether you can actually teach if there is no innate interest in the receiving party. In others words: what is the value of teaching without a receptive learner? But also on what knowledge is, and how one gets by knowledge. What actually is the learning process, and can we totally, consciously design this? Should we actually aim to maximize the learning potential or should we rather be talking about optimization, thus truly changing the educational paradigm? Most methods are now geared towards maximizing the learning process in an instrumental way, e.g. through mixing entertainment and education, but still eventually measuring the educational output through the looking glass of maximization. The questions thus effectively being: did the student learn more by using this method than that method? In a paradigm that departs from optimizing the learning process that central question would rather be: what did this person learn that he/she previously was unaware of? And isn't that exactly what education, learning and teaching are about in the first place?

(cartoon: Rat Race escape artists)

Educating science communication?

My week was governed by pushing EthiekZaak (of course!) and for MK5060 by science and technology education or communication (is there a fundamental difference?). It is a week that left me wondering how and when we are going to science e&c 2.0. From a meeting on Monday in NEMO where science professionals from mainly universities and a few science centers representatives discussed how to better position science in society to newspaper articles on wrong science and emotions governing the discussion on nuclear energy (http://tinyurl.com/5svgnsv sorry Dutch only!). A Kohnstamm lecture delivered by Louise Fresco who wonders how we get past the era in which emotions have become a source of konwledge and signals that society suffers from an overkill of non information. 

Facts versus emotions. Science versus society. Scientists and communicators who wonder how to redevelop the message they are sending. Because the public does not understand. Because the public chooses to rely on peer information from internet fora rather than trust the experts. And happily lets their emotions rule. So the experts say.

I wonder: why are we still stuck in this polarising line of thought? And in this sender-message-receiver line of working? 

In philosophical tradition the relation between rationality and emotions is one of the most difficult subjects and after a good 2500 years we have a rich tradition but no definite answers (hey, we are philosophers:-)). One of the finest works written on this subject in my opinion is Upheavels of thought by Martha Nussbaum. Elaborating on and working on the basis of philosophical tradition and the arts she comes to the conclusion that the tangle of human emotions is an aid and fundamental to our existence rather than a handicap, an impediment. She positions emotions as intelligent responses to the perception of value. This is a nearly cosmis shift in philosophical thinking which has long evaded matters of the heart and placed great value on detachment from these matters and opted for values like "coolness", "pure rationality" and the likes.

Science communication would do well to take this perspective into account I feel as it would help to shift the dynamics of the debate. Rather then alsmost verbally beating up "the public" (whoever that may be) by more facts, more facts, still more facts, labelling articulated emotions as "hysteria" and basically telling the public off for not knowing better, the emotions could be taken seriously and be addressed as such. In other words: make the debate inclusive and consciously accept that emotions are part of science and in effect help shape science. It would mean a move away from th sender-message-receiver line of working and a move towards a participatory way of thinking about science and science c&e. Anybody fancies elaborating this line of thought and experimenting with it?

GOOD Education

Just read a fascinating article in The Australian. A quote:  "By 2025, there will be more Australians with degrees than ever before. This is an important first step, but it will be wasted if graduates haven't also been skilled to be the leaders and the thinkers of the 21st century. Achieving prosperity aspirations will require far-sighted reforms beyond a policy of funding universities on student demand alone."Another plea for thinking outside the square. I am not quite sure though whether this has to solely start with (university) education. Of course we still have not figured out what the essence of the good in education is (some claim it's the toolbox approach that is the substance of good education, others claim there is more to it, that is is about world citizenships etc. e.g. Nussbaum), but still I wonder: is that the only way to allow society to change? Because if you think outside the square, you still have to be able to find a relation with existing squares, so to speak. So not only the current generation of students has to learn how to be the leaders and the thinkers of the 21st century, also the current generation needs to be trained, educated, reshaped, whatever the wording. Otherwise we end up with a new generation that is disconnected and thus not capable of transforming. Because transformation needs connecting, of that I am convinced.

Also I am convinced that education needs philosophical scrutiny. Very few sector experience as many reshapings, innovations, new methods and experiments as the eduational sector, but compared to the intensity of experiments the theorectical foundation is rather poor. What is it that as a society we expect from education? What do we want our children to learn? What do we - grown ups (apparently:-)) want to learn? Who do we want to teach our children, our parents and ourselves? And where do we want to learn? Is the geography of learning and teaching, the where, important? Are schools the right form to work with for children? And if not, what, where and why then? Are schools on their way to museums as a form of education that we at one time thought was elementary to what we wanted to teach, be taught, learn and be educated in? A first grasp of questions that we by now quite desperately need to pay attention to. Starting with: what now is good education? Any thought anybody?

On teachers and teaching in higher education

In an interview with Loek Nieuwenhuis on BNR newsradio he ponders how teachers can be remotivated for their profession. Government thinks about financial incentives, Nieuwenhuis thinks about creating teams of people and a closer connection between education and the workplace. Whereas he mainly focusses on the vocational education, I think that remotivation of teachers on an academic level is also an issue to be taken into account.

Teachers on an academic level are either Phd students or people with Phd. But with no special didactical skills, training and at times even without any special inclination or ambition for teaching. The reasoning is probably that it is all about the content, but aren't we by now beyond that, I wonder? Can't we make more of academic teaching and training, get more out of academics and academic students if we pay attention to training academic teachers? And wouldn't that also be a simple first step towards knowledge valorisation? It is one of those items that I always wonder about. Lost of energy concerning education goes to primary, secondary and vocational training. Primary and secondary because they are the basis for all higher education. Vocational education takes in the majority of the people. But does that justify the little bit of energy that goes into professionalizing academic teaching? What constitutes good academic teaching? What is a good teacher? And what is good teaching? What is a good academic learning and teaching environment?

My own inclination would be that the answers to these questions are not only found by academic thinking and by thinking within the box of the academic system. Answers are to be found in practices on all levels of teaching, in cross overs between teaching and learning environments on different levels. In thinking and acting across existing boundaries and systems, so that new ones will evolve. Over the next weeks I will blog some more about this, as the ethics of education have my profound interest!

Yes, still here!

It's been quiet on my blog for a while. I am still here though and MK5060 is up and running with the first clients a fact again. But I am in the process of developing not one but even two new lines of business, each together with a partner. And I am writing my articles, with one completed in draft version and sent out for comment, the other one in the near final stage and then there is the book on bike2culture that is close to the first draft. I hope to be well underway to a new blogpost here at the end of this week!

FLL Benelux final

Yesterday was the day of the FLL Benelux final. The FIRST® LEGO® League (FLL) is a competition that challenges kids in the age of 8 to 15 to undertake research into the role technology plays in society. This years theme was Body Forward and so a heap of teams presented solutions for heart failure, night vision,artificial limbs, wheelchairs with gearshifts, cool braces for kids with scolioses and other problems. The finals were held in Continium, the recently redone and re-openend science center in Kerkrade. I was part of the team jury judging the team work and that was nowhere near as easy as it looked! Quite a few schools and teams are by now experienced and it is hard to judge the authenticity and truthfulness of everything and everybody I found. And with some teams you feel that they did a great job, but it just doesn't show. And then there are the teams where it all comes together and they give you energy to move on in the wonderous field of science education. As always the entire event was presented by Hidde en Thomas, who outdid themselves once again as far as I'm concerned. And I even got to hand out an award, the one for best team coach. We wholeheartedly and uninanimously decided that it should go to the 13 year old who had coached her team of 13-15 year olds without help of any grown ups. She and the whole team did a wonderful job and it was my pleasure to give her the award. Although we were knackered by the time we got home, we totally enjoyed the experience and the warm hospitality of Continium. Thanks to the entire organising team! 

A few impressions (and yes, as we are getting close to Carnival in the South of Holland, Prince Carnaval was in attendance!):

The Green Coach from the German team

Prince Carnival in attendance

LEGO Basketball player

at the end of the day.....Packed and ready to go home

Higher education: on dialogue and real choices

The pressure on higher education is becoming unbearable and requires fundamental change. Higher education is stretched past its limits of what the current budgets and coming budget cuts allow. That is how I read the message of the Dutch secretary of state for education. I am aware that it is a consicously positive way of reading this message. And that there is another way of interpreting it: politics, "The Hague" comes up with everything without listening to the ones involved. Two world colliding: the managers, politics, money and result drivenness versus the world of emotions of teachers who passionately want to teach, of the students, involved in a system they cannot control and of which they are insecure whether it will help them form their future. Whether the leadership they feel is necessary for the future is awakened in them in this system. But can they see a viable alternative future? The clash between the worlds is evident. But necessary. Because neither the solely managerial perspective offers a fruitful path nor does the alternative offered by teachers and students.

And that is the downside of this process, no matter how positive the interpretation of the message. There is no proper dialogue. No dialogue between the personal, emotional, the passion and the experience from practice on the one hand and the managerial, alsmost technological policies that are now voiced. This dialogue is necessary. Because to proceed how we have been doing of the past decades will not help us to create the future we envisage. This dialogical way of thinking and working, of looking at organisations I think is making progress in a number of areas, notably health care. Or at least in thinking about health care with Kunneman as one of the leading thinkers on the subject (sorry, article in Dutch).

Dialogue in this matter requires true leadership. Leadership that recognizes the value of both perspectives but that is also capable of thinking past the existing frameworks. That is capable of dealing with the emotions involved. Emotions that are valuable and hold a truth that is equal to the managerial perspective. Leadership that enables to mould the future of education, that moves education into the future with a clear idea in stead of merely managing on surviving the future. Leadership that is based on listing and dialogical thinking.

My contribution: this week and next week I have a number of conversations planned with new parties and old friends where this will be on the agenda and where we will seek to find out what we can contribute together to organising and enabling this dialogue. In addition I have submitted a proposal along the lines of action learning for Informatie aan Zee regarding this topic, but then of course focussing on the choices that information and documentation organisations see themselves faced with. Not everything is possible anymore (if it ever was:-), but vis-a-vis a multitude of ambitions, possibilities, demands and budget cuts how do you deal with the inevitable dilemma's? And what are ways of dealing with these dilemma's knowing that whichever way you go there will be fundamental and substantial loss, change and gain?

Please contact me if you want to think and work on these questions!

Physical and virtual learning environments

Will we still have a need for libraries in the future? This article on the BBC site gives one of the best summaries of the main arguments in the debate on access to information that I have seen for a while. It does give a clear picture of where libraries need to develop. In the western world that is. Because the eIFL.net experience taught me that in the south and east matters do look dramatically different!

Author of Things and Stuff wins Herman de Coninck debut prize!

Annemarie Estor, with whom I devised and wrote my company fairytale (Things and Stuff), won the Herman de Coninck price for her poetic debut Vuurdoorn me. A personal and professional achievement and I am so incredibly proud of her and happy for her! Above all it is a true compliment for her determination to follow her passion and dream.

For me personally I take it as an inspiration today to work on the books and articles I have started to write. Articles on entertainment and education, on ethics in training of (young) doctors and on using dilemmas in science and technology education. My book on conference management which is still in the very early stages but begging to be taken that step further and on our epically disasterous journey bike2culture. Inspiration for a day of writing thus. With the sole ambiton of getting everything that one step further towards publication. Getting myself through this solitary work singing Dory's song from Finding Nemo: "Just keep swimming". just keep writing, just keep writing....

The same goes for Annemarie: whatever you do, keep writing, keep composing poems. We need your written children for inspiration and enchantment.

Ethics and social media

Recently I have started my quest to enhance the synthesis between my work and my academic training. One of the implications: ethics should become a larger component of my work. How? What? Where? It's all part of my search. In that search I came upon the Dutch Center for Ethics in Healthcare (sorry, Dutch only). Almost against my will I was drawn to the page that asks you to contribute. Do you have any suggestions as to what should be on the ethical agenda? Experiences in healthcare that you would like to share so that the practice can be changed evidence based?

Should I? Should I not? Healthcare, being a patient in that system is a very personal and intimate experience at the best of times and when things go wrong and your experience turns into a nightmare, it becomes even more intimate. Because it almost makes you feel as if you are a loser or somebody who was not worth caring for. Rationally this is of course not true. But it is a nagging feeling. Maybe too intimate to share with an organisation I did not know?

But I kept going back and thought long and hard. Explored my gutfeeling. My conclusion: my knowledge obliges me to contribute.

I have hands on knowledge of good and bad practices, of my own moral dilemma's in those situations, of dialogues with doctors on how the wrongdoing and going affected me and them. If you don't share what you know and what you experience, how can true change come about? So I filled out the form, taking my experiences to a more general abstract level, signalling the moral issues in e.g. training of young doctors, the needs of informal networks surrounding Alzheimer patients, good care for gynaelogical patients and the increasing responsibility that is allocated to patients by the Dutch health care system. I was not sure whether to expect something: the possibility to deliver feedback is all too often offered by organisations without giving thought to or taking the consequences. You have to do something with the feedback you get.

What followed to me is a prime example of good practice. Within 4 hours I received a personally written (in contrast to automatically generated) e-mail thanking me for my contribution and offering the possibility to discuss my contribution by telephone. Which we did the next day. What resulted was a true meeting of minds on ethics in practice, dilemma's in health care and how to get moral considerations out of the taboo sphere into the open, into informal communities onto the layman. Ethics and ethicists do not tend to be overly communicative. It is all too often taken into an abstract, academic domain. Which I strongly feel is at par with the heart of ethics. Aristotle already noted that ethical theory is distinctly different from theoretical sciences as the methodology must match its subject matter which is the nature of good action. And so it must inevitably recognize that many generalizations will hold only for the most part and that it is essentially practice based. Ethics is studied in order to improve our lives, to enhance ourselves, thoughts and actions. This essential relation between practice and ethical theory in my opinion deserves center stage. So I happily consented in thinking along on  how to realise this and equally happily consented to writing an article on ethical and moral issues in the training of doctors. If you want to think along with me, let me know or go to the comments page of the CEG.

Conference 3.0

Conferences are about telling a story, together with speakers, public and facilitators. Conferences are about strategic, tactical and operational excellence. At least: at surface level. At a deeper level they are abut connecting spirits, minds, souls, about transformation of practice, transformation of people. Nothing esoteric: its simply about making it happen through connecting the powers of kindred and inspiring spirits. Of knowmads.

Almost in with this much of the conference thinking is still firmly stuck in what I call the conference 1.0 and 2.0 thinking.

Conference 1.0: put an inspiring speaker (or a series of inspiring speakers) on stage who inform, educate and entertain the public with their thoughts. There is limited time for interaction with the speaker(s) - if there is time at all. The goal of these conferences: to inspire and educate. To show a new horizon, new ways forward.

Conference 2.0: combine inspiring speakers with workshoplike formats, thus allowing for interaction between members of the audience and speakers.

The conference 3.0 format that I can see arising, is the type of conference where the audience learns from the audience. Where the audience is it's own teachers, facilitated by professionals who know how to connect people and how to connect knowledge. Action learning in groups and teams. Unconferencing. Away from the top down method. Onto a method where you put value to the audience and their knowledge. People will hardly come to your conference to hear something new. The new is out there, in the social media. And the other new - original thinking - is out there in conferences like TED. Which are great, but not every conference can be a TED experience. And not every conference should aim to be. Conferences are about your public and about your goal. It is a working form, a means to reach and end. Not an end in itself. 

People come to conferences, to share their experiences and learn from others. They come to transform their organisations and their own functioning. 

If you want a conference, note these trends, give some thought to whether a conference is the right means for your end and if so: give these new forms some thought if you want a conference. Dare think about this and dare to do it, before you start organising on the automatic pilot on the 1.0 and 2.0 format. 

A lost generation?

Over much of the last years I have been involved in educating professionals in the field of cultural entrepreneurship, educational leadership and other topics. Sometimes we started off on a specific topic but through dialogue, action learning etc whole new fields were discovered. Education as it is supposed to be: interaction, the human dialogue in the center if and where needed supported by ICT, activiation of tacit and hidden knowledge of participants, making full use of the creativity of all involved.

Yes, there is heaps of creativity in people who are 30+. Why the somewhat irritated yes? Because the main focus these days seems to be on the seeminly boundless creativity in kids. That focus sometimes makes me feel like I am part of a lost cause, a lost generation. Away from the personal an a generational level I think that in focussing so much on the next generation we are forgetting our own strength, ability and responsibility in developing this society.

I am part of a generation that was brought up on regimented schools, learning facts, being taught on the borders of old fashioned school thinking and new instruments and didactical thoughts and possibilities brought on by ICT. A generation that does a lot of DYI when it comes to e.g. ICT and self development. A generation that is currently looking for anchors and sustainable development and that has the incredible challange in doing so while being both the catalysts, designers and subjects of change. We are in and of the changes that we experience, initiate, create and are subject to.

How can we enhance this generation of 30, 40 and 50 year olds in their quest to develop themselves and so develop society? Not only in instrumental relation to their work but also in more general terms? We cannot only live by putting all hopes on the next generation and putting our time in developing the best curriculum and educational strategies and products for them. In doing so we are cutting corners: it puts way too much pressure on the coming generation to "save the world" whilst simultaneously underestimating the qualities so abundantly available in the current working generation. A generation that I feel we can support by bringing the human interaction back to the center stage of the educational process. By taking advantage of technical solutions but also, and probably mainly by exploring innovative ways of combining ideals, passion, knowledge and emotions into a conscious learning processes.

the flu

I managed to escape the virus for a while but now I have succumbed: I am in bed feeling definitly beaten and I am trying hard not to cough my lungs out. The hardest thing though is the fact that a headache makes me unable to think clearly. While there is so much to think about... Hope to be up and running soon again.

World wide in The Netherlands

When you travel and work internationally, even in your home the world comes to you it appears. A comforting thought. Since we returned from our travels we have been able to rekindle many business relations and friendships across the globe through skype, e-mail and phone. And sometimes the travel just comes to you. On our journey from Russia to Australia we produced our own power by biking through the Busch& Muller e-werk. This led to an inspiring meeting with fellow cyclists this weekend.

Dick and Trudy will be off on 1 February. They are about 50, have two grown up daughters, they said goodbye to their work and their own company and sold their house to start living on two bicycles for a year. We discussed the practicalities of the e-werk apparatus, but also the more mundain topics of how as a woman you can go at any time any place when you really need to. Stuff that hardly anybody talks about as it is not sexy and probably does not contribute to inspiring travel enthusiasm. However, as always: practicalities like these can either seriously enhance or taint the on the road experience :-)

For us their visit tuned into our good memories. Moreover it is hugely inspiring to talk to people who are equally passionate. The lure of hard core travel, of discovering for yourself what you are made of and what the peoples of the world are made of, a desire to travel and to explore that it is so intense that at some stage(s) of your life you are willing to give up everything you have worked for, everything you have acquired and fought for to chase that one dream, is quite hard to explain to some. Most people end up making a choice: staying at home, dreaming of going but eventually never leaving, or going never succeeding in making a home again eventually loosing all sense of belonging, all sense of anchor in this world, becoming eternal nomads living from small job to small job. Both entail a loss of essential freedom and an even more essential loss of self we feel. So we set out to have both: to travel AND to work on a professional level, against the odds even both establishing a proper career true to our training and ambitions. All it takes it that we work a bit harder. But that has never killed anybody and I actually quite enjoy it. Every step gives meaning to and lays the groundwork for another step.

We thoroughly enjoyed meeting these kindred spirits, who at their age - when most have firmly settled -give up everything, trustig themselves, their own magnetic north, the future and the part of the world they are going to explore.  We wish them the very best of luck, an inspiring journey and a meeting of minds and hearts with whoever crosses their path. As always, may the road rise to meet them.

marketing & education: the case of the Hammam

Who of you have visited a hammam recently? My last visit was quite a while back, but I am diving into it anew as the hammam here in The Hague has enlisted my help to develop a marketing plan. The hammam has recently come under "new old" management. New, because Hans Klomp and Marian van Vliet had handed over the management to a different board in 2007. Old, because both, and especially Hans, are the founders of this bath house. With this transition to new management the hammam needs to find its place in the local, regional and national landscape. Who are the competitors and why? Who visit the hammam? Which new target groups do we want to reach? Etc. In short: your average good old fashioned marketing plan.

But not quite! One of the reasons I enjoy this so much, is that the marketing for this intercultural institution goes directly to questions of identity. The hammam is not Turkish, not Moroccan, not Tunesian. It is a bathhouse firmly rooted in the Turkish Arabic culture that has the aim to attract multicultural visitors. And in large(r) numbers I may add. But in order to attract visitors, the nationality question is important. People want to own it as "theirs". It cannot be taken over by westerners. In other words: if we would draw up and implement an entire marketing plan to attract westerners we would finish off the entire purpose of the facility. We have to do justice to the hammam as a platform for intercultural meetings, for intercultural contact.

In the meeting today we discussed the first draft of the marketing plan. It needs to be taken one step further but the general opinion was that we are well underway to a feasible plan that will deliver both a guideline for the next five years as well as a concrete plan for action for 2011. Which will be an exciting year for the hammam as not only have they decided to go for a new corporate style (I just linked them up with the graphic designer) but also because they will start training the staff in hospitality, marketing etc. This will put the basis in place for the years to come. Also we quite extensively discussed the use of social media to promote the hammam. Hans and Marian do not feel very digital and so this will probably be something for the staff to take up. For the website we discussed the possibilities that e.g. blogger offers. True, it is a blog, but with any imagination it can quite easiliy be (ab:-)used as a very dynamic website. NRC - a Dutch newspaper - has gone this way as well, be it not via blogger. But I found it inspiring and bearing in mind that the hammam has a low marketing budget and wants easy websitemanagement, I thought this would offer a good opportunity at least for now. Which immediately brought us to the organisational consequences. Using a blog as your website means that it has to be maintained on at least a weekly if not daily basis. Who is capable of doing so? Do we devise ground rules for this? What can we write and what not? But it also requires a different mode of thinking. To prepare for the discussion with the graphic designer the hammam staff and management will create a moodboard, as that makes the discussion with the designer so much easier. So I suggested that they make pictures and take some moving images to put on their website to give voice to their process of professionalisation. And that is when marketing becomes fun and GOOD: when you go past the campaign concepts and past the corporate image to really develop the organisation.

(hand)book on conference management for the non profit secto

June 2010 we temporarily closed MK5060 full circle projects to enter a time of reflection. I had lived and build up the business for 7 years, guiding myself and the people in my network through turbulent years, working with new people on new fields...turbulent and great years. But it was time for reflection and although this did not work out on the bicycles we did get our time off and we finally find now that there is room in us for new ideas, adventures and projects. Probably the overriding conclusion for me is that I will consciously work on creating synthesis.

For a number of my clients I am a passionate conference organiser, others see me as a marketeer with a deep understanding of the subject and apt at market research whereas for yet others I am a project manager whom you hire for projects that need strategical, tactical and operational attention. Projects that need peoplemanagement. Rarely the marekting, educational and organisational angles come together. So for 2011 that is one of the things that I will aim to create.

As a first step I have started to write. Something that I have always done but that as of late lost the battle with the tremendous amount of work that came my way. Don't get me wrong: I am not complaining. I mean: you start your own business and you have to good fortune to hit the ground running and to keep on running which is a gift, a treasure. But I have agreed with myself now (and aren't those the hardest agreements to keep) that one day a week I will write, with the aim to create a (hand)book on conference/eventmanagement for the non-profit sector. I am itchting to address the gap in eventmanagement between the strategic level and the level of operationalisation. To write on how one can and should address the needs of the guests. How to put hospitality and speakers center stage, how to leave your ego at the door, opening yourself completely to the needs and wants of your public and your speakers so that the story that needs telling, the goal for which you organise the conference or the event is reached.

I just drafted the first table of contents to focus my thoughts. I would love to make this a joint venture and I need your input. Please let me know what you would want to find in a (hand)book on conference management for the non profit sector, either by sending me an e-mail or by responding to this blog. I look forward to hearing from you!

Reading, eating

Finally getting around to reading some books that have been on the shelf for various amounts of time. Common denominator: too long... Not for profit, Martha Nussbaums warm hearted and to the point plea for a retake on education is a must read I find for everybody interested and/or involved in education. She goes to the core of education, steering away from the form of education (multimedia etc.). I do apologise for making the distinction between form and content here, a distinction that I fundamentally do not believe in: content without form is useless and form without content is nothing. But anyways: best way I can phrase it for now. Sorry. Not for profit is utterly readable for a wide audience and is a timely book. So go ahead, get it and read it! And share your thoughts. Upheavels of thought: the intelligence of emotions is another one I finally finished. Again by Nussbaum, inches thick and at times a slow read but what an utter joy. Philosophy can truly be art.

Also tackled Osterwalders Businessmodel innovation. Innovative content and innovative production process. Form and content rarely had a better marriage. Should have read this much earlier, but well: better late than never I guess.

I am eagerly awaiting Kotlers publication on Museum Strategy and Marketing, which I ordered at Amazon UK about 1,5 weeks ago, but which has not yet reached me. It should arrive any time now really, I am acting like a border colly on the doormat waiting for it:-) In the meantime some light reading in the evening hours: Oprah magazine which I borrowed of a friend and I find that the whole branding of the magazine is baffling in a positive way. And then there is my absolute favorite: Delicious. Yes I admit: I am a foody. Who is trying and finally managing to loose some weight (made it one dress size down already!). My, can I get happy looking at glorious food pictures and studying recipes. Almost as good as cooking and tasting it. But still: one dress size to go, so I need to hang in there and I will.

Alexander the Great

2011 for me started with a good conversation. Yesterday I was asked which exhibition I visited most recently, what I thought about it and which exhibition I would like to organise myself. Wauw. Inspiring questions! Especially as the most recent exhbition I visited was that of Alexander the Great in the Hermitage in Amsterdam. Having travelled close to Alexanders footsteps in Asia a few times my husband and I were immediately attracted by the subject of the exhibition and we simply had to go see it.

The marketing for the exhibition is excellent. The Hermitage is a fantastic building where cafe, museum store and exhibitions all ooze one thought, one vision. A total concept. Well done branding, in short which we found a joy to experience. Above all: what a great thought to organise an exhibition on Alexander the Great. Somebody who still inspires nowadays leaders and travelled in countries that speak to our imagination and have our hearts. It was really about time that this legendary man got his own exhibition.

What I did not get in the exhibition was an "Alexander experience". What was his world? How did the teachings of Aristotle influence his thoughts and actions? Imagine being taught by this greatest of thinkers and yes, I am guilty of jealousy here. How was he taught? And what did he learn? To what extent did his education shape his future? And can we connect this somehow to todays education?

Despite the many aesthetically thoroughly enjoyable objects (some of which gave a sense of homecoming as we had just seen them real life in Mongolia and China!) I admit that I struggled to get a feel for the magnitude of his undertaking. I had to think about the Terracotta Army at some point. Before we saw it real life we had seen pictures and read about it. But to see it real life really drives home the point of magnitude and scale. The same goes for Alexanders undertaking: with 50.000 soldiers trekking to unknown places, battling on unknown battlefields. Leaving your home leading a pack of soldiers and fortune seekers, crossing borders not knowing what you will encounter. Friends? Foes? What makes the battle worth the battle? How far will you go in risking the lifes of your friends and comrades to conquer ground unknown? How do you find meaning and purpose to your actions when all around you is a big unknown?

Remarking this is easy, but how to realise it? And do you want to do so? Do you aim to offer an "experience"? To bring history alive? That entails moral choices, collection choices, practical and policy considerations, financial limitations and probably other things that I am not even aware of. And I would not dare to claim that I can come up with an absolute answer in a mere blog or let alone something that will not have been considered by the staff. However, thinking out loud freely from a visitors perspective a different use of multimedia could have been of help I think. E.g. a strategic game, a schematic animation of major battles....Definitly not a re-enactment of some sort, but rather a representation that drives home the man and the magnitude of his actions, including the not so rosy side of those. While talking about it I noticed that I feel more strongly about this then I thought I did. Probably because his undertaking back then has such similarities to our current Western effort in e.g. Afghanistan. A window of opportunity to connect an inspiring and baffling past with an equally baffling present day that is the hummus for the future.