My son did a degree in Business. I asked him how much of the Course Content he actually uses in his work. He was in Senior Management in the Post Office. His answer, "Almost none of it."

I did my Certificate 2 in Business at TAFE. I asked my CEO why we don't implement what we were taught in the Course. His answer, "We have a Business to run."

I have used very little of what I was taught in my Computer Science course at TAFE. The only Course I did that was of any practical use was my Engineering Trade Course, most of what I used daily.

At High School I did, Maths 1&2, English 1&2, History & Geography, Chemistry & Physics, Accounting, Latin & Religion, Woodwork, Metalwork & Tech. Drawing. Most of the content I have never used.

Something needs to be done about the Schools Course contents. Maybe that would save lots of money.

These teachers go to primary School, Secondary School then to Uni, then do a Masters, then to being teachers at Uni. They write books about the Subjects they teach, based on their knowledge. (Eh!?) None of it any practical value in the Real World.

Ludwig: YES Jayb, but I wouldn’t touch international aid.

I would mate, Most of it is used to pay CEO's big Salary's & pay Administration. After paying Government Bribes, inflated Transport prices & local militia, only about 5% actually gets to the people on the ground. Wasted money! (Personal experience)

It seems to me that the problems besetting the tertiary sector stem from one primary source which is not unique to that sector, but is pervading all aspects of our society. Emperor Julian touched on it, but he focussed on the wrong aspect. The problem is managerialism, which has brought a focus on process over outcome, credential over ability, conformity over innovation. It rewards stolidity, discourages individuality and flair.

Managerialists are more concerned with "doing nothing wrong" than with doing anything really well. People are messily unpredictable if left to work things out for themselves and that makes the job of those charged with planning and implementing programs more difficult and can lead to negative outcomes, which can in turn reflect badly on the manager.

The rot really set in when Quality Management and HACCP were misapplied to fields in which they were not appropriate. They are tools to optimise process manufacturing operations, where the environment is strictly controlled and the goods being produced are expected to meet specified parameters, but they have become a standard part of the toolkit of managers and specifiers in fields where the product is inherently variable and its nature inherently ill-defined.

Some private sector firms that rely on innovation for their continued prosperity have actively sought to move away from such a culture. Google, Facebook, Apple are all examples where the management is deliberately non-intrusive and individuality is encouraged. Sure, the testing and QA on a new product is rigorous and all the boxes have to be ticked, but staff are judged on output, not on ability to follow rigid rules. Making mistakes is expected and taking a risk on a new idea that might fail is supported. Sharing ideas and learning from each other is a part of the job description and prescriptive flow-charts are few and far between.

Treating people as interchangeable functional units makes managers' jobs easier, but the best outcome it can achieve is optimisation of a process, it can't create anything new or cope with dynamic inputs effectively. We must fight it.

No quarrel with Antiseptic. Yes the root problem driving BOTH the dumbing down of universities AND the horrendous cost IS managerialism, though there is another colony of white ants: the "needs of industry" lobby (seen among these responses)which demands that universities be handmaidens of corporations - doing their R&D and their training for them - instead of getting on with the human necessity of exploring the basic structure of the world which is something nations can do but businesses can't.

However the Government is ducking the financial cost of the managerial class while transferring funds away from the actual work that universities are there for - which is the appropriate focus for this thread.

Antiseptic: Managerialists are more concerned with "doing nothing wrong" than with doing anything really well.

You're right. the attitude is that if I do something it might be wrong, so I'll do nothing, so nothing get's done. The Railways & the Army fell into this category with junior managers.

Antiseptic: The rot really set in when Quality Management and HACCP were misapplied to fields in which they were not appropriate.

Oh Yes! J.I.T. is a good example. It might work on a production line but it doesn't work on Maintenance. J.I.T. was applied to our Wagon Workshop. We had to get rid of our inventory & order parts for as they were needed. You just can't do that with Maintenance. You might audit the wagon for a particular part in the yard but find a number of things need to be replaced when the wagon is in the shop. The answer from management was to send it around again. Now wagons were taking 2 weeks instead of 1 day to be repaired & put safely back on the road. At a $1000 a day, was that financial sound? Management said it was, because it came off a different budget. (Eh! ?)

The most frustrating thing I have ever done was oversee the introduction of "Quality Assurance" into a manufacturing company I managed.

It took 2 years, & hundred of hours of senior staff who had better things to do, like maintaining quality on the line.

At the finish we had a lovely flow of paperwork.

We had one & a half extra staff to maintain this flow.

We had a slight reduction in efficiency due to production people having to service that paper flow.

We had a slight drop in quality consistency of our produce for 2 reasons.
1/ Those previously responsible for quality now believed it was not their job.
2/ Production staff spent more time on paperwork & less actually on the line.

I heard the same story from suppliers, when I complained of a loss of quality in their products.

This was a prime example of a system designed by academics, to apply to industries they had no understanding of in the first place. Responsibility for quality now became the responsibility of a quality control manager, rather than the people making the stuff.

We were successful because of the quality of our product & service. We did not need extra management & paper work to tell us what we all ready knew.

I gather government departments required extra staff to check the "Quality assurance" credentials of the companies who supplied them.

Jayb, the problem with most tafe colleges, is thisenrollose doing the teaching, either didn't make it, or, they are so out of touch that they seek the safe haven of such institutions.

Hasbeen, the bit that amuses me about all this compliance, on top of compliance, is the fact that our government have to have equities into why our productivity is so low.

HELLO!

In the butchery industry, it is no longer worthwhile makimg yourmown small goods, as the compliance costs, and risks associated with problems, makes it not worth the effort.

Another talent lost.
Though many break the law, those days are numbered.