Re: Education and Productivity: Whats the Correlation?

[Barb Philbrick <caslonsvcs -at- IBM -dot- NET>]

I have noticed the same trends. Especially the disciplined thought. I
recently had a project in which we worked with data entry folks
(generally high school educated). I have never had to work so hard at
keeping people focused and forcing them to look at individual step
they took. They tended to dismiss 10-minute tasks as, "You just press
this button and then do xxxx." I spent a lot of time prying out the 15
other tasks between pressing the button and xxxx.

As far as PhDs appreciating the value of good documentation more than
programmers - it depends on who does the technical support.
Programmers who have had to answer questions that should have been
documented generally have a high appreciation for documentation. In
one job I had, the engineers and programmers had written their own
documentation before I came along, and they were very appreciative of
documentation skills. The one PhD there actually had the most problems
letting go of the documentation.

If PhDs have problems letting imperfect products go, I wish there were
more of them making decisions.  I've found that most engineers have to
struggle with the pressures of new product release vs. the ethics of
letting a faulty product go out the door. (Hence the office sign,
"There is a time in every project when it is necessary to shoot the
engineer.")

>-There is absolutely no correlation between education level and business
>acumen, and this fact of life is sometimes incomprehensible to the
>higher degreed--a source of frustration to others who have to interact
>with him/her on a daily basis.
This might go up on my wall. I'm dealing with one of these now.

>I have noticed the following advantages to working with educated people:

>-Meetings run smoother. It's easier to keep a PhD on-topic and focused on
>the particular agenda for the meeting.

>-Disciplined thought. PhD's tend to listen better and think through
>problems more clearly. (Of course, implementation is a different
>story....)

>-Reading ability. If you are dealing with programmers, most will cringe
>even at the sound of "documentation."  But a higher probability exists
>that a PhD will understand the merits of good technical documentation
>and make an attempt to follow through in both reading existing materials
>and creating new technical documentation.
>
>Of course, the flip side is the following:
>-PhD's can be surprisingly in-the-dark when it comes to the latest tools
>and software packages (ironic, isn't it?).
>-PhD's have incredible difficulty shipping imperfect products (a must in
>the software development world, a flogging offense in academia).
>-There is absolutely no correlation between education level and business
>acumen, and this fact of life is sometimes incomprehensible to the
>higher degreed--a source of frustration to others who have to interact
>with him/her on a daily basis.
>
>Conclusion:
>Mostly the question of educated versus non-educated becomes a
>personality issue, depending on the particular person and circumstance.
>However, given two people with equal brain power, the one with the
>higher degree is easier to communicate with in a linear, sensible
>fashion. The hyper-intelligent college dropouts (they are all over this
>industry!) tend to approach problems in a less disciplined, non-linear
>fashion, thereby making it more difficult to communicate.
>
>Just my US$0.02.
>
>Cheers,
>Matt
>
>--
> Matt Danda
> Technical Writer
> Sony Objective Composer (Belgium)
> matthew -dot- danda -at- sonycom -dot- com
>
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Barbara Philbrick, Caslon Services Inc.
Salutation, by Ezra Pound
O generation of the thoroughly smug / and the thoroughly uncomfortable,
I have seen fishermen picknicking in the sun, / I have seen them with untidy families, 
I have seen their smiles full of teeth / and heard ungainly laughter. 
And I am happier than you are, / And they were happier than I am; /  And the fish swim in the lake / and do not even own clothing.

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