The Paula Principle

Author: peterprinciple

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More

Complex, problem-solving jobs – or the reverse?

Below is a rather depressing table.  I've taken it from a piece by Michael Handel in  the recent ippr publication Technology, globalisation and the future of work in Europe, which draws on data from the European Working Conditions Survey. First, it suggests that the quality of work in the UK dropped significantly over the decade to 2005, absolutely and relative to other EU countries.  We started well above the EU average on both complex tasks and problem-solving at work, but 10 years later we had dropped significantly on both these scores, so that we were below average on the former and only just above on the latter.   This is not a healthy…
Read More

Rejections, and more important things

It's the day after International Women's Day, and I just thought I'd share two responses I've had to the PP book manuscript.  The first is from a publisher: "There are two problems.  First they feel that some of the material is not wholly unfamiliar – my colleagues who read many more business books than me tell me that they have read books which cover the subject and they are not sure this breaks enough new ground.  And second – and I am not sure how one resolves this problem– they feel it would be a sales obstacle for us to publish a book on this subject by a man.  It probably…
Read More

Plumbing, quotas, piloting

  I've just  spent most of the day at the Women of the World festival at the Southbank Centre.  It started with Jude Kelly interviewing Annie Lennox (yes!!), with scrolling stats on the global position of women;  the most startling of these is that gender-based violence notches up more deaths and disablement than wars, malaria, cancer and crashes.   It's worth also remembering that 41 million girls don't even get primary education.   Kirsty Wark then chaired a discussion on whether things had gone backwards as far as (violent) misogyny is concerned; it led me to her film on Blurred Lines, which deals with the fissile and contentious boundaries between…
Read More

Valuing care

There are about 2 million people employed in the care sector in the UK.   1.4 million are in the 'frontline' , which means they do the physical caring,      but also often are one of the few social contacts that the client has, especially in the case of elderly clients.   Most of these are women.  It's a demanding job that many of us would be completely unable to sustain.  It's also one where low pay is very widespread.  This is criminal - often literally so, as many are paid below the National Minimum Wage. A recent report from the ever-relevant Resolution Foundation, aptly titled 'As If we Cared', tackles…
Read More

Choosing not to go on upwards, by men

Paula Factor 5, you may remember, is positive choice:  where women make the decision not to go for a job which is above their current level because they actively prefer to stay doing what they are doing, or to move in a horizontal direction.  They don't need the money or the status that a promotion would bring;  they feel they are exercising their competences already and/or learning new ones; and they do not want to rise to a level where they might perhaps become examples of the Peter Principle. I've been discussing this with a male friend.  He sent me the following: "I know clearly in my own career I…
Read More

Men learning – in sheds or not

    I've been reading a collection which focusses on how and why men do or don't learn as adults.    It's a basic component of the Paula Principle picture that men appear more reluctant to engage in learning, formal and informal, across most OECD countries.   The PP looks at the consequences  of this (or lack of them) for women ;   Men Learning Through Life  asks what this reluctance means for men.   It is not an exhibition of 'moral panic' about male disadvantage, but a good research-based look at a distinctive issue and what might be done about it.   The book draws its inspiration from pioneering studies…
Read More

Gaps

A quick post following a good meeting yesterday organised by UCU, on widening access to higher education, in the august surrounding's of the Dean's Yard Westminster.  (My last post came from the even more distinguished crypt of St Paul's - where will I find myself next?). Two key issues struck me.  One was 'trends in gaps'.    Helen Thornley of UCAS gave details of the latest figures on applications and entries to universities.    The gap between those from the most and least advantaged backgrounds is diminishing - though not very fast, and not o the 'high tariff' (i.e. elite) universities.  At the same time, the gap between female and…
Read More

The tangibility of part-time work

"Between 1990 and 2011, the value of intangible assets in the UK grew from £50.2 billion to £137.5 billion, while at the same time the value of tangible, physical assets has increased much more slowly from £72.1 billion to £89.8 billion. In 2015, intangible investment will be 50% higher than investment in tangibles."   CIPD Human Capital Reporting: Investing for Sustainable Growth 2014, quoting a NESTA report by Goodrich et al Technology and the Arts. I'm always a bit suspicious of these kinds of calculation, but the overall message is pretty clear: we should be looking at how the money we spend (publicly and privately) on things like education and training (prime examples of intangibles) is effectively put to use, and not…
Read More

Higher education: UCAS shows more push behind the PP

What gives the Paula Principle its current salience is the difference levels of achievement between women and men in education of all kinds.   I've just been looking at the latest UCAS report on applications and entry to higher education.  It confirms the seemingly inexorable growth in the gap between female and male educational paths. First, the overall picture: - For 18 year olds in 2014 the entry rate increased (3.2 per cent proportionally for men, 3.7 per cent for women) to the highest recorded levels for both men (25.8 per cent) and women (34.1 per cent). As with application rates, 18 year old women were around a third (32…
Read More

Crossing cultures: flexibility and drug habits

I've argued several times in this blog for more attention to part-time work as the key to women being able to work to their level of competence (and men too…).  A report on Women and Flexible Working from the ippr (published,a tad puzzlingly, on Boxing Day) compares practices across 7 EU countries. The basic premiss is clear:  better practice on enabling women to work flexibly will be good for the economy, as well as for them personally.  Sweden, Netherlands and Germany are the leaders on both female employment levels and flexible working. The first two show particularly strong levels of employee choice over working time, with around 40% of women…
Read More