INSIDER | COLUMN
THE WORLD CUP AND ACADEMIA
DUC PHAM, SCHOOL OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING, THE UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM
and during the competition will have been re- placed by a myriad of other hot stories. However, there are lessons which those of us in academia in the UK might want to preserve from the globe’s biggest sporting event.
B
The first lesson is that good teamwork is the winning factor. Academia is structured to recognise and reward individual achievements. Moreover, it has the habit of focusing on just one aspect of performance, for example, a researcher’s ability to attract income.
However, Germany’s Mannschaft was able to lift the coveted cup not because it had stellar individual forwards like Brazil’s Neymar da Silva Santos Júnior or Argentina’s Lionel Messi. The team won the trophy because it was a united and balanced squad of talented and disciplined players who collaborated effectively. The team did not have just strikers, but consisted of a dependable goal keeper and brilliant defenders as well. Likewise, a winning academic department will require not only research stars, but good teachers and reliable administrators, too.
The importance of having a well-rounded and organised team was more than clearly demonstrated by the 7-1 defeat suffered by Brazil at the hands of Germany. The home team had entered the competition as the favourite to win. However, the team did not have uniform strength and had heavily depended on a few individuals. It was thrown off-balance and into disarray by the absence of its star forward Neymar through injury and its captain and central defender Thiago Silva through suspension.
A winning academic department will need to be strong across the board and not be over reliant on just one or two stars. It will comprise a balance of people at different stages of their careers — established researchers, teachers and administrators as well as new talents with fresh ideas to help advance the discipline.
The second lesson is that cultivating the required talent to achieve success is a long game. The Mannschaft did not become world champion overnight. In 2002, following many disappointing performances, Germany launched a national campaign to recruit and invest in the best young players in the country. This long-term investment took 12 years to mature.
Academic departments should heed this lesson in planning for events such as the Research Excellence Framework (REF), a periodic exercise designed to assess research quality at British
y the time this article appears in print, the 2014 World Cup will have become a fading memory; the deluge of daily news before
higher education institutions. Although the next REF is due in 2020, given the long preparation lead time, they should seriously think about investing in people now for the 2026 REF. The third lesson is that it sometimes pays to take calculated risks. Academia is not well-known for risk taking. However, as the great New Zealand mountaineer and explorer Sir Edmund Hillary once wrote: ‘Nothing venture, Nothing win’. This was evident in the second semi-final between Argentina and the Netherlands. Both sides were so risk-averse for fear of making a mistake and losing that the game became dull.
On the other hand, The Netherlands’ Louis van Gaal made an audacious move when replacing his goal keeper in the last minutes of their game against Costa Rica. The move was a calculated risk because, during training, the alternative goal keeper Tim Krul had proved better at stopping penalty kicks. He rose to the occasion and the Dutch team won the match.
The fourth lesson is that even the best team needs to evolve and improve. For many years, Spain had dominated the game, having won the 2010 World Cup and both the 2008 and 2012 European Championships. Likewise, Brazil had been the embodiment of world-class football. Both failed to win in 2014 because Spain had not rejuvenated their team, relying entirely on their ‘golden generation’, while Brazil had not embraced new styles or tactics, wanting to play as they always had.
Academic teams need to be flexible and be prepared to change plans, implement new ideas, adopt new technology and strategies, move to new areas and seize new opportunities. From reading REF submissions, I know that it is extremely rare nowadays to find a research unit able to stay the same for a long time and still remain successful.
The fifth and final lesson is that the best team is the best because of visionary leadership. The Mannschaft had visionary leaders in Jürgen Klinsmann, their former head coach, and Joachim Löw, the current manager, whose clear goal was for the team to become world champion again. They defined a detailed roadmap to drive the team to that goal. They instilled a culture of openness towards innovation, diversity and flexibility which eventually led to glory.
Unlike football players, academics tend to work much more independently of one another. They can be difficult to lead as they are generally averse to taking instructions from others (see Herding Tigers, CMM, Volume 5, No 6, p 46). Leading in academia requires a great deal of patience and can sometimes be frustrating, but exemplary leadership is essential to bring about outstanding successes like that of Germany in the 2014 World Cup.
http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/schools/mechanical- engineering/
index.aspx
30 | commercial micro manufacturing international Vol 7 No.4
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52