TheCapitol.netCoursesConvenience LearningCustom TrainingPublicationsFaculty & AuthorsClientsStoreClient Care

Career Archives

Main

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, from TheCapitol.Net

Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing

How to Compose Clear and Effective Reports, Letters, Email, and Memos
Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing

Do you need to improve your writing skills? This intensive one-day course helps students understand the three dimensions of professional writing: organization, format and style. In addition to reviewing and teaching specific writing techniques, our faculty show you how to:
  • Apply critical thinking to the writing process
  • Use the four keys to effective writing
  • Understand the five-step writing process
  • Develop an effective writing style
Communication skills are the key to efficient and effective operations in business and government. New employees should brush-up on their basic written communication and plain English skills, while experienced professionals, burdened by the additional workload caused by downsizing and budget cuts, can also benefit from this refresher course.

Our writing courses have been described as "really about how to get better job reviews and get promoted" because they help you improve one of your most important, and visible, job skills: written communication.

April 15, 2010, 9 am - 4 pm.

Approved for 0.6 CEUs from George Mason University.
Approved for CEUs from George Mason University

Where: DC Bar Conference Center, 1101 K Street NW, Suite 200 (12th and K Streets NW) in Washington, DC

This is a required course for the Certificate in Communication and Advocacy.

For more information, including agenda and secure online registration, see WordWorkshop.com

Continue reading "Writing for Government and Business: Critical Thinking and Writing, from TheCapitol.Net"

April 12, 2010 09:57 AM   Link    Comments (0)

Lawyers and Law Grads: Is a Career With the Federal Government in Your Future? How to Get a Law Job With The Federal Government




Lawyers and Law Grads: Is a Career With the Federal Government in Your Future? How to Get a Law Job With The Federal Government
Lawyers and Law Grads: Is a Career With the Federal Government in Your Future? How to Get a Law Job With The Federal Government 

Recorded 2010
ISBN 10: 1-58733-203-5 Total run time: 50 minutes 2036
The online download of this program is FREE
This Audio Course is sold and distributed with a Limited License.

Thinking about going to law school? Before you borrow any money, see:


If you don’t have the time to personally attend one of our live courses in Washington, DC, we offer convenient audio courses showing you how Washington works. TM

For more information and titles, see CapitolLearning.com

February 15, 2010 11:37 AM   Link    Comments (0)

Finding a Job in Washington, DC

How to Find a Job in Washington, DC How to Get a Job with the U.S. Federal Government How to Obtain a Security Clearance from the U.S. Federal Government
How to Find a Job in Washington, DC  How to Get a Job with the U.S. Federal Government How to Obtain a Security Clearance from the U.S. Federal Government

If you don’t have the time to personally attend one of our live courses in Washington, DC, we offer convenient audio courses showing you how Washington works. TM

For more information and titles, see CapitolLearning.com

February 1, 2010 05:37 PM   Link    Comments (0)

America's Most Overrated Product

[E]ven those high-school students who are fully qualified to attend college are increasingly unlikely to derive enough benefit to justify the often six-figure cost and four to six years (or more) it takes to graduate. Research suggests that more than 40 percent of freshmen at four-year institutions do not graduate in six years. Colleges trumpet the statistic that, over their lifetimes, college graduates earn more than nongraduates, but that's terribly misleading. You could lock the collegebound in a closet for four years, and they'd still go on to earn more than the pool of non-collegebound -- they're brighter, more motivated, and have better family connections.

Also, the past advantage of college graduates in the job market is eroding. Ever more students attend college at the same time as ever more employers are automating and sending offshore ever more professional jobs, and hiring part-time workers. Many college graduates are forced to take some very nonprofessional positions, such as driving a truck or tending bar.

"America's Most Overrated Product: the Bachelor's Degree," by Marty Nemko, The Chronicle of Higher Education, May 2, 2008

More



October 23, 2008 09:17 AM   Link    Comments (0)

TheCapitol.Net Introduces Derrick Dortch’s Career Development Audio Courses

According to the U.S. Office of Personal Management, 300,000 federal employees will be eligible to retire by 2010. With the rising number of retirees, TheCapitol.Net has teamed up with Derrick Dortch in developing audio courses that help professionals navigate the Washington, DC job search process.

"As one of the biggest employers in the nation, the federal government is always hiring. This means it’s always a good time to look for a federal job,” said Derrick Dortch, President of the Diversa Group, a consulting company specializing in career, entrepreneurship, leadership and organizational consulting, development & training. “Thousands of federal workers will retire by 2014. Combined with regular hiring needs of the government, thousands of federal jobs will be available for job seekers interested in government service."

Dortch’s audio courses, How to Find a Job in Washington DC, How to Obtain a Security Clearance from the U.S. Federal Government and How to Get a Job with the U.S. Federal Government, can help prepare aspiring federal employees for their first professional jobs in the DC area. In addition to his work at The Diversa Group, Dortch also hosts a monthly online career program for The Washington Post and is a regular weekly host for Fed Access with Derrick T. Dortch on Federal News Radio 1500 A.M.

For the recent college graduate, How to Find a Job in Washington, DC includes essential lessons such as how to build a Washington network, popular online websites to look for positions, and how to make a lasting impression in the interview process, both over the phone and in person. Also, Dortch discusses the realities of the job search and interview process.

When looking for a job within the federal government, Dortch’s course, How to Get a Job with the U.S. Federal Government explains how to develop a government job search strategy, match yourself with the right agencies and positions, effectively target positions, and develop federal resumes and KSAs to increase your chances of being offered a job.

In How to Obtain a Security Clearance from the U.S. Federal Government, Dortch provides a comprehensive guide to the different types of security clearances, how to obtain a security clearance, and various factors considered in the clearance process.

For more information about any of these audio courses, go to www.CapitolLearning.com or call TheCapitol.Net directly at 703-739-3790 for more details.

September 15, 2008 02:27 PM   Link    Comments (0)

"Are Too Many People Going to College?"

More people should be getting the basics of a liberal education. But for most students, the places to provide those basics are elementary and middle school.
. . .
We should look at the kind of work that goes into acquiring a liberal education at the college level in the same way that we look at the grueling apprenticeship that goes into becoming a master chef: something that understandably attracts only a few people. Most students at today’s colleges choose not to take the courses that go into a liberal education because the capabilities they want to develop lie elsewhere. These students are not lazy, any more than students who don’t want to spend hours learning how to chop carrots into a perfect eighth-inch dice are lazy. A liberal education just doesn’t make sense for them.
. . .
When high-school graduates think that obtaining a B.A. will help them get a higher- paying job, they are only narrowly correct. Economists have established beyond doubt that people with B.A.s earn more on average than people without them. But why does the B.A. produce that result? For whom does the B.A. produce that result? For some jobs, the economic premium for a degree is produced by the actual education that has gone into getting the degree. Lawyers, physicians, and engineers can earn their high incomes only by deploying knowledge and skills that take years to acquire, and degrees in law, medicine, and engineering still signify competence in those knowledges and skills. But for many other jobs, the economic premium for the B.A. is created by a brutal fact of life about the American job market: Employers do not even interview applicants who do not hold a B.A. Even more brutal, the advantage conferred by the B.A. often has nothing to do with the content of the education. Employers do not value what the student learned, just that the student has a degree.
. . .
But while it is true that the average person with a B.A. makes more than the average person without a B.A., getting a B.A. is still going to be the wrong economic decision for many high-school graduates. Wages within occupations form a distribution. Young people with okay-but-not-great academic ability who are thinking about whether to go after a B.A. need to consider the competition they will face after they graduate. Let me put these calculations in terms of a specific example, a young man who has just graduated from high school and is trying to decide whether to become an electrician or go to college and major in business, hoping to become a white-collar manager. He is at the 70th percentile in linguistic ability and logical mathematical ability—someone who shouldn’t go to college by my standards, but who can, in today’s world, easily find a college that will give him a degree. He is exactly average in interpersonal and intrapersonal ability. He is at the 95th percentile in the small-motor skills and spatial abilities that are helpful in being a good electrician.

He begins by looking up the average income of electricians and managers on the Bureau of Labor Statistics website, and finds that the mean annual income for electricians in 2005 was$45,630, only about half of the $88,450 mean for management occupations. It looks as if getting a B.A. will buy him a huge wage premium. Should he try to get the B.A. on economic grounds?

To make his decision correctly, our young man must start by throwing out the averages. He has the ability to become an excellent electrician and can reasonably expect to be near the top of the electricians’ income distribution. He does not have it in him to be an excellent manager, because he is only average in interpersonal and intrapersonal ability and only modestly above average in academic ability, all of which are important for becoming a good manager, while his competitors for those slots will include many who are high in all of those abilities. Realistically, he should be looking at the incomes toward the bottom of the distribution of managers. With that in mind, he goes back to the Bureau of Labor Statistics website and discovers that an electrician at the 90th percentile of electricians’ incomes made $70,480 in 2005, almost twice the income of a manager at the 10th percentile of managers’ incomes ($37,800). Even if our young man successfully completes college and gets a B.A. (which is far from certain), he is likely to make less money than if he becomes an electrician.

"Are Too Many People Going to College?" By Charles Murray, The American Magazine, September 8, 2008




. . . . . . . . .


September 14, 2008 09:07 AM   Link    Comments (0)

Uncle Sam is Hiring

Although the economy is in a funk, there is one employer who expects to hire big time in the coming years -- Uncle Sam.

"Most experts agree that the government will need to replace at least a half million federal employees in the near future," says a recent report by the Merit Systems Protection Board.

The board preceded that statement with an almost lyrical explanation of why so many hires will be needed: "The upcoming wave of expected retirements may be a tsunami (as some predict) or it may have the erosive effect of a constant crashing of smaller waves upon the beach."

"Where the Hiring Is Hot," by Joe Davidson, The Washington Post, August 26, 2008

Capitol Learning Audio Courses from TheCapitol.Net

August 26, 2008 10:47 AM   Link    Comments (0)

How to Get a Job with the U.S. Federal Government

How to Get a Job with the U.S. Federal Government

A Telephone Seminar

The U.S. Federal Government is one of the biggest and best employers in the United States. It has some of the most interesting and unique jobs available and has opportunities both domestically and abroad. Within the federal government you can be anything from an accountant, astronaut, cook, criminal investigator, diplomat, doctor, intelligence analyst, IT specialist, to a veterinarian. There is a government job for you.

Landing a federal job is not always an easy process. There is a great deal of competition for many positions. So the question is how do you get the federal job that you want? This audio course teaches you how.

Open Q&A with the faculty included: Derrick Dortch.

Can't fit the telephone seminar into your schedule? Get this Audio Course on CD!

How to Get a Job with the U.S. Federal Government
Capitol Learning Audio Course
Includes seminar materials.
Audio Course on CD: $47 plus shipping and handling Buy this Audio Course on CD

July 29, 2008 08:07 AM   Link    Comments (0)

How to Obtain a Security Clearance from the U.S. Federal Government

How to Obtain a Security Clearance from the U.S. Federal Government

A Telephone Seminar

Find out everything you wanted to know about security clearances and the adjudication process used by the federal government and its contractors. Security clearances are required to work for government agencies in the national and homeland security community as well as government contractors supporting their work. This audio course will teach you:

Open Q&A with the faculty included: Derrick Dortch.

Can't fit the telephone seminar into your schedule? Get this Audio Course on CD!

How to Obtain a Security Clearance from the U.S. Federal Government
Capitol Learning Audio Course
Includes seminar materials.
Audio Course on CD: $47 plus shipping and handling Buy this Audio Course on CD

July 27, 2008 06:07 AM   Link    Comments (0)

True calling ... and standard of living.

If one of the disadvantages of an elite education is the temptation it offers to mediocrity, another is the temptation it offers to security. When parents explain why they work so hard to give their children the best possible education, they invariably say it is because of the opportunities it opens up. But what of the opportunities it shuts down? An elite education gives you the chance to be rich--which is, after all, what we’re talking about--but it takes away the chance not to be. Yet the opportunity not to be rich is one of the greatest opportunities with which young Americans have been blessed. We live in a society that is itself so wealthy that it can afford to provide a decent living to whole classes of people who in other countries exist (or in earlier times existed) on the brink of poverty or, at least, of indignity. You can live comfortably in the United States as a schoolteacher, or a community organizer, or a civil rights lawyer, or an artist--that is, by any reasonable definition of comfort. You have to live in an ordinary house instead of an apartment in Manhattan or a mansion in L.A.; you have to drive a Honda instead of a BMW or a Hummer; you have to vacation in Florida instead of Barbados or Paris, but what are such losses when set against the opportunity to do work you believe in, work you’re suited for, work you love, every day of your life?

Yet it is precisely that opportunity that an elite education takes away. How can I be a schoolteacher--wouldn’t that be a waste of my expensive education? Wouldn’t I be squandering the opportunities my parents worked so hard to provide? What will my friends think? How will I face my classmates at our 20th reunion, when they’re all rich lawyers or important people in New York? And the question that lies behind all these: Isn’t it beneath me? So a whole universe of possibility closes, and you miss your true calling.

"The Disadvantages of an Elite Education: Our best universities have forgotten that the reason they exist is to make minds, not careers." by William Deresiewicz, The American Scholar, Summer 2008

 How to Find a Job in Washington, DC
Capitol Learning Audio Course
Includes seminar materials.
Audio Course on CD: $47 plus shipping and handling Buy this Audio Course on CD


. . . . . . . . .


. . . . . . . . .


. . . . . . . . .


. . . . . . . . .


June 29, 2008 08:27 PM   Link    Comments (0)

How to Find a Job in Washington, DC - Useful Web Sites

This is a list of web sites useful for job seekers and career changers in the Washington, DC area.

These web sites were discussed in the Capitol Learning Audio Course, "How to Find a Job in Washington, DC" taught by Derrick Dortch.

 How to Find a Job in Washington, DC
Capitol Learning Audio Course
Includes seminar materials.
Audio Course on CD: $47 plus shipping and handling Buy this Audio Course on CD


. . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . .

June 18, 2008 02:07 PM   Link    Comments (0)

Keys to Effective Presentations: Invigorate Your Delivery and Increase Your Confidence

Keys to Effective Presentations: Invigorate Your Delivery and Increase Your Confidence

A Telephone Seminar

Jill Kamp Melton explains how to deliver a memorable presentation.

Open Q&A with the faculty included.

 Keys to Effective Presentations: Invigorate Your Delivery and Increase Your Confidence
Capitol Learning Audio Course
Includes seminar materials.
Audio Course on CD: $47 plus shipping and handling Buy this Audio Course on CD

June 16, 2008 07:47 AM   Link    Comments (0)

How to Find a Job in Washington, DC

How to Find a Job in Washington, DC

A Telephone Seminar

  • Where to start--developing your game plan
  • When to come to Washington
  • How to build a Washington network
  • Online websites
  • How to get a job on the Hill
  • How to interview effectively--telephone and in person
  • Following up on meetings and interviews
  • Reality check

Open Q&A with the faculty included: Derrick Dortch.

 How to Find a Job in Washington, DC
Capitol Learning Audio Course
Includes seminar materials.
Audio Course on CD: $47 plus shipping and handling Buy this Audio Course on CD

June 13, 2008 09:37 AM   Link    Comments (0)

Diplomas Count 2008 - Dropping Out of High School

As the nation struggles to close its graduation gap, Diplomas Count 2008 examines states' efforts to forge stronger connections between precollegiate and postsecondary education.
. . .
Nationwide, about 71 percent of 9th graders make it to graduation four years later, according to data from 2005, the latest available. And that figure drops to 58 percent for Hispanics, 55 percent for African-Americans, and 51 percent for Native Americans.

Those rates improved slightly from 2004 to 2005 for all groups, but large gaps remain across states. While more than eight in 10 students graduate on time in Iowa, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Wisconsin, for example, the proportion drops to fewer than six in 10 in the District of Columbia, Georgia, Louisiana, Nevada, New Mexico, and South Carolina.

Analyses conducted for Diplomas Count by the EPE Research Center also continue to show wide disparities between state-reported graduation rates and the center’s estimates. Such disparities are one reason that the U.S. Department of Education proposed new rules this spring that would require all states to calculate graduation rates based on a uniform method that tracks cohorts of students as they progress through high school.

"Executive Summary," Diplomas Count 2008, by Education Week and the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center

More



. . . . . . . . .


June 8, 2008 10:07 AM   Link    Comments (0)

Keys to Effective Presentations: Invigorate Your Delivery and Increase Your Confidence

Keys to Effective Presentations: Invigorate Your Delivery and Increase Your Confidence

A Telephone Seminar

How to deliver a memorable presentation.
  • Tips to project your voice and use breathing to help reduce anxiety. Your voice can help or hurt you. Learn how to change it.
  • Techniques to increase your confidence and become a dynamic presenter. Turn your lack of confidence into an asset.
  • Use content to engage your audience.
  • Handle Q & A strategically. Change hecklers into helpers.
  • Manage visual aids to add value.
  • Practical "Do's and Don'ts".

Open Q&A with the faculty included:Jill Kamp Melton.

 Keys to Effective Presentations: Invigorate Your Delivery and Increase Your Confidence
Capitol Learning Audio Course
Includes seminar materials.
Audio Course on CD: $47 plus shipping and handling Buy this Audio Course on CD

May 31, 2008 08:37 AM   Link    Comments (0)

How to Find a Job in Washington, DC

How to Find a Job in Washington, DC

A Telephone Seminar

  • Where to start--developing your game plan
  • When to come to Washington
  • How to build a Washington network
  • Online websites
  • How to get a job on the Hill
  • How to interview effectively--telephone and in person
  • Following up on meetings and interviews
  • Reality check

Open Q&A with the faculty included: Derrick Dortch.

 How to Find a Job in Washington, DC
Capitol Learning Audio Course
Includes seminar materials.
Audio Course on CD: $47 plus shipping and handling Buy this Audio Course on CD

May 21, 2008 07:47 AM   Link    Comments (0)

What's wrong with this picture?

What's wrong with this picture?


Caution: this is a professional actor. Do NOT attempt this at a business meal!

There are at least eight things in this picture that demonstrate bad business etiquette.

For a link to the answers, see our training course, "How to Walk, Talk and Network in Washington: Presentations, Briefings, Business Etiquette, and Networking Skills for Washington: Cmmunication Skills for the Professional".

Also see our Capitol Learning Audio Course, "Business Etiquette: Keys to Professional Success," with Jill Kamp Melton.

January 31, 2008 04:07 PM   Link    Comments (0)

Does it matter where you go to college?

The other students are the biggest advantage of going to an elite college; you learn more from them than the professors. But you should be able to reproduce this at most colleges if you make a conscious effort to find smart friends. At most colleges you can find at least a handful of other smart students, and most people have only a handful of close friends in college anyway. The odds of finding smart professors are even better. The curve for faculty is a lot flatter than for students, especially in math and the hard sciences; you have to go pretty far down the list of colleges before you stop finding smart professors in the math department.

So it's not surprising that we've found the relative prestige of different colleges useless in judging individuals. There's a lot of randomness in how colleges select people, and what they learn there depends much more on them than the college. Between these two sources of variation, the college someone went to doesn't mean a lot. It is to some degree a predictor of ability, but so weak that we regard it mainly as a source of error and try consciously to ignore it.

I doubt what we've discovered is an anomaly specific to startups. Probably people have always overestimated the importance of where one goes to college. We're just finally able to measure it.

The unfortunate thing is not just that people are judged by such a superficial test, but that so many judge themselves by it. A lot of people, probably the majority of people in America, have some amount of insecurity about where, or whether, they went to college. The tragedy of the situation is that by far the greatest liability of not having gone to the college you'd have liked is your own feeling that you're thereby lacking something. Colleges are a bit like exclusive clubs in this respect. There is only one real advantage to being a member of most exclusive clubs: you know you wouldn't be missing much if you weren't. When you're excluded, you can only imagine the advantages of being an insider. But invariably they're larger in your imagination than in real life.

So it is with colleges. Colleges differ, but they're nothing like the stamp of destiny so many imagine them to be. People aren't what some admissions officer decides about them at seventeen. They're what they make themselves.

Indeed, the great advantage of not caring where people went to college is not just that you can stop judging them (and yourself) by superficial measures, but that you can focus instead on what really matters. What matters is what you make of yourself. I think that's what we should tell kids. Their job isn't to get good grades so they can get into a good college, but to learn and do. And not just because that's more rewarding than worldly success. That will increasingly be the route to worldly success.

"Colleges", by Paul Graham, September 2007 (footnotes omitted)

If you are a high school student, see Paul Graham's not-yet-given high school talk for more good advice: "What You'll Wish You'd Known," January 2005

October 2, 2007 10:37 PM   Link    Comments (0)

"The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn't"

And Joe said, "I've got something he can never have."
And I said, "What on earth could that be, Joe?"
And Joe said, "The knowledge that I've got enough."

"Kurt Vonnegut and The No Asshole Rule," Bob Sutton, Work Matters, February 22, 2007




. . . . . .


February 25, 2007 08:27 AM   Link    Comments (0)

So THAT'S what's wrong with the picture....

What's wrong with this picture?

Good table manners should be second nature so that you can concentrate on your meeting, not on which fork to use.

  • Place your napkin on your lap within 10 seconds of sitting down at the table.
  • Buttering the whole piece of bread; butter one bite-size piece of bread at a time.
  • Gesturing with food
  • Holding spoon wrong
  • Ladling soup towards himself (OK, it's difficult to see, but you ladle soup away from yourself)
  • Placing silverware on both table & plate (butter knife)
  • Resting elbow on the table
  • Eating with both hands
And remember to pass the salt and pepper together.

Did you get at least six of these?

10 seconds! That's all you get to make a favorable first impression. Our training can help you shape your first impressions and all that follows. See our web site for information regarding business etiquette, presentation & briefing skills, and networking skills for Washington.

Communication Skills for the Professional

Communication Skills for the Professional
Presentations, Briefings, Business Etiquette, and Networking Skills for Washington

Also see our Capitol Learning Audio Course, "Business Etiquette: Keys to Professional Success," with Jill Kamp Melton.

Text used with the permission of Jane Wilger Engstrom.




. . . . . . . . .




January 31, 2007 03:37 PM   Link    Comments (0)

"The Psychic Appeal of Manual Work"

I began working as an electrician’s helper at age fourteen, and started a small electrical contracting business after college, in Santa Barbara. In those years I never ceased to take pleasure in the moment, at the end of a job, when I would flip the switch. “And there was light.” It was an experience of agency and competence. The effects of my work were visible for all to see, so my competence was real for others as well; it had a social currency. The well-founded pride of the tradesman is far from the gratuitous “self-esteem” that educators would impart to students, as though by magic.

I was sometimes quieted at the sight of a gang of conduit entering a large panel in a commercial setting, bent into nestled, flowing curves, with varying offsets, that somehow all terminated in the same plane. This was a skill so far beyond my abilities that I felt I was in the presence of some genius, and the man who bent that conduit surely imagined this moment of recognition as he worked. As a residential electrician, most of my work got covered up inside walls. Yet even so, there is pride in meeting the aesthetic demands of a workmanlike installation. Maybe another electrician will see it someday. Even if not, one feels responsible to one’s better self. Or rather, to the thing itself—craftsmanship might be defined simply as the desire to do something well, for its own sake. If the primary satisfaction is intrinsic and private in this way, there is nonetheless a sort of self-disclosing that takes place.
. . .
Because craftsmanship refers to objective standards that do not issue from the self and its desires, it poses a challenge to the ethic of consumerism, as the sociologist Richard Sennett has recently argued. The craftsman is proud of what he has made, and cherishes it, while the consumer discards things that are perfectly serviceable in his restless pursuit of the new. The craftsman is then more possessive, more tied to what is present, the dead incarnation of past labor; the consumer is more free, more imaginative, and so more valorous according to those who would sell us things. Being able to think materially about material goods, hence critically, gives one some independence from the manipulations of marketing, which typically divert attention from what a thing is to a back-story intimated through associations, the point of which is to exaggerate minor differences between brands. Knowing the production narrative, or at least being able to plausibly imagine it, renders the social narrative of the advertisement less potent. The tradesman has an impoverished fantasy life compared to the ideal consumer; he is more utilitarian and less given to soaring hopes. But he is also more autonomous.

This would seem to be significant for any political typology. Political theorists from Aristotle to Thomas Jefferson have questioned the republican virtue of the mechanic, finding him too narrow in his concerns to be moved by the public good. Yet this assessment was made before the full flowering of mass communication and mass conformity, which pose a different set of problems for the republican character: enervation of judgment and erosion of the independent spirit. Since the standards of craftsmanship issue from the logic of things rather than the art of persuasion, practiced submission to them perhaps gives the craftsman some psychic ground to stand on against fantastic hopes aroused by demagogues, whether commercial or political.
. . .
Today, in our schools, the manual trades are given little honor. The egalitarian worry that has always attended tracking students into “college prep” and “vocational ed” is overlaid with another: the fear that acquiring a specific skill set means that one’s life is determined. In college, by contrast, many students don’t learn anything of particular application; college is the ticket to an open future. Craftsmanship entails learning to do one thing really well, while the ideal of the new economy is to be able to learn new things, celebrating potential rather than achievement. Somehow, every worker in the cutting-edge workplace is now supposed to act like an “intrapreneur,” that is, to be actively involved in the continuous redefinition of his own job. Shop class presents an image of stasis that runs directly counter to what Richard Sennett identifies as “a key element in the new economy’s idealized self: the capacity to surrender, to give up possession of an established reality.” This stance toward “established reality,” which can only be called psychedelic, is best not indulged around a table saw. It is dissatisfied with what Arendt calls the “reality and reliability” of the world. It is a strange sort of ideal, attractive only to a peculiar sort of self—gratuitous ontological insecurity is no fun for most people.
. . .
Skilled manual labor entails a systematic encounter with the material world, precisely the kind of encounter that gives rise to natural science. From its earliest practice, craft knowledge has entailed knowledge of the “ways” of one’s materials—that is, knowledge of their nature, acquired through disciplined perception and a systematic approach to problems. And in fact, in areas of well-developed craft, technological developments typically preceded and gave rise to advances in scientific understanding, not vice versa. The steam engine is a good example. It was developed by mechanics who observed the relations between volume, pressure, and temperature. This at a time when theoretical scientists were tied to the caloric theory of heat, which later turned out to be a conceptual dead end. The success of the steam engine contributed to the development of what we now call classical thermodynamics.
. . .
So what advice should one give to a young person? By all means, go to college. In fact, approach college in the spirit of craftsmanship, going deep into liberal arts and sciences. In the summers, learn a manual trade. You’re likely to be less damaged, and quite possibly better paid, as an independent tradesman than as a cubicle-dwelling tender of information systems. To heed such advice would require a certain contrarian streak, as it entails rejecting a life course mapped out by others as obligatory and inevitable.

"Shop Class as Soulcraft," by Matthew B. Crawfor, The New Atlantis, Summer 2006

September 4, 2006 08:17 PM   Link    Comments (0)

Craftsmanship

Dead Programmer's Cafe has an interesting post on craftsmanship in software and construction, and links to a post by Joel Sporksy, who says:

[S]ometimes fixing a 1% defect takes 500% effort.
. . . . . . . . .


April 16, 2006 08:37 AM   Link    Comments (0)

Languages of the world

If you are a student thinking about studying a language, here are the most spoken languages in the world:

Language Approximate number
of speakers
1. Chinese (Mandarin) 1,075,000,000
2. English 514,000,000
3. Hindustani 496,000,000
4. Spanish 425,000,000
5. Russian 275,000,000

Source: InfoPlease

December 11, 2005 12:22 AM   Link    Comments (0)

College Grads and Government Service

Worried that too many young Americans are turned off by the idea of working in government, Congress has provided $600,000 for a research project to develop strategies to raise interest among college students in federal service.

The "Call to Service Recruitment Initiative" will be run by the Office of Personnel Management and the Partnership for Public Service, according to the fiscal 2006 spending bill that covers OPM operations.

"Congress Funds Project to Entice College Grads to Government Service," by Stephen Barr, The Wahsington Post, December 9, 2005

Half of the 1.9 million current federal employees will be eligible to retire in the next five years, and the Partnership's research shows that Uncle Sam must work harder to attract college students to public service jobs. A 2002 survey found that college students know very little about employment opportunities in the federal government: only 21% of them ever recalled a federal recruiter visiting their campus. And a 2005 survey of graduating college seniors found that only 23% were “very interested” in working for the government.

"Attracting Young Americans to Federal Service," FedSmith, July 29, 2005

The Call to Serve Recruitment Initiative is part of the Call to Serve program, a network created in 2002 by the Partnership and the U.S. Office of Personnel Management to educate young Americans about government careers. The network currently consists of 552 colleges and universities and 62 federal agency partners.

"White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card Pitches Public Service to 2,000 Interns; PPS Announces New National Effort to Help Attract Young Americans to Federal Service," Partnership for Public Service, July 26, 2005

"What is Call To Serve?" Partnership for Public Service

"Managing Federal Recruitment: Issues, Insights, And Illustrations; A Report To The President And The Congress Of The United States (Agency Illustrations)," by The U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board, September, 2004

A recent college graduate of our acquaintance applied for several government jobs over a 12-month period in 2004 and 2005, and received very few responses, despite having a solid B average from a good liberal arts college and being conversant in Spanish and Mandarin. So it doesn't sound to us like the federal government is trying too hard to hire recent college grads .... rather than $600,000 studies, maybe federal government agency HR offices should merely return phone calls and acknowledge receipt of applications and resumes ...

December 10, 2005 10:57 AM   Link    Comments (0)

Thinking of Going to Grad School?

Then you'll want to read this post, and the comments, on Crooked Timber:

It’s around the time of year when undergraduates start thinking about graduate school, so naturally it’s the time of year for overheated blog posts on why going to grad school is meant to be a Very Bad Idea. The latest of these is from Dean Dad, who wants to Stop the Cycle of Abuse, i.e. stop people going to grad school. The reasons given are all fairly standard factoids – it’s a huge opportunity cost, it takes forever, and the job market is awful. None of these are good reasons, and it would be an awful decision to not apply to graduate schools because of posts like these.

"Go to Grad School!" Crooked Timber, November 30, 2005

More

December 1, 2005 10:15 AM   Link    Comments (0)

"Vast Majority of Workers Skip Tax-Saving FSAs"

"Federal employees work too hard for their salaries to give any of it away. But that's exactly what happens when they pay for medical or child-care expenses with out-of-pocket dollars, instead of dollars from their FSAFEDS account," said Frank D. Titus , assistant director for insurance programs at the Office of Personnel Management.

"Vast Majority of Workers Skip Tax-Saving FSAs," by Stephen Barr, The Washington Post, October 23, 2005, Page C02

October 23, 2005 06:37 AM   Link    Comments (0)

"Top 10 Questions To Ask During Law Firm Interviews"

It's callback season at law firms around the country, and that means thousands of law students are donning suits and interviewing for summer associate positions. The most awkward part of most interviews comes near the end, when the attorneys in charge run out of things to say and fallback on an old standard: "So, do you have any questions for me?" Most law students don't know how to respond. I thought I would help out by recommending some good questions to ask:

Our favorites:

1. "How would you describe the atmosphere here — Is it more like a labor camp or a slave ship?"

10. "Where else are you interviewing?"

"Top 10 Questions To Ask During Law Firm Interviews," by Orrin Kerr, The Volokh Conspiracy, October 19, 2005

Lots of good suggestions in the comments, too:

"Am I expected to check my Blackberry at 3:15 a.m.?"

"When I spend twenty hours writing the notes and putting together the PowerPoint slides for a partner's seminar presentation, how does that REALLY count toward my hours?"

Other Resources

October 19, 2005 04:54 PM   Link    Comments (0)

Washington is a Small Town

Words of wisdom...

"You have to take every job looking over your shoulder," said [Russell] Merbeth, 46, now a lobbyist with Eschelon Telecom.
[Headhunter Joseph] Kirby says that many of the professionals he views as aces share two notable talents. "They have developed in themselves a pretty good ability to read the tea leaves in terms of which way things are headed," Kirby notes. "And they have an uncanny ability to be adaptable and almost chameleon-like, without having people think they're talking out of both sides of their mouth. There's a certain art to that."
"Throw out your 10- and 20- and 30-year plans," said [Carl] Feldbaum, 61, who retired from BIO [Biotechnology Industry Organization] earlier this year. "Hang a little bit loose, because you're not sure what opportunities are going to come your way."
"If you want to make a career in Washington, it's just like living in Ketchum, Idaho," Feldbaum said. "If you have any intention of cheating the corner grocer, the next day everyone in town knows it. And no one ever forgets."

"A Guide To Getting Ahead," by Mark Kukis, National Journal, October 14, 2005

October 17, 2005 02:04 PM   Link    Comments (0)

"Find a question that makes the world interesting."

If you want to do good work, what you need is a great curiosity about a promising question. The critical moment for Einstein was was when he looked at Maxwell's equations and said, what the hell is going on here?

It can take years to zero in on a productive question, because it can take years to figure out what a subject is really about. To take an extreme example, consider math. Most people think they hate math, but the boring stuff you do in school under the name "mathematics" is not at all like what mathematicians do.

The great mathematician G. H. Hardy said he didn't like math in high school either. He only took it up because he was better at it than the other students. Only later did he realize math was interesting-- only later did he start to ask questions instead of merely answering them correctly.

When a friend of mine used to grumble because he had to write a paper for school, his mother would tell him: find a way to make it interesting. That's what you need to do: find a question that makes the world interesting. People who do great things look at the same world everyone else does, but notice some odd detail that's compellingly mysterious.

And not only in intellectual matters. Henry Ford's great question was, why do cars have to be a luxury item? What would happen if you treated them as a commodity? Franz Beckenbauer's was, in effect, why does everyone have to stay in his position? Why can't defenders score goals too?

"What you'll wish you'd known," by Paul Graham, January, 2005

October 15, 2005 11:35 AM   Link    Comments (0)