OEB 2015 - Opening Plenary - David Price

(OFF) Thanks very much...

(David Price) This is the
ever-shrinking presentation.

It was originally 25 minutes,
last night it was 23,

now it's 22.

I've got a 40-minute presentation.
I'm just going to speak twice as quickly.

No, I'm only kidding, it's only
20, 22 minutes.

And I've got a thing to time it
to make sure I don't go over.

About four months ago, I was diagnosed
with cancer of the colon.

And what was it, seven weeks ago,
I had the operation

which kind of went okay,
got rid of the tumor.

But when the colon was reconnected,
it sprung a leak

and I got a thing called sepsis,
which I later discovered,

is fatal in 60% of the cases.

What essentially happens with sepsis is

the organs start to pack in,
one after the other,

so my heart was fibrillating,

I lost, kidneys stopped working,

lungs stopped working,
so they put me on a ventilator.

And my wife Claire
who's here somewhere

was told to bring the family around,
because they didn't expect me

to get through the weekend.

As you can see, I survived, and this is
actually the first talk I've given

since I was in intensive care.

I was in intensive care for a week.

So, when a sick, no, no honest.
(Applause)

But when I say I'm delighted to be here,
I'm not just being polite.

(laughter)

I'm talking existentially
rather than conversationally.

But I wanted to start with that story
because, in that process of the journey

from diagnosis to operation,
I met with some remarkable people:

on forums and interest groups,
but I also visited and interviewed people.

So I interviewed some people
in the Netherlands

who are treating their loved ones,
who've got end-stage cancer.

They are lay people, computer technicians,

who, frankly, conventional medicine's
given up, they're stage 4,

they said there is nothing more we can do,
so they're administering

intravenous cocktails of drugs,
some of which are approved,

some of which are off-patent,

some of which are off-label.

I visited a clinic, here in Germany,
which I can't name, because

they're kind of operating in the shadows
in fear that they'll be closed down.

And what it seemed to me,
once I looked beyond health

is that this is a phenomenon

which is happening
in all kinds of areas of public life,

that we're seeing what I call
people-powered innovation.

And I think it presents a real challenge
for institutions and organizations.

So, why is it important?

I think it's important because it's
kind of a natural consequence

of the issues I talked about
in my book "Open"

where, now that we're able to share and
exchange knowledge, we're now at a point

where we want to do something about it,
and we want now

to be more in control of our own lives.

But I think it's particularly important
for the people who are in this room today:

educators and human resource people,

because one of the things that we're
seeing is a major shift in the way

in which we accredit knowledge
and competencies.

I don't know if any of you have read

Phillip Brown's excellent book

called "The Global Auction," but he talks
about how our graduates are facing

a high-skilled, low-income future

because of globalization
and a whole range of other issues.

And recently, Laszlo Bock who is in charge
of People Operations at Google said this,

"Your degree is not a proxy
for your ability to do any job.

"The world only cares about
and pays off on

"what you can do with what you know

"and it doesn't care how you learned it."

So my point, I guess, is that
unless we change the product,

we risk being dis-intermediated.

By that, I mean learners
can find other ways

to get the knowledge and skills
that they need.

And let's face it, the product hasn't
really changed much in decades.

So I'd argue that the best way
to stay relevant

is to involve users
in the process of innovation.

So this is what I mean by
people-powered innovation,

a process where users lead users,
accelerate innovation

by either advocating
for new products or services,

tinkering with existing products
and services,

or creating new products
and services from scratch.

That's my kind of working definition,
based partly

on Eric von Hippel's definition
of people-powered innovation.

So here's some examples.

The potato crisp,
the humble potato chip

was invented in 1853 by a chef
called George Crum

who worked at a restaurant in Saratoga.

Now he gets the credit for inventing it,
but I think

it should go to the disgruntled diner
in that restaurant

who kept sending the potatoes back,
said that they were too thickly sliced.

And this kept going backwards
and forwards

and eventually George Crum got really
pissed off about this

and cooked them as thin as he could,
burned them to a crisp,

smothered them in salt
and then sent them out.

And the diner loved it.

So he thought, oh,
we're on to something here

but he didn't take out a patent, in fact,
none of these examples have been patented.

So, 1853, we've always had
people-powered innovation.

In fact, you could argue that up until
the Industrial Revolution,

that's all we had, we had
people-powered innovation.

But if you bring it a wee bit
more up to date

I don't know if you know
the story of the skateboard

but it was something that surfers, facing
a window where they couldn't surf,

it was the best kind of substitute.

So they took a pair of roller-skates,
chopped them in two,

put wheels on either end of a plank
of wood, and you had a skateboard.

So the skateboard industry is now worth
$4.8 billion a year.

And a similar story happened
with the mountain bike.

It was basically cannibalized from
other forms of bikes

and developed entirely by users.

To bring it even more up to date,

I don't know if you're aware
of this thing called Patreon?

It's been set up by Jack Conte
who is a musician.

Certainly, he wouldn't have thought
himself as a kind of entrepreneur

but it kind of recreates
in the digital age

the 18th century notion
of patronage for artists.

So you pay up artists,
because you like their work.

And it has been a hugely successful
venture for Jack.

And then one of the few companies
that have really latched onto

people-powered innovation
at a very early stage

is Proctor & Gamble, who have developed
a thing called Connect and Develop

and that service now,
which brings in innovations

from outside of the organization,

that constitutes about half
of all their innovations.

So much so that Proctor & Gamble say:
"Proudly found elsewhere."

That's their motto.

And I wonder how many of us working
in universities could say the same thing,

or how many of us who are
learning officers in companies?

So, where do we see
people-powered innovation?

Well, you can go to any maker space
and you'll see it,

visit forums or interest groups,
even groups like Anonymous,

whatever you may think
of their philosophy,

you can't deny their ingenuity
and innovation.

And I've looked at a number of examples

and I've identified
four common characteristics.

I'm going to quickly go through them.

The first is need.
The second is jugaad.

Don't worry if it's not
a familiar term to you.

Third is the hacker ethic
and the fourth is a sense of agency.

Right. Very quick examples.

It's a cliché, but it's a cliché
for a reason,

that invention is indeed the mother
of necessity.

And you get people-powered innovation
where the need is greatest.

So it's no accident that some of the
most innovative things that we now see

now are happening in the developed world
in slums and favelas.

So 85% of mobile transactions
have actually originated

in developing countries.

And 50% of them were created by users.

And if you think about it, that's kind of
paved the way for things like

Apple Pay and Samsung Wallet.

The first use of mobile banking
was actually in the Philippines,

and what people did there was to take
pay-as-you-go top-up vouchers,

take the code from them, text them
to their friends and family

in other parts of the Philippines, and
they used it as a kind of currency.

But they're not just turning air time
into money,

they're turning shit into money too.

This is a genuine sign,
I didn't make this up

but it says, if you can't read the bottom
it says,

"Shit Business is Serious Business".

And there's a guy in Lagos in Nigeria

and Lagos has a big
public health problem

because people are using
the streets as a toilet

but there is a graphic artist
called Isaac Agbetusin

who invented a thing that he called
the Dignified Mobile Toilet.

They look like the kind of Portaloos
that you see on building sites

but he's designed it, built it,
delivers it to communities

and then they charge people
ten cents to use them.

But that's only part of the story, because
then the waste is collected

and turned into biogas which is sold
to energy companies.

It's ingenious. He's getting profit at
both ends of the transaction.

So that leads us
to the second characteristic.

And it's this word jugaad.
And if you're not familiar with it,

it's a Hindi term which kind of means
it's making the most of what you've got.

So I don't know if you can see
the photograph on the right.

That's an ox-powered two-story truck.

During the rainy season,
of course people get drenched

so somebody found the cabin
from an old truck, put it on.

There are people on the top deck
of the truck, people on the bottom,

and they're staying dry.
Making the most of what you've got.

But it's also this sense of jugaad
as meaning "good enough".

What you see on the left
is the world's first clay refrigerator.

It was created, again,
by just an ordinary user.

And of course it doesn't work
as well as a powered refrigerator

that we might have in the West.

It's cooled by cold water
which cools the clay.

But when you've got temperatures
of 45, 50 degrees in summer,

it's good enough.
It keeps the produce cool enough

to be used, and it doesn't go off.

Here's some very quick examples
of jugaad as well.

Guy on the top left,
he's frying his breakfast

while he's listening to his MP3 player.
(audience laughing)

Guys on the top right have designated
the compartment a sleeper compartment.

They took a blanket and put it up
as a hammock.

Guy at the bottom right.
This is fascinating.

He's turned what we call in the U.K.
a flip-flop, Australians call them thongs,

he's turned it into a gun holster.

I don't know what he's doing
with the other flip-flop.

And the guy on the bottom left
has invented a kind of hands-free kit.

(audience laughing)

It's just a handkerchief with
a mobile phone.

I hope to God he's cut a couple
of holes out in the front.

But what we're seeing is that
jugaad principles

are now being adopted
by Western countries.

And if you think about it,
a company like Google

when it talks about everything's
(mumbles), fail fast and integrate

that's a kind of jugaad approach
to innovation.

And when jugaad meets
the next characteristic,

I think things get really interesting.

So when you combine a hacker ethic
with jugaad,

I think you then start or rub up against
what I would call

one of the biggest blockers
to people-powered innovation,

and that's a kind of overly-strict
regulatory framework.

And it's put there on the premise
of protecting us and maintaining quality.

Now I'm assuming you all know the story
of Wikipedia, so I'll give you

the truncated version.

When it was first started,
it was called Newpedia

and they commissioned a bunch
of academics to write articles

which were then going to be
peer-reviewed to maintain the quality.

And two years into its existence,
Newpedia had to close

cause it had a grand total of 25 articles,
cause people had spent all that time

arguing about whether
the article was good enough.

So it became Wikipedia,
and as you know, Jimmy Wales then said,

"To hell with this.
I'll make it open source.

"Anybody can write this.
It will be good enough.

"And people can hack it
and improve it."

But what's less commonly known
is that Wikipedia wasn't

the kind of direct successor
to Newpedia.

It sort of forked, and alongside Wikipedia
was a thing called Citizendium.

Now, could you just put your hand up
if you've ever used Wikipedia?

Yeah, pretty much everybody.

Can you put your hand up if
you've used Citizendium?

Yes, and that's because
they insisted on peer review.

And if you go on the Citizendium website,
they've got something like 160,000 articles

which have been commissioned,
and 106 of them, I think it is,

have actually been released for citation.

So, I don't know what's happening
for all the rest, but it seems to me

there's a lesson here
for academic publishing

because I don't believe peer review,
unless it's open source,

does anything other than obstruct
research and innovation and not advance it.

So here's an example from education,

which is what I'd consider
to be jugaad in the hacker ethic.

There's a college in London
called the School for Communication Arts.

It's run by a maverick called Marc Lewis,

and it serves the advertising industry.

Now, it provides tertiary-level courses
but they're not degrees

because he can't get validated.

Why can't he get validated?

Because Marc invites people
to hack its own programs,

and he does it via this.
He has a thing called the Curriculum Wiki.

So if you're in the advertising industry,
and you think that there's

a particular skill which is not being developed,
or there's some new processes and practices,

or if you're a student,
or indeed a member of the public,

you can put up on the Curriculum Wiki
what you think should be taught,

and Marc and his staff there
will guarantee to turn that

into a set of learning outcomes
with a syllabus.

And they'll have it up and running
within six weeks.

Now of course, that means
that it can't get validation,

because in the U.K.,
universities want to know

what your program's going to be
in five years' time.

He doesn't know what they're going
to be doing in five weeks' time,

but he doesn't care because
all the students get jobs.

They've got 100% employability rate.

So that's a case of, I think,
the kind of regulatory frameworks

that we've got coming up against
innovation and people-powered innovation.

And it seems to me that
that sense of agency is really important.

In most examples of formal learning,
it seems to me we've promoted

a kind of learned dependence.

We're the experts.
You're the learners.

And if you want to progress
to the next level,

then you're going to need us.

And then along came the biggest,
disruptive innovation

since chewing gum in education,
and that's YouTube.

And everybody suddenly went,
"Hmm, maybe we don't need you guys

"as much as we thought we did."

And YouTube begat MOOCs.

And then the new mantra became
"Any lecturer that can be replaced

"by a YouTube video, will be."

But whilst MOOCs and online learning allow
learners to hack their education, sort of,

they don't yet build community
or a sense of learner agency.

And I believe that building learner
agency will be the next big development

in learning, because that's what we see
in social learning now.

And learners expect that
that agency in formal learning

is also going to be there.

So, it's not hard to do.

We just need to adopt social learning's
six key motivations

which I talk about in the book.

And there's a whole other talk
to go through these

but I'll just quickly list them.

So, a sense of do-it-yourself.

There's a great deal of autonomy
in social learning.

You all know that because
that's how you communicate.

I know I'm preaching to the converted here.

Second is immediacy.

There's what Lillian Katz called
a horizontal relevance about learning

because you're getting the knowledge
that you need now

to solve the challenge
that you've got

rather than just-in-case
at some point in the future.

There's an obvious sense
of collegiality, do it with friends.

It's now the case that if you're
on Twitter or Yammer,

you've probably got your closest
collaborator on the other side

of the world, rather than
on the other side of the office.

And then, there's a sense of playfulness
about all of this stuff.

Then we get into the contentious ones.

Do unto others.

Now, I know that social media
has got bullies, got trolls,

and there are bad people out there
who do bad things,

but that's the stuff that gets reported.

What doesn't get reported
are the million random acts of kindness

which happen every day because of
that sense of generosity

which is powering the learning.

And similarly, for the last one.

There's a high visibility about the
learning which is happening

in the social space which isn't
being replicated, I would argue,

in the formal learning space.

Companies and universities
get very nervous about the learning

being open to the rest of the world.

But I think these six qualities
of social learning are

the means by which those communities
develop a sense of agency.

And I'd argue that we need to think
about how many of these

we can bring in to our formal
learning programs.

And it's really encouraging to see
the presentations that are scheduled

for the next couple of days,
particularly the ones which

are about peer learning.

So they're the four kind of
common characteristics

behind people-powered
innovation.

I'm now, only got a couple of
minutes left, so let's just finish

with perhaps three things
that we could do

to develop more people-powered
innovation.

First is don't be afraid of the pro-am.

The poster boy these days
for the pro-am is this kid.

Just put your hand up
if you recognize this kid.

Oh, not many.
His name's Jack Andraka.

When he was fifteen,
he came up with a biomarker

for pancreatic cancer because
the need was there.

A close member of his family died
of pancreatic cancer

because it wasn't spotted early enough.

So Jack came up, did all his research
on Google and Wikipedia.

He calls them "teenager's two best friends."

And then he reached a point where
he needed lab space.

So he wrote to 200 universities
in America

and 199 of them turned him down.

They couldn't see what a 15-year-old
could possibly tell them

about pancreatic cancer, I mean,
he didn't even have a master's.

So how would he possibly be able
to help them?

Now fortunately, one did,
and that was Johns Hopkins.

And it's ready to go into production now,
this biomarker.

But here again, he's come up,
he's incredibly frustrated

because he's come up against
regulatory framework

which is not allowing this thing
to be made available

because of the ridiculous clinical
trial system that we've got.

And it's going to be five,
possibly ten years,

before this is now made available.

And as Jack says, "How many
more people are going to die

"as a result of that?"

So that's one,
don't be afraid of the pro-am,

and obviously,
de-regulate where possible.

Welcome those education hackers.

But then finally, I think we've just
not got to be in denial about this.

Since "Open" was published,
I've worked with a lot of companies

and universities, and I go in
and I tell them about the risks

of being dis-intermediated.

But I sense this kind of collective
denial going on.

And it's understandable because
for a long time,

learners had nowhere else to go.

And we've had a kind of monopoly
for the past hundred years or more,

but the time to open up education
is here and it's now,

and we have to involve users
in redefining what we do.

So I began by talking about
my recent cancer treatment.

And when I was first diagnosed, I had
my first meeting with the oncologist.

And as you can imagine,
I had done a ton of research

because I'm a hypochondriac,
I don't mind admitting it.

The only consolation about
being a hypochondriac

is that eventually you're proven right.
(audience laughs)

So I was talking to the oncologist, and I
said, "What are the alternatives to surgery?"

"What are going to be the side effects
of chemotherapy, if I have to have it?"

And he was getting more
and more frustrated.

I asked about holistic treatments.

Eventually, he kind of snapped
at me, and he said,

"Look, just have the surgery.
Don't overthink this."

Now, when a doctor tells you
to not overthink it,

I would strongly recommend
you find another doctor,

because that's the kind of
Apple philosophy.

"You know, we've done
all the research and the design.

"You should just be grateful
that we're letting you buy it."

But one of these forums that I was on,
the one I was telling you about

that are operating kind of
on the boundaries,

go on there regularly, and this oncologist
joined in on the conversation.

And people woke up smart,
and they said,

"But we never get professionals
coming on this forum."

And the oncologist said, "Well,
it's really important

"that this dialogue takes place."

And I remember what he said.

He said, "Those who seek answers
need to be part of the solution."

So I hope you'll think how you
can bring more people-powered innovation

into your own learning programs, and
enable people to be part of the solution.

Thanks very much for listening.

(applause)

- David, thank you very much, indeed.
You're great, at 23 minutes,

so thank you very much indeed
for making that happen.

And some of these questions
actually will be applicable

for Cory and for Ian as well, so you
may want to pick them up

in your remarks too.

But let me just reflect some of
the comments that we've been getting,

and there you can see the address.

I can take many more if you want.

This one from Alejandro Molini.

The shift to a new age of opportunity,
what exactly is this shift towards?

- Well, I think that's a bigger question.

That's a question that I asked myself when
I looked at the overall theme for today.

But certainly as far as the thing that I
was talking about, for me

it is this shift towards knowledge
is becoming more open.

It's a curious kind of battle which is
constantly taking place

cause I think Cory will be talking
to some extent about institutions

and how they're making it difficult
for that knowledge to be shared.

But I think what we've seen over
the past ten years, is a desire

for people to have more control
over their lives,

and the implication behind all that,
which is why I think dis-intermediation

is such a powerful implication.

If you're part of the music industry,
you never thought that you'd be done out.

If you were a travel agent, you never
really thought that people

would want to organize their
own holidays.

If you're a taxi driver, you probably
didn't see Uber coming.

But that to me is part of that shift.

- What about this comment from
Maria Ebro?

A very interesting talk, but how do
you ensure confidentiality?

How do you balance control
versus innovation?

- Yep, there is no easy answer to that.

And when I talk about regulatory
frameworks, of course you wouldn't want

to get on a plane and wonder if
the pilot was actually somebody

who previously was sitting
in the back row.

There are some needs for that
regulatory framework,

but I think we've gone too far.

And now that knowledge is
everywhere, it's possible that

the next big breakthroughs
in a lot of these areas

will come from laypeople.

I just think that what happens currently
is that we shut those people out

of the conversation, and we need to work
with them, as Proctor & Gamble did.

- But do you see this as a genuinely
serious problem, the issue of balancing

control and innovation?

- Well absolutely, but we were just
talking about this earlier when we

were talking about the Google DNS thing,
and Google then potentially have access

to a lot of confidential information.

There's almost a sense in which, I think,
the younger generation,

anybody under the age of 20-25 has almost
given up on the notion of confidentiality.

I think people, and it's not always in
their best interests, but I think people

are recognizing that perhaps they've just
got to give some of that information away,

and you have to trust some of those
organizations,

but there's no easy answer to this.

I think it's constantly in play, it's
constantly in flux, this tension.

- All right, I'm trying to reflect as many
of your thoughts as are coming to me

at the moment, so we're moving
all over the place.

What about this from Alex Anesteciadas.

Where do we see people-powered
innovation going now?

- I'd love to see more of it in education
because I think it is one of the areas.

- How can that be achieved?

- How can it be achieved?
It can be achieved by strategic decisions

by organizations that they're going
to work with.

I just started working with the largest
bank in Ireland, and they took

a conscious decision their services
hadn't changed much in about 30 years.

And so they need people to help them
redesign those services.

But that has to come from the
senior management,

recognizing that in most cases,
the rate of innovation

cannot possibly keep up with the
demand for change

that customers are exercising.

- There's a comment here which is really
based around the generational challenge,

I suspect, from Ben Fisher.

How do we get all teachers now to work with
this new reality, the new media,

the new digital space, to work
with these new opportunities?

And it's something which I'm sure Cory
and Ian would address as well.

Your view, David, at the moment.

- What I always say, and I do a lot of work
in schools, and when people are trying

to bring in new innovations, particularly
technologically-based ones,

is work with the enthusiasts and don't
waste your time with the people

who are just not going to want to change
no matter what happens.

We were having a conversation with a
colleague from Australia.

(applause)

I can see people have got the scars
where they've tried.

Colleague last night had just that problem.

You know that there are some people,
and you can see the challenge.

They're in their 50s, 60s, and they've
just decided they've learned enough stuff.

You know, it's like
the Homer Simpson thing.

Every time I get a new piece of
information, some more stuff

has got to go out of the brain
to make way for it.

- You're being very defeatist,
aren't you?

- I'm not. I'm just know that if you
want innovation to happen,

you've got to protect it
and nurture it,

and that the best way to do that
is to create a safe space for innovation.

So I've worked in schools that will create
these innovation pods,

and they have a simple rule where they
say, "You don't have to be part

"of this innovation if you don't want to.
The only thing you can't do

"is to say anything or do anything which
is going to prevent it from taking place.

"If you don't want to be part of it, then
at least step out of the way."

So I think that,
because it's really hard

to get new innovations
to happen in education.

Education has always progressed
incrementally, and the problem is now,

the world's moving so fast that
that incremental shift

isn't going to cut it anymore.

- This is coming through as a theme
which I'm sure is in the back

of almost everyone's mind in the
audience here, all the delegates,

but this is continuing this, David.

How can we integrate the shift in the
organization's core as mainstream?

How can we change
the working way of people,

change, appreciate the opportunities?

I'm interpreting now, this question.

- Well, again I come back
to involving the learners.

I've kind of been involved in music
education for a while

because I was a musician
before I got a real job.

And one of the programs
I introduced was pretty radical

because it was about starting
with the kids' musical interests,

and at the time, teachers said,
"But we don't know anything

"about hip-hop."

And I'd say to people, "Yes,
but you've got a pair of ears.

"You can help these students."

I think what happens is that when
educators see the impact

that it's having on students, that
innovation is having on their lives,

you hope that most of them
will accept the need to change.

And in the process of changing,
it seems to me that

you're not just changing
the pedagogy,

you're changing the relationship
with your students.

And that is the big emotive pull,
it seems to me, for educators.

When you become a learner
alongside those students,

that fundamentally changes
the nature of that relationship.

But we've become so used to seeing
educators as the experts

that most people are terrified
of taking that particular hat off

and putting the learner hat on.

- All right, David, one last question.

When will companies step up
to the plate, based on something

you were saying earlier, and truly hire
based on competence and not degrees?

That's from Daniel Evans,
last question.

- Yeah, well, Google has now got,
I think, Cory would know this.

Is it 14% of their hires now
don't have a degree?

- I don't know the number,
but what they've decided

is that they can get around the
tight labor market,

where they're competing with
Facebook for every new hire

and bidding them up, by hiring
people Facebook wouldn't hire,

people without degrees who
nevertheless do good work.

And they did double-blinded
experiments internally

with their HR department that
showed that the degrees

were irrelevant to the performance.

And so, they're doing what's
commercially smart.

- Yeah, and I think there's a kind of
trickle-down effect,

so Ernst & Young have said they are no
longer going to hire people on degrees.

They've got other ways of assessing
their competence and capability.

So I think we'll start to see this,
increasingly so.

And also, as the currency of the degree,
as what it means, diminishes,

and I do believe it will diminish,
I think that people will start to say,

"Well, hang on, why are we simply
hiring on the basis of a degree?"

So, I think it will take time,
but it's on its way and it's inevitable.

- All right, David, thank you
very much indeed.

- Thank you.

(applause)