Comments on: Set a Big Goal. Give All to Meet It. This is Stupid.

By: Michael F. Martin

Michael F. Martin — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:06:12 +0000

Since you mentioned high school graduation speeches…

http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html

By: Jeff

Jeff — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 07:46:16 +0000

As the anecdote above from Jim and my own experience shows official aid can and does sometimes support innovation, flexible approaches and appropriate adaptation of strategy. The problem is that these experiences have to work against other tendencies of official aid: top down planning, rigid application of superficial performance indicators, rigid and inflexible funding and contracting mechanisms. Official aid needs to be reformed to increase the chances of supporting flexible approaches and innovation while minimizing the constraints of rigid bureaucracy.

By: Jonathan Eyler-Werve

Jonathan Eyler-Werve — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 06:49:22 +0000

MDG discussion in reference to Twitter plug for this post:

“Why the Millennium Development Goals are anathema to social entrepreneurship & creativity http://bit.ly/18gof8“

By: Jonathan Eyler-Werve

Jonathan Eyler-Werve — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 06:45:25 +0000

I would argue that your entrepreneur’s goals did not change: he wanted to make money, or useful products, or some combination of both.

His tactics changed. Goals: not so much.

So are the MGDs more like goals or tactics? I would argue they are essential outcomes. They are the things that any tactical decisions – new innovation, better ideas, clever change of strategy – must eventually steer us toward.

By: Jim

Jim — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 05:14:48 +0000

Funny that you mention James Grant and oral rehydration therapy (ORT). Here’s an actual quote from the man himself:

“I do not think it is an exaggeration to say that a majority of the one million children whose lives are saved each year thanks to ORT, owe their lives – directly or indirectly – to the US Agency for International Development. USAID largely financed the brilliant multi-year research that led to the discovery of ORT … USAID has pioneered international support for its widespread application … It certainly took vision and courage for USAID to embrace ORT the way it did, often in the face of incredulity from elsewhere in the bureaucracy and skepticism from tax-payers unaware of the impact of diarrhoea around the world”.

The reference is ‘ORT: Celebration and challenge’, a speech by James Grant, Executive Director of UNICEF, 1994.

So in other words here is a perfect example of ‘official aid’ doing what you are saying it can’t do – innovating to find better solutions. Care to explain?

By: Tord Steiro

Tord Steiro — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 03:23:26 +0000

Back at what you do best, Bill!

A consistent and intelligent post – thought provoking – without any obvious ideological rantings, and with no attempt to penetrate the celeb reporting segment.

I would like, however, to stress one aspect about developing countries: As I recently worked in one, I could not but start thinking about two terms coined by Doug North – personal- and impersonal exchange – that kind of describes differences in market maturity and behaviour. I have a feeling that most developing country economies are more or less based on personal exchange. That’s a difference from how we are used to think about markets, and may perhaps constrain entrepreneurs, and create unnecessary bureaucracy for everybody who do not have the ‘personal’ component readily available?

By: phme

phme — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 02:33:20 +0000

I find the analogy between our common interest here and the software world interesting. They share than two words: development and programming. Both commonly used design models of the “big design up-front” type.

In the early 2000’s the software people came up with the concept of agile development: promoting rapid iterations in short design-to-feedback loops, having a general direction in mind but no precisely defined set of steps to go there, start delivering rapidly… The main keyword here is “adaptation”.

Now, when you build a dam, that’s not really possible, but there are many cases where development programmers think big design where they should not.

Ah, and now we have a Development 2.0 manifesto as well

By: mister z

mister z — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 20:28:22 +0000

Indeed. NGOs are between the devil and the deep blue sea, with UN and government donors that regularly demand they “be innovative!” but then only fund proposals that fit a previously proven methodology acceptable to someone writing guidelines at HQ 5 years ago.