Replacing Word's non-breaking space

After all these years, I had finally become motivated enough to want to find out just what that little degree symbol meant when Word formatting was toggled on, and whether I needed it. And what I mean is text like this:

with a°50%°SS on one question

This is the degree symbol, which appears to have no other 'official' name (Waddingham, 2014), though apparently it was once called a "gradus" in Latin referring to steps, having many technical and scientific uses, such as temperature, angles, co-ordinates (Symbol Wiki, 2025; Webb, 2018). It is also a 'glyph' not a diacritical, from the Greek, 'carving' (Webb, 2018): what we also know as a pictogram. 

What I didn't realise is that the degree symbol which shows when Word formatting is toggled on is equivalent to " " in html: a non-breaking space (Certent Help, 2021). IT Trip says that "A standard space (ASCII code 32) tells Word that it’s okay to move to a new line at that point if needed. A nonbreaking space (ASCII code 160), on the other hand, instructs Word to keep the adjacent text together on one line" (2025). When we "notice a tiny circle in place of a regular space" because we have toggled on the Pilcrow (¶), we are seeing "a nonbreaking space. The symbol typically looks like a degree sign (°), and if [we] try to delete it as if it were standard text, it can behave unpredictably" (IT Trip, 2025). That is because the non-breaking space often joins things together that it does not make sense for them to be split up, such as a title and a name, an ellipsis, or large, formatted numbers (e.g. Sir Graham Henry; ...; $5 billion). 

If we end up with funny clumps of text that will not break over a line, we can fix it. We simply use find and replace. So, to find and replace non-breaking spaces, which shows as a degree symbol when Word formatting has been toggled on, we simply: 

1. highlight the text we want to replace the non-breaking spaces
2. open Word's Find and Replace box (Ctrl & H), then 
3. key ^s (caret, lower case s) into the "Find what" box
4. key one tap of the spacebar into the "Replace with" box
5. Click the Replace All button

We have now replaced all non-breaking spaces with standard spaces.

However, if we want to key a degree sign on our keyboard, we hold the Alt key down and key 0176. We get a °. 

And finally, if we want to add a non-breaking space in Word we simply highlight the standard space we want to replace with a non-breaking space, and key Ctrl, Shift and Spacebar (Wright, 2025).

I think that covers it!

Sam

References:

Certent Help. (2021). Non-breaking space. https://dm.certent.com/help/Content/D_Draft/Format/nonbreaking_space.htm

IT Trip. (2025, April 10). How to Remove or Replace Nonbreaking Spaces in Word for Perfect Document Formatting. https://en.ittrip.xyz/ms-office/word/remove-nonbreaking-space

Symbol Wiki. (2025). Degree Sign Symbol °. https://symbolwiki.com/en/degree-sign

Waddingham, A. (Ed.) (2014). New Hart's Rules: The Oxford style guide (2nd ed.). Oxford University Press.

Webb, S. (2018). Clash of Symbols: A Ride Through the Riches of Glyphs. Springer International Publishing AG.

Wright, E. (2025). How to Insert Nonbreaking Spaces in Microsoft Word. https://erinwrightwriting.com/how-to-insert-nonbreaking-spaces-in-microsoft-word/

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Have you heard of the Ringelmann effect?

I was listening to a podcast last year (Agnew, 2025), and the Ringelmann effect was mentioned. My ears pricked up: a new theory! This effect is named after some late 19th century agricultural engineering research (in the 1880s), which showed that, as team size increases, member contributions drop; or how "individual effort [decreases] when performing in groups as compared to when [members] perform alone" (Kravitz & Martin, 1986, p. 936, citing Latane et al., 1979, p. 822; Ringelmann, 1913). It is the first study of social loafing... sort of.

When studying how processes and group productivity relate, these human factors efficiency experiments showed that group members working together on a rope pull meant that each person could put in significantly less effort than when if they were working alone (Ringelmann, 1913; Kravitz & Martin, 1986)... which is entirely logical. We go from an individual maximum strain to being able to do things more safely, with shared responsibility. That to me is the power of numbers; the benefit of working together which allows us to minimise individual harm.

But. As we add more people to our group, the collective becomes less efficient: teams become less productive as they get bigger. There is a sweet spot for team size (Kravitz & Martin, 1986, after Ringelmann, 1913)... and this too is logical. If not everyone can get a grip on the rope, collective returns decrease. No surprises there, either, with Ringelmann noting "coordination loss" (according to Kravitz & Martin, 1986, p. 936). For the rope pull, more than 7 people was where coordination loss outweighed productivity for manual handling (Ringelmann, 1913).

And, if we have ever tried to co-ordinate a group meeting, we will all know that the larger a group is, the harder it is to get everyone aligned and free at the same time. In my experience - NB: I have no empirical evidence for this! - the sweet spot for co-ordinating a team is somewhere between three and five people.

However, I hesitate to say that Ringelmann's theory (1913) is about social loafing. My take on this is on optimisation: together we maximise collective safe physical effort, getting the job done without anyone busting a gut; until the group becomes too unwieldy to manage.

Sam

References:

Agnew, P. (2025, September). Why (often) you’re less effective in a team [Podcast]. Nudge. https://pod.link/1457621005/episode/ZjA3MzU2ZjQtOGUyNS0xMWYwLTk2ZmEtZjcyYjk0NzkzZjUx

Kravitz, D., & Martin, B. (1986). Ringelmann Rediscovered: The Original Article. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50(5), 936-941. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.50.5.936

Ringelmann, M. (1913). Recherches sur les moteurs animés: Travail de l'homme [Research on animate sources of power: The work of man]. Annales de l'Institut National Agronomique, 2(12), 1-40. http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k54409695.image.f14.langEN

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Are LLM apps the 'man behind the curtain'?

I have noticed more and more that people are using AI apps to put together text for novel situations. For example, a colleague of mine recently used the Open AI app, ChatGPT, to write a response to a student complaint, and the resulting answer was a superb piece of sympathetic, supportive writing intended to smooth those ruffled feathers. The response was read for sense, edited to suit our context, and emailed out. It seemed to work in practice, as well.

Personally, the idea of pasting another's email into such an app feels like stealing: I am giving away another's words under my own aegis. I am uncomfortable with that. If it is my own writing that needs editing down (e.g. sweating a 500 word draft into two paragraphs), I semi-OK with it, but even then I am struggling. Perhaps 'hesitant' might better describe how I feel. It feels ...dishonest.

Perhaps it feels like cheating because writing is a "time skill", like keyboarding (Canning, 1975, p. 277). It is “where the ticking away of the unforgiving seconds plays a dominant part in both learning and application of the skill” (p. 277), now known as sequential learning (what comes next) and map learning (where we find that next thing). Our skills become automatic though practice, helping us to embed both types of learning (Canning, 1975; Rao et al, 2000). Like learning to drive, like cooking, like carpentry, like becoming a doctor, or like glassblowing; there are no shortcuts. We learn by doing year on year, gathering mastery. Once we gain mastery, we can take some shortcuts: but too many will erode our hard-won skills. I worry that LLMs writing on our behalf will erode our writing mastery. Everyone may be doing it, but I am not sure that makes it any better. 

Adding more to my unease, if we are using the large language model AI apps, how do we know the apps we use are valid, and don't suffer from hallucinations (Lingard, 2023)? Trying to compare AI LLM apps is difficult for the average user: there are so many options, and how do we actually weight them against each other? 

Well, that is where LM Arena https://beta.lmarena.ai/ comes in (Bansal, 2025). We can ask a question in this online app, and we get pointed to a pair of LLMs, and asked to chose our preferred answer from the two results from two anonymised LLMs. We can chose to ask again; to clarify further; or accept the result (which will then unmask which LLM we prefer). Having tried a few times, I am apparently drawn to Claude.ai and DeepSeek. No surprises there: these are the two models I have found in my own limited usage to provide the most accurate responses to my personal requests.

However, I am still uneasy, and the Bansal article further explores yet another reason for my unease: the inequity of human AI 'raters': those underpaid workers who 'massage' those responses we receive to our AI app requests (2025). This is truly smoke and mirrors: AIs need a human baby-sitter. 

Human AI raters apparently don't "trust [...] the products they are helping build and train. Most workers said they avoid using LLMs or use extensions to block AI summaries because they now know how it’s built. Many also discourage their family and friends from using it, for the same reason" (Bansal, 2025). It is reminiscent of the Wizard of Oz, perhaps the most famous "man behind the curtain"; the charlatan of our childhood imaginings (Baum, 1900). It looks and sounds great, but it is all a trick.

If those who work on the apps avoid them, perhaps some unease is warranted.

Sam

References:

Bansal, V. (2025, September 11). How thousands of ‘overworked, underpaid’ humans train Google’s AI to seem smart. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/sep/11/google-gemini-ai-training-humans

Baum, L. F. (1900). The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (illustrations W. W. Denslow). George M. Hill Company.

Canning, B. W. (1975). Keyboard skill-a useful business accompaniment. Education + Training, 17(10), 277-278. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb016409

Lingard, L. (2023). Writing with ChatGPT: An illustration of its capacity, limitations & implications for academic writers. Perspectives on Medical Education, 12(1), 261-270. https://doi.org/10.5334/pme.1072

Rao, S. M., Harrington, D., & Parsons, M. W. (2000). Acquisition of keyboarding skills: An event-related fMRI study. NeuroImage, 11(5), S361. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1053-8119(00)91292-8

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Copying a Google Calendar from 2025 to 2026, part 4

In a couple of recent posts (here), I looked at the stage for exporting a Google Calendar as an .ics file, and updating it for reimporting as a new Google calendar.

However, if we get that reimporting WRONG, we need to know how to undo it. I did just that, by trying to get clever and assuming that I could change the dates of my calendar export and then reimport it into the same calendar. Of course it overwrote all this year's dates because the entry ID numbers were the same. Sigh.

Luckily someone has documented how to undo the import for us all to benefit from: and it is a life-saver (GCal Tools, 2020). All we need to do is to open our edited .ics file in some type of text editor (I use Notepad). Do a find and replace of the following:

STATUS:CONFIRMED

For:

STATUS:CANCELLED

Then save the .ics file. We are now able to reimport the .ics file into our Google calendar, and our mistake will be erased. 

All I need to do is now to undo the find and replace, then reimport the .ics file into a new Google calendar to avoid the duplicate problem. And that worked perfectly.

Yay! And next time I was much more careful, first creating a unique annual calendar for the next year so I can safely have duplicate event IDs :-)

Sam

References:

GCal Tools. (2020, November 12). How to undo an import to Google Calendar [video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/hJdGBmHDafA

Google Calendar Help. (2025, January 1). Copy Google Calendar Events from 2024 Calendar year to 2025. https://support.google.com/calendar/thread/319764201/copy-google-calendar-events-from-2024-calendar-year-to-2025-year?msgid=320864848#

read more "Copying a Google Calendar from 2025 to 2026, part 4"

Academic publishing, open access, and profit

Having research papers hidden behind a paywall offends my sense of social justice, particularly in a place as small as Aotearoa New Zealand. It offends me even more because New Zealand academics, appointed to tertiary institutions, do the research, and write the articles within the boundaries of their own teaching work (which is funded by our government). And it might take two years for an idea to go from research being a paper ready for publication. Those want to publish also need to peer review for the journal, for the privilege of being published in that journal... and they do that as well within the boundaries of their own teaching work (which is funded by our government). 

Then those who are on the editorial boards of the journals we are submitting to are also other academics, who - guess what? - do what they do within the boundaries of their own teaching work (which is funded by their governments in their nations). 

And then the big publishing houses - Reed-Elsevier, Taylor & Francis, Wiley-Blackwell, Springer and SAGE (MacDonald, 2015) - who incidentally own over half the global journals and teaching text brands (The Economist, 2024), now often own the copyright on the research because they 'published' it. And because they own the copyright, they paywall the articles: they formatted it, after all, they own the processes, and they have the website. They make BILLIONS in profit annually (The Economist, 2024) all due to global 'government funded' research, write-up, and validation... which actually means that taxpayers from around the world provide the publishing houses with utterly ridiculous waterfall of money. 

One paper I asked my library to obtain for me was going to cost USD$75 (NZD$125) to rent a copy of the article FOR ONE YEAR for my own research only. I could share it with no one. I wouldn't 'own' a copy - I had to agree to destroy it after a year. These costs are extortionate. 

But when we consider that the writer gets nothing (except being published and a few author copies); the peer reviewers get nothing (except being published); the editorial boards get nothing (except to say they are on the board); and the taxpayer gets nothing; this model does not seem fair. Why should the payers get locked out of reading the research they are paying for?

Authors usually get roughly 6 'free' copies for the privilege of having sweated blood for a year or more to write the article which finally passes peer-review and gets accepted. So let's rub some salt into that wound: those big publishers make a song and dance about 'open access' publication, which means that, if the submitting academics pay a fee, the article becomes available freely to all (Butler et al., 2023). And the fee? Usually around $4000 (USD$2600 ≈ NZD$4300), but may be up to USD$10000 (≈NZD$17000; Ayeni & Larivière, 2025, p. 1). There are very few institutions that can afford to cough up that type of open access charges. Trying to get back conference travel costs of $100 is hard enough; there is very little untagged money in the education sector. The Gates Foundation announced last year that they will no longer fund open access fees (The Economist, 2024). 

But it is not just journals where the publishing houses have it all their own way. A colleague of mine wrote a textbook on coaching which used to retail for around USD$150 - she got $1 profit on her years of work in putting that text together. So when it came time to do a second edition, she declined the publication house contract, and went to a self-publishing/printing house in Ireland that did print-on-demand. Her students together online batch-ordered their copies for NZD$75 each (which including international shipping). She made about NZD$25 per copy on the second edition, at effectively a quarter the price to students.

So why are we paying publishing houses to 'publish'? Even if institutions no longer have the capacity to self-publish, we need a better way. Perhaps we need the research equivalent of Wikipedia. If we had the platform, and we collectively bought in, it could be run by the same volunteer efforts as the academic writing, peer-review and editorial boards currently are. 

I would love to see those vampire publishers kicked into touch. 

Sam

References:

Ayeni, P., & Larivière, V. (2025). Inequity, precarity, and disparity: Exploring systemic and institutional barriers in open access publishing. Journal of Librarianship and Information Science. Advance online publication, 1-18. https://doi.org/10.1177/0961000625135338

Butler, L.-A., Matthias, L., Simard, M.-A., Mongeon, P., & Haustein, S. (2023). The oligopoly’s shift to open access: How the big five academic publishers profit from article processing charges. Quantitative Science Studies, 4(4), 778–799. https://doi.org/10.1162/qss_a_00272

MacDonald, F. (2015, June 12). These Five Companies Control More Than Half of Academic Publishing. Science Alert. https://www.sciencealert.com/these-five-companies-control-more-than-half-of-academic-publishing

The Economist. (2024, November 20). Scientific publishers are producing more papers than ever. http://openscience.ens.fr/ABOUT_OPEN_ACCESS/ARTICLES/2024_11_20_The_Economist_on_publishing.pdf

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Senge's learning organisation characteristics

In a previous post (here), I mentioned Senge’s five elements of learning organisations: those of systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, a shared vision, and team learning (2006). In learning organisations, those who lead are kaitiaki and teachers, not those who impose or tell. They accompany the troops, not dictate. They are are the sweeper on the curling rink, allowing the team to continually develop themselves to better understand the complexity of a unified systems model, to clarify organisational vision, to create shared mental understandings, and to create something that is larger than the sum of the individual parts.

So lets walk through what these elements are, in more detail:

• Systems thinking: this is the most important element of a learning organisation - the "fifth discipline" of Senge's seminal book (1990, 2006). It is thought that management may try overly hard to simplify what are very complex systems, seeing the organisation as parts and not as a whole: the organisation is thus not seen as one dynamic system. Taking a higher-level and longer-term view would enable us to more clearly see the impact of our actions - because we are often measured on a short time-scale and on specifics, not systems. While "We [may] learn best from our experience, [...] we [may not...] directly experience the consequences of many of our most important decisions" (Senge, 1990, p. 23). We are likely to remain blind to the ramifications of what we set in motion. We need to think about the interconnectedness of all things.
  
  
• Personal mastery: This is our personal proficiency, our expertise; our vocation or calling. Our professional drive to master the unmasterable; our focus which keeps us in a continual learning mode. And because we are so driven to master our profession, our organisation learns through us. "Individual learning does not guarantee organizational learning. But without it no organizational learning occurs" (Senge, 1990, p. 139).
  
  
• Mental models: These are "deeply ingrained assumptions, generalizations, or even pictures and images that influence how we understand the world and how we take action" (Senge, 1990, p. 8). I have written about mental models before (here), what Daft calls “theories people hold about specific systems in the world and their expected behavior” (2008, p. 133). They are the routine ways of thinking we develop through experience and education, our repertoire (Schon, 1983) and Schon is a good person to draw on here: we need to be reflective to be able to see what happens when our mental models - often our 'sacred cows' - are slaughtered in front of us. Read more on mental models here. 
  
  
• Shared vision: Senge begins with is a simple idea about leadership; that we need to have "the capacity to hold a shared picture of the future we seek to create" (1990, p. 9), or be able to create that capacity as we move forward together. That shared vision is the critical piece of kit that allows us to stay synchronised; in step, in harmony, aligned. It focuses all our efforts on the one key place we are all working towards. Everyone buys in, and the goals are legitimate. Two elements implicit in this shared vision are: a sense of purpose, of agency, that collectively we can do this work; and a longer-term view, that time is less important than the goal being achieved. Senge relates "Once the vision of the product and how they would develop it began to crystallize [...] the team began to work in an extraordinary way. The energy and enthusiasm were palpable. Each individual felt a genuine sense of responsibility for how the team as a whole functioned, not just for 'doing [their] part'" (1990, p. 314-15).
  
  
• Team learning: This is somewhat aligned to the humility of Level 5 leaders (Collins, 2001), and mindset (Dweck, 2006), in that the openness to learning, and mistakes being a part of learning, are key attributes of the organisation and the staff actually learning from 'throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks'. This learning is "the process of aligning and developing the capacities of a team to create the results its members truly desire" (Senge, 1990, p. 236), where what is learned builds on personal mastery, but it fits with the shared vision, and the team can see how it will speed progress. Team learning begins with true, open conversation, or "'dialogue,' the capacity of members of a team to suspend assumptions and enter into a genuine "thinking together." To the Greeks dia-logos meant a free-flowing of meaning through a group, allowing the group to discover insights not attainable individually" (Senge, 1990, p. 12). Senge reminds us that "Dialogue differs from the more common 'discussion,' which has its roots with 'percussion' and 'concussion,' literally a heaving of ideas back and forth in a winner takes-all competition" (1990, p. 12). And while I take his point, I think that is semantics. I don't think of winner takes all in discussion: I focus more on disussion being a collaborative conversation.

However, it is easy to see that if a team, an organisation, or a nation delivers on these five elements, it will be very productive indeed.

Sam

References:

Collins, J. (2001). Good to Great: Why some companies make the leap... and others don’t. HarperCollins Publishers.

Dweck, C. (2006). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Baltimore Books.

Schon, D. (1983). The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. Basic Books.

Senge, P. (1990). The Fifth Discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. Currency Doubleday.

Senge, P. (2006). The Fifth Discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization (2nd ed.). Currency Doubleday.

read more "Senge's learning organisation characteristics"

Samsung, Google, and USB troubleshooting

I have an Android Samsung phone. Together this is usually a very reliable piece of kit - although I would love to delete some of the crazy Apps the Samsung marketing people think the consumer needs/wants - but Google and Samsung usually works well.

However, there is a growing problem with these two big kids not playing nicely with USB C. Sometimes everything works seamlessly, and other times... not so seamless. More screamy, in fact. I don't know which corporate giant is at fault here, but many times I plug in my USB cable... and NOTHING happens.

Why am I using USB with my phone? I use USB to transfer my ebooks and talking book files onto my phone. I don't use cloud storage because I (a) like to use the listening and reading apps I have personally selected, and that work for me, and (b) I draw my files from a range of libraries which all use different apps, and (c) I read/listen on my PC as well as on my phone, and sometimes my laptop, so need cross-device accessibility.

Many people have a tile "USB" or "USB Options" in their Samsung Quick Access settings Menu. I have a blank space. There is no reference to USB anywhere in my phone's settings. Sigh.

Two things. Firstly, use another cable. USB cables seem to take offence to my phone with regular monotony. Just changing one cable for another can make it play more nicely.

If that doesn't work, however, I have found a second solution, thanks to the Blinks and Buttons site (Ellison, 2024). What I need to do is to enable Samsung's USB "debugging mode". How we do that is:

1. Tap on the 'Settings' icon on our Samsung phone
2. "Scroll down and tap on 'About phone'" (likely right at the bottom)
3. Tap on Software, then "Look for the 'Build number' and tap on it seven times to enable developer options"
4. "Once developer options are enabled, go back to the main settings page and tap on 'Developer options'" (also likely right at the bottom)
5. "Toggle on the 'USB debugging' option"
6. "A pop-up message will appear, asking for [our] confirmation. Press 'OK'" Ellison, 2024), and now our USB connection should work.

With USB debugging mode turned on, I am able to plug in my USB cable to my PC and transfer files.

However, Ellison warns that we should "Disable USB debugging mode after [we] have finished using it to ensure the security" of our phone (2024). Good point. Presumably toggling off Developer Mode - which makes the whole set of options vanish - does the same thing. Then we simply repeat Ellison's process (2024) above the next time we need to use our USB cable.

Sam

References:

Ellison, J. (2024, September 3). Enabling USB Debugging Mode To Activate USB Ports On Samsung Devices. Blinks and Buttons. https://blinksandbuttons.net/how-do-i-enable-usb-ports-on-my-samsung/

read more "Samsung, Google, and USB troubleshooting"

What is a theme?

Donald Super was the founder of the "Thematic-Extrapolation Method" (1954) where we take the life history of client, and seek patterns of behaviour within it. He "described [it] as extrapolation based on thematic analysis, and the underlying theory is the theory of life patterns" (p. 13). This is where we are the "historian, reviewing historical evidence, seeking the patterns or themes that explain the past, and then extrapolating the most plausible prediction of future client performance" (Jepsen, 1994, p. 44).

The theme is what we seek with our clients. As Super says, "one way to understand what an individual will do in the future is to understand what [they] did in the past" (1954, p. 13), by together analysing the past "sequence of events and the development of characteristics", we can identify "the recurring themes and underlying trends" and hopefully help the client see potential futures. Both desirable and undesirable futures. By doing this we put the power in the hands of the client to make change.

Yep: that is good. But what are themes, exactly? We can turn to Super here as well. Themes can be thought of "as changes in the frequency, strength, and interaction of the behavioral manifestations[,] needs, values, [and] achievements (Jepsen, 1994, p. 44, citing Super, 1957, p. 282). Super provided "an example of an emerging theme from the case history of George Litch [...] whose early need for security was extrapolated as a likely recurring [theme] later in his career" (p. 44, citing Super, 1954).

Perhaps from this we could assume that a theme is a pattern. A pattern of need, value, behaviour, or achievement, a pattern which is likely to recur... unless we make a deliberate effort to change (Jepson, 1994; Super, 1954, 1957). So what type of things might form a theme?

As we can see from Mr Litch, security can form a theme throughout our career. Other themes I have seen in my practice include fear/seeking of change; avoidance/seeking of responsibility; damaged/solid psychological contracts; bewilderment of/insight into others' motives. All limit or propel the individual in their work.

From a practitioner point of view, a practice theme might be particular type of practice, a particular client group, a particular stage, or a particular field. A practitioner theme might be clients in science; engineering graduates; student job search; career transformation; career transition; clients with complex/specialist workplace needs, such as disability, vulnerable populations, neurodiversity or diverse learners; managing conflict; working with a particular culture or ethnicity; entrepreneurship and career development; ethics; gender; leadership; motivation; national and international change; AI; decentralisation versus centralisation; globalisation versus localisation; new practitioners; professional development.

The list is almost endless. But at least, thanks to Super (1954, 1957), we know what a theme is.

Sam

References:

Jepsen, D. A. (1994). The thematic‐extrapolation method: Incorporating career patterns into career counseling. The Career Development Quarterly, 43(1), 43-53. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.2161-0045.1994.tb00845.x

Super, D. E. (1954). Career patterns as a basis for vocational counseling. Journal of Counseling Psychology 1(1), 12-20. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0061989

Super, D. E. (1957). The Psychology of Careers. Harper & Row.

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The knowledge worker

Knowledge workers are professionals whose job is the analysis, application, and creation of information in order to solve complex problems... or to generate ideas. Their specialised expertise, critical thinking, and ingenuity is their secret sauce; not their muscles nor their strength. They are driven by a need for autonomy, continuous learning, and informed decision-making (CERIC, 2025). 

Peter Drucker related a story which I find a sound example of what knowledge work is perceived as being (1959):

"In the wilds [...] the big car of an American tourist broke down and refused to start. No one could figure out what was the matter; even the factory representative who was flown in gave up. The tourist was ready to abandon the car and go home when someone remembered that an old blacksmith who lived beyond the mountains some fifty miles away had, in his youth, tinkered with engines. In his despair the tourist sent for him. Three days later the old man appeared on a mule. He took one look at the car and asked for a hammer. He gently tapped one spot on the engine twice, and said, “Start her up”; and the engine purred as smoothly as if it had just left the test stand."

“What do I owe you?” the grateful tourist asked.

“A hundred dollars.”

“What, a hundred dollars for two taps with the hammer?”

“Well, I can itemize it for you,” the old man said, "For two taps with hammer—ten cents; For having known where — 99 dollars and 90 cents" (Drucker, 1959, pp. 75-76).

In this case, the knowledge worker, or "professional specialist" (Drucker, 1959, p. 76) holds the arcane knowledge of "having known where" to apply that 10 cents worth of percussive maintenance.

In 1954, Peter Drucker talked about the "advancement of the arts" — the constant improvement of our ability to do by applying to it our increased knowledge — is one of the tasks of the business enterprise and a major factor in its survival and prosperity (Drucker, 1954, p. 56). He moves on to talk about the "leader [of] the team; [... who may have] authority [but] it is guidance rather than supervision or command [that conveys leadership]. It derives from knowledge rather than from rank (p. 138). It is emphasised that we must "learn by acquiring knowledge rather than simply by experience. [This] requires 'teaching' rather than 'training' programs — many of the typical programs of today make a [person] rigid, rather than flexible, teach tricks of the trade rather than understanding. And the need to train workers in the ability to unlearn and to learn will become greater as the skill and knowledge level of the worker increases" (1954, p. 268).

Then in 1957, he began considering how "to organize men of knowledge" (Drucker, 1959, p. xi). I wonder if this is the start of his ideas about knowledge work, per se? I get the impression that Drucker feels we can see the shadowy outline of a pattern long before we can know what the pattern IS, and that by working out what is missing, by "the systematic organization of our ignorance from which we then can develop the necessary new specific knowledge and tools" (p. 31). So we see something. We clock a pattern. We consider what we CANNOT see. That enables us to build a taxonomy of what we CAN see. 

Drucker goes on to suggest that "Organization[al] knowledge and professional knowledge are becoming the real 'factors of production'; [and that] 'land, labor and capital,' the three factors of production of traditional economics, are increasingly becoming merely limitations on the effectiveness of knowledge" (Drucker, 1959, p. 62). Where management's aim was previously that of "functional specialization", where management "tried to organize skill and knowledge work as if it were performed by" a single individual (p. 69), more current thinking is that we use "thousands of high-grade professionals of all kinds of knowledge [... who] work[...] together, organized [...] by the stage of the project" that they are involved with (p. 70). 

We bring in the right people, at the right time, to work their arcane knowledge. An old idea whose time has finally come.  

Sam

References:

CERIC. (2025). Glossary of Career Development. Canadian Education and Research in Career Counselling. https://ceric.ca/glossary-of-career-development/

Drucker, P. F. (1954). The Practice of Management. Harper & Row.

Drucker, P. F. (1959). Landmarks of Tomorrow (reprint of 1957). Harper & Row.

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Viewing Apple .heic files

Ah, the joys of Apple systems. While I have encountered these conversion problems before (here), I had an interesting problem earlier this year when I was sent an email with some attached image files from an iPhone user. The image attachments were ".heic" files, and had been downsized (i.e. the images were smaller sized files so as to send easily).

The trouble was, when I downloaded these files to my Windows system, they downloaded as 'zero byte' sized files (which I didn't notice at the time). But when I headed over to the Cloud Convert website to convert the files, I got a weird message: "20250202_181443.heic is too small, please upload files larger than 1 bytes". Ohhh-kaaaay.

I went back to the files. Yep: they were indeed 0 bytes. I downloaded them again. Same deal. I tried another platform (FreeConvert): the same result. I tried to open the images directly from the email using the Microsoft Photo app, but was asked to purchase a driver for $1.50 in order to open the files. Blow that: the files may still not open after paying for the driver. There must be another way...

But there didn't seem to be. So instead I went back to the sender and asked them if others had also had problems, and did they know of another way to pass these images to me?

The next day I received another set of .heic files, but they were much larger files (3 and 4Mb). I downloaded them, and they downloaded as files of roughly the same size. Then I was able to convert them by going to https://cloudconvert.com/:

• In the Convert box, select Images | .heic in the left-hand dropdown list
• In the right-hand dropdown list, select "jpg" 
• Use the red box under the header section to upload the .heic file to be converted 
• Download the resulting file. 

So do-able once the files were appropriately sized. But still puzzling as to why this proved so awkward...

Sam

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Pierce's cantilever bridge

Now, how is this for a great metaphor about the careful construction of argument: in reflecting on their workplace habits and actions after the fact, a writer now understands that they were "building a bridge - Pierce’s cantilever bridge - plank by plank and each of those planks was put in place instinctively/intuitively. Pierce describes the bridge as ‘A cantilever bridge of induction, held together by scientific struts and ties. Yet every plank of its advance is first laid by retroduction alone, that is to say, by the spontaneous conjectures of instinctive reason; and neither Deduction nor Induction contributes a single new concept to the structure" (Chaffers-Jones, 2006, p. 10; citing Blaikie, 1993, p. 165, who in turn cites Pierce 1934, p. 324). What Pierce called retroduction (Hartshome & Weiss, 1960) - and at times reduction, or hypothesis - we would I think today call abduction (Chaffers-Jones, 2006). Read more on abduction here.

Like Peirce, Professor Bhaskar - initiator of the critical realist approach to research (more here) - apparently also favoured retroduction as a term to define how "we delve into underlying causal powers [...] moving from 'surface' appearances to a knowledge of 'deep' structures which cannot be obtained through sense experience'" (Chaffers-Jones, 2006, p. 11; citing Johnson & Duberley, 2000, p. 155, drawing on Bhaskar, 1979). Sense experience seems to opens up such wonderful and exotic research horizons.

I was so taken by this description that I got a copy of Peirce's collected works, to read the original author's words in full:

"Finally comes the bottom [perhaps 'ultimate' might be better?] question of logical Critic[: "]What sort of validity can be attributed to the First Stage of inquiry?["] Observe that neither Deduction nor Induction contributes the smallest positive item to the final conclusion of the inquiry. They render the indefinite definite; Deduction Explicates; Induction evaluates: that is all. Over the chasm that yawns between the ultimate goal of science and such ideas of Man’s environment as, coming over him during his primeval wanderings in the forest, while yet his very notion of error was of the vaguest, he managed to communicate to some fellow, we are building a cantilever bridge of induction, held together by scientific struts and ties. Yet every plank of its advance is first laid by Retroduction alone, that is to say, by the spontaneous conjectures of instinctive reason; and neither Deduction nor Induction contributes a single new concept to the structure (Hartshome & Weiss, 1960, p. 323-4)

Wow: I find that quite powerful (though I could do without the scatter-gun approach to capitalisation). And while I don't know enough about research design to truly say that Peirce nailed it, the word pair "Induction evaluates" (Hartshome & Weiss, 1960, p. 323) seems terrifically clear and imminently brief to me; weighing what we found in our research against some standard, theory, or idea. Though Burks suggests, "induction is an inference from a sample to a whole" (1946, p. 301) which is NOT how we see induction today: inference is not intended. Then "Deduction Explicates": what we found, in answer to our hypothesis, is explained in detail (Hartshome & Weiss, 1960, p. 323). Done. Dusting our hands together. The two main research philosophies are despatched with dispatch.

But abduction: now there seems to lie a truly philosophical approach to research inquiry. We think, and we link our thought into a meticulous scaffold using scientific rationale to pin our thinking together. Burks suggests that "abduction is an inference from a body of data to an explaining hypothesis" (1946, p. 301), but I am not sure that is helpful. Abduction seems a likely fit with action research, as well as with the more normally-associated grounded theory. It appears flexible, measured, and iterative.

So I wonder why we have fallen into the binary approach of induction and deduction only?

Sam

References:

Bhaskar, R. (1979). The Possibility of Naturalism: A philosophical critique of the contemporary human sciences. The Harvester Press.

Blaikie, N. (1993). Approaches to Social Enquiry. Blackwell Publishers.

Burks, A. W. (1946). Peirce's Theory of Abduction. Philosophy of Science, 13(4), 301-306. https://www.jstor.org/stable/185210

Chaffers-Jones, R. (2006). Reflexivity and whole brain thinking: An exploration. [Doctoral Thesis, Sheffield Hallam University]. https://shura.shu.ac.uk/19436/1/10694317.pdf

Hartshome, S., & Weiss, P. (Eds.). (1960). Collected Papers of Charles Sanders Peirce (Vol. V Pragmatism and Pramaticism; Vol. VI Scientific Metaphysics, originally published 1934). The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.

Juicy_fish. (2025). Dusting free icon. Flaticon. https://www.flaticon.com/free-icons/clap

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Theory of Planned Behaviour

The theory of planned behaviour (TPB) aims to explain why we decide to act in certain ways. It sets out by 'assumes' that we will behave sensibly; that we will use the information available to us, and think carefully about the implications of our actions (Ajzen, 1991, 2005).

TPB is underpinned by three factors: our personal factors, our social influences, and how controlled we are (Ajzen, 2005):

• Our personal factors: our own feelings, which are our attitude towards a particular act. Our broad attitudes about organisations, people, or things are studied by social psychologists, but what about individual positive or negative evaluations of actions? Our behaviours are considered "overdetermined" as so, so many things combine to produce a particular action. For example, do we think of exercise as being good or bad? Helpful or harmful? Fun or a drag? And if we find exercise is enjoyable and makes us feel great, we are much more likely to keep doing it.
  
  
• Subjective norms/social influences to perform or not perform the behavior under consideration. This is what others think about what we do, and whether the opinions of others matter to us. If our friends, family, or community approve or disapprove of our behaviour, we may be less likely to continue - a perceived 'normative prescription'. If our norm group of friends at Uni think studying hard is cool, we are much more likely to study hard ourselves.
  
  
• Perceived behavioral control, or our sense of self-efficacy or ability to perform the behaviour. If we rate an action, and feel social pressure to do it, AND think we can deliver on it, when we "have the means and opportunities to do so" (Ajzen, 2005, p. 118). So if we think we can do something, we are much more likely to try. It might be our perception of how easy or difficult we think the act is. It might be understanding we have done an earlier version before, and this is just a bit harder. It might be that we have skills, resources, and opportunities to try something similar to a previous experience that we can translate our skills into. As a beginner cook, a family recipe, our memory, and a range of YouTube videos can enable us to make soup for the first time. We are likely to encounter difficulties, but will our mindset (Dweck, 2006) help us to overcome these or become blocked when we encounter them? Understanding the realistic constraints and how we may act is key.

These three TPB variables will help us understand what our intention is likely to be, and therefore how likely it is that we will act in an intended way. The relative weighting of the factors varies from one person to another, or from one population to another. Sometimes, only one or two of the factors are at play, while at others, all three are important. For some intentions our attitudes/personal factors feel more important than social norms, while for others, norms will provide the most influence. Perceived behavioral control is more important for some behaviours than for others, such as do our perceptions of behavioral control align to our actual sense of control? If so, we are more likely to see ourselves doing it, and actually get it done. Being able to measure each of these three factors should help us predict our intentionality. 

Sometimes our perceived behavioral control is not that realistic (often when we don't know much about a task!) and that is where the dotted arrow in the TPB diagram (accompanying this post) indicates that if our perceived behavioural control and our understanding of being able to deliver the act (i.e. actual behaviour; our actual control over our behaviour) do not align, we are unlikely to do behave regardless of our intention. We will be all talk and no trousers.

So TPB is where desire, norms and capability shape our intentions - our plan to act - and our intention then influences our actual behaviour. Poor intention without control leads to little to no action. Having a strong intention with a good sense of control means we are likely to act. 

So if we are in a big city and broke, we could decide to save money by walking to the next bus zone to decrease the fare (personal attitude), gaining exercise (societal norm), and saving money without it being too great a leap (perceived control). 

Sam

References:

Ajzen, I. (1991). The theory of planned behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 50(2), 179-211. https://doi.org/10.1016/0749-5978(91)90020-T

Ajzen, I. (2005). Attitudes, Personality and Behavior: Mapping social psychology (2nd ed.). Open University Press.

APCDA. (2025). Gunawan, W., Riasnugrahani, M., Budiwan, T. I., 112b Preparing for the Future: Exploring Employability and Entrepreneurship Antecedents of Uni Students [video]. APCDA Hybrid Conference 12-26 May 2025, Zheng Zhou Shi, China. https://asiapacificcda.vids.io/videos/ea91dbbf1f1de6c163/112b-preparing-for-the-future-exploring-employability-and-entrepreneurship-antecedents-of-uni-students

Dweck, C. (2006). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Baltimore Books.

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Slideshow options for android

I have been looking for a photo slideshow to run on my phone for a while so that I can show people selected images of overseas holidays, in an order which is not the date saved or created; but rather in the order of places we visited, or separate storylines. It is surprisingly difficult to find something which does this in a seamless way.

I tried SlideShow for Google Photos, but that doesn't work with albums (why on earth NOT???). So I uninstalled it and scrapped that idea.  

However, I have found that, if I go through all my images, and saved them to an album. I set up title images, and edited the dates to show the album in a particular order. 

Once that background work is done, there is a native slideshow within Google Photos works both on a phone and on a PC (though each one is a little different, and there is a bit of a trick to getting to the Slideshow menu option. 

1. On PC: Open the Google Photos album, then click on the first photo in the album and open it. Then, at the top-right corner, click the menu (i.e. the three dots); and select Slideshow. Use either the screen arrows or keyboard arrows to click through faster than the automatic timer (which I think is five seconds per image; Makvana, 2022). 
   
   
2. Android phone app: Open Google Photos, go to Collections. Click on the Albums tile, and find your desired album. Again, click on the first photo in the album and open it. Then, at the top-right corner, click the menu (i.e. the three dots); and scroll across to find and select Slideshow (Makvana, 2022). Swipe to move the slideshow along faster than the automatic 5 seconds/image.

I hope you find that useful!

Sam

References:

Makvana, M. (2022 March 4). How to Make a Slideshow on Google Photos. How-To Geek. https://www.howtogeek.com/783634/how-to-make-a-slideshow-on-google-photos/

* Image made with https://app.leonardo.ai/

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Literally figurative

It is interesting how often we understand the meaning of a saying - i.e., an analogy or metaphor - but forget about its literal meaning. Actually, sayings are - per se - interesting, whether we call them metaphors, aphorisms, analogies, maxims, similes, adages, witticisms, axioms, clichés, saws, epigrams, one-liners, proverbs, figures of speech, or idioms. And yes, I know these all have slight nuances in definition, but most of us would see these as being largely the same. And that 'same' is nicely epigrammed as "a crystallised summary of popular wisdom or fancy" (Apperson et al., 2006, p. 5).

How do these things arise? These are things which can be more broadly "understood in other than their literal significance" (Lurie, 1968, p. iii): pithy phrases which convey rich meaning in shorthand that captures the imagination of those who hear it. They grow from the literal to the figurative (Johnson, 2016).

However, that shorthand can also lead to overuse. And that changes our tolerance for such sayings, known as 'semantic satiation'. What a great term: this is where our sayings "become less meaningful as a [result of their] function of repetition" (Black, 2003, p. 63). The act of repeat after repeat after repeat means the sayings lose impact. Think of "All roads lead to Rome" (Apperson et al., 2006, p. 17) which has been flogged like the dead horse it is.

It is not only familiarity and time which changes our perspective. Over time meaning drifts as well, allowing us to apply a saying to a band of similar experiences, rather than simply describing the original event. For example, the "All roads lead to Rome" saying no longer means anything because Rome is no longer the centre of the known world. Or the aphorism "the canary in the mineshaft" once literally meant potentially sacrificing a canary by lowering a cage down the mineshaft, so if it came up alive, the miners knew the air was sweet below. The mine was safe for workers. However, today, "the canary" is not about a dead bird to show safety, but "the canary in the mineshaft [...] is a signal of danger[, ... an early warning] signal [...] that we need to take [something in our immediate environment] seriously" (Hollnger, 2021). More modern legal usage is where lawyers may see "the jury is the canary in the mine shaft; if it goes, if our people lose their inherited right to do justice in court, other democratic institutions will lose breath too" (Burns, 2007, p. 8).

Something we say, formed over time, usually began by describing a particular event, such as the "ring, a ring o' roses" rhyming child's ring dance, where increased knowledge of the plague and conspiracy theorists linked in the 20th century linked "the pocket full of posies" to the futile herb bundles we carried to ward off the black death, and "A-tishoo, a-tishoo, we all fall down" to the arrival of illness and the immediacy of death (Ferguson, 2018). But this is an etymological fallacy: it was always just a ring dance, and had nothing to do with the plague (Fergusson, 2018).

So sayings not only have drift due to time, saturation and fallacy, the speed of meaning drift may increase, too. It appears that our digital world may be a key driver here... and interestingly, the computer age has provided us with a great saying: "garbage in, garbage out" (Simpson, 1982, as cited by Speake, 2008).

Sam

References:

Apperson, G. L., Manser, M. H., Curtis, S. J. (2006). Dictionary of Proverbs (new ed.). Wordsworth Editions Ltd.

Black, S. R. (2004). Chapter 4: Review of Semantic Satiation. In S. P. Shohov (Ed.), Advances in Psychology Research (Vol. 26, pp. 63-74). Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

Burns, R. P. (2007). The Death of the American Trial. University of Chicago Press.

Gross, J. (1987). The Oxford Book of Aphorisms. Oxford University Press.

Grothe, M. (2008). I Never Met a Metaphor I Didn't Like: A Comprehensive Compilation of History's Greatest Analogies, Metaphors, and Similes. HarperCollins.

Hollnger, P. C. (2021, November 30). Why Physical Punishment Persists: Ignorance of early child development enables physical punishment. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/great-kids-great-parents/202111/why-physical-punishment-persists

Johnson, R. (2016). Understanding Sayings: Figuratively speaking. Crabtree Publishing Company.

Lurie, C. N. (1968). Everyday sayings: their meanings explained, their origins given. Gale Research Co.

Speake, J. (Ed.). (2008). The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs (5th ed.). Oxford University Press.

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Theory X and Theory Y

Maslow's work on his Hierarchy of Needs was transferred from psychology to management, where "Douglas McGregor [..] encountered it in 1944 and drew on it in developing his famous Theory X and Theory Y concept" (Bridgman et al., 2019, p. 84).

The basis of the theory is that Theory X managers takes an authoritarian approach, assuming their staff dislike work, are inherently lazy, requiring strict supervision and monitoring; while Theory Y managers are participatory, thinking their people love their work, are self-motivated and will thrive in a supportive, team environment (Daft, 2022).

• Theory X: Staff inherently dislike of work and will avoid it if they can; because staff don’t like work, most need coercion, controlling, directing, or the threat of punishment to make them deliver what the organisation needs; and staff prefer being told, don’t want responsibility, are not ambitious, and seek security more than anything else (Daft, 2022).
• Theory Y: Most staff like working: it’s as normal as rest or play; control and threatening punishment are not necessary to have staff work hard to meet organisational goals; staff can self-manage if they care about the goals they’re working on; most staff, if supported well, will take on, and seek responsibility; most staff are innovative and can problem-solve with imagination, ingenuity, and creativity if asked; and most staff talents “are only partially utilized” (Daft, 2022, p. 140).

This assumption - a philosophy of management, if we will - colours the approaches and decisions these managers take with their staff in a myriad of ways. A Theory X manager will manage staff with high control, low trust approach. They are likely to be more detailed about punctuality, breaks, and following the rules. A Theory Y manager is more likely operate a low control, high trust model. They will be more big picture about making the right product for the customer, and once targets are met, everyone celebrates.

We can find that a Theory X manager might be appropriate for new staff: a "telling" approach like the 1969 Hersey Blanchard life cycle theory of leadership (Blanchard & Hersey, 1996). However, once staff become more experienced, a manager who is between the X and Y types will allow more "participation" and can increase or relax control to suit the employee (Blanchard & Hersey, 1996). Then, once staff are very experienced, a manager can move to a Theory Y style: a "delegating" approach (Blanchard & Hersey, 1996). Perhaps we could think of McGregor's work less like two styles, and more like a continuum in shades of grey.

What I also find interesting is that Douglas McGregor took 16 years to formalise his thoughts from encountering Maslow's work in 1944, to formalising his theory in 1960 (Bridgman et al., 2019; Daft, 2022).

Sam

References:

Bridgman, T., Cummings, S., & Ballard, J. A. (2019). Who Built Maslow’s Pyramid? A History of the Creation of Management Studies’ Most Famous Symbol and Its Implications for Management Education. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 18(1), 81–98. https://doi.org/10.5465/amle.2017.0351

Blanchard, K. H., & Hersey, P. (1996). Great ideas revisited. Training & Development, 50(1), 42-48.

Daft, R. L. (2022). The Leadership Experience (8th ed.). Cengage Learning.

McGregor, D. (1960). The Human Side of Enterprise (1st ed.). McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc.

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Searching difficult sites

There are a few websites I use regularly which have poor search functions; or hardly any search function at all. Sometimes the search on those sites may be specific to a single section of the website architecture, or the search box may appear on only a few pages, 

However, there are a couple of ways to search those sites which have - often unintentionally - made it harder for us to find their stuff. 

Firstly, if I am wanting to search the page I am on, then I simply Crtl & F to bring up the Find window, and enter my search term in that. A quick enter should take me to the first instance of my entered search term on the page. Repeated enters will tab me through each of the next occurrences.

Secondly, there are a couple of sites where I need to find particular documents or sub-pages. Here I will entering a search string - like the two examples following - into my favourite search bar (DuckDuckGo at the moment): 

site:www.cate.co.nz Code of Ethics 

site:www.cate.co.nz "Code of Ethics"

We put "site:" followed by the website itself to identify the web domain (or a longer URL) we want to be searched, and then the search term we are seeking at that address. We can use quotes marks in the search string if we are looking for an exactly search term (i.e. exactly what is inside the double quote marks, including spaces). 

And between those two methods, I usually find that which I need.

Sam

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A meta-theory idea

I have been thinking about the difficulties those coming into career practice from the hard sciences or engineering have in bridging their thinking into the psychology/counselling theory space; from science to social science. Suddenly in career practice, 'theories' have a different flavour: they are not the more easily evidenced, readily observable, quite measurable facts, such as E=mc²; they are less solid, increasingly vague, more contextual attributes, such as "has a tendency to not complete when...".

Not only do we have this shift from solid to vague, but there are a number of theories where the concepts or components are similar. I think this is a meta-theory - a "theory about theory", which gives us a structure so we can think about the world around us, and to consider our "assumptions about the nature of reality, and of knowledge, that stand behind specific theories and the[...] concepts" those theories relate to (Given et al., 2023, p. 121). Effectively, meta-theories help us to see what assumptions we make, and how we might go about unpicking them to see how they really work (Edwards, 2008). The idea of meta-theories may help us find connections between psychology/industrial psychology/organisational behaviour, where career development sits, and the harder sciences. The meta-theories I began thinking about are relationship versus task (Ceri-Booms et al., 2017); and rationality versus emotionality (Daft, 2008). 

In the 1940s and 50s the organisational behaviour field begins researching behaviour theories in leadership: what behaviours we show, such as the Iowa Studies (Kurt Lewin) which considered the autocratic, democratic and laissez faire attributes of leadership; the Ohio State Studies (Harris Fleishman) exploring consideration & initiating structure; the University of Michigan Studies (Renis Likert) which looked at employee-centered, and job-centered attributes; and the University of Texas Blake & Mouton Leadership Grid (1964) which focused on concern for people versus concern for results (Daft, 2008). The meta-theory of the behaviouralists is task behaviours versus relationship behaviours (Ceri-Booms et al., 2017).

We can also consider leadership styles and theories on a continuum of rationality versus emotionality; where management is at the blue end of the spectrum, and charismatic leadership is at the red end. Charismatic leadership can be hot, emotional and may lack rationality. Transformational leadership styles, which are more relational styles, but are more rational than charismatic leadership may become, sit in the middle, in the lavender zone: neither hot nor cold. And of course, when we say 'rational' we know we are not actually rational; but imagined to be possibly closer to rational than emotional – and as shown in the image accompanying this post (Daft, 2008).

We end up with these vaguely similar ideas for many different theories, and perhaps meta-theory might give us more "overall coherency" (Edwards, 2008, p. ii); maybe being to aligned to a particular theory means we become "prisoners caught in the framework of our theories", and "that these conceptual prisons are self-made and that we need to find ways to 'break out' of them" (p. 1).

It is difficult research work to do, but many of us see the glimmer of similarity, even if we are unable to undertake the research. We know someone will crack that nut one day. And by finding the commonalities, we can think about a much larger picture - not the individual theory - and break our ideas free.

Here's to jailbreaking the scientists into the social sciences :-)

Sam

References:

Ceri-Booms, M., Curşeu, P. L., & Oerlemans, L. A. (2017). Task and person-focused leadership behaviors and team performance: A meta-analysis. Human Resource Management Review, 27(1), 178-192. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2016.09.010

Daft. R. L. (2008). The Leadership Experience (4th ed.). Thomson South-Western.

Edwards, M. G. (2008). An Integral Metatheory for Organisational Transformation. [Doctoral thesis, University of Western Australia]. https://api.research-repository.uwa.edu.au/ws/portalfiles/portal/3220635/Edwards_Mark_Gerard_2008.pdf

Given, L. M., Case, D. O., & Willson, R. (2023). Chapter 4: Metatheories, Theories, and Models. In Looking for Information: Examining Research on How People Engage With Information (pp. 121-178). Emerald Publishing Limited.

Tannenbaum, R. & Schmidt, W. (1973). How to Choose a Leadership Pattern. Harvard Business Review, 51(3), 162-180.

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