Government puts biologist in charge of broadband

What

So they want broadband so they put a biologist in charge

what next an unqualified failure in charge of education

they are judt being idiot tbh and need a reality check!

By Deathtaker27 on 19 Mar 2010

Who needs knowledge?

"the appointment of the head of broadband policy and programmes was made in line with the usual employment procedures in the civil service." I suppose that means all senior civil servants are employed on the basis of knowing very little about the area they are supposed to oversee...Somehow I am not surprised but I am saddened.

By miketoll on 19 Mar 2010

I suspect that most senior civil servants regard being a Bureaucrat as a skill wheras most people regard it as a disease.

By milliganp on 19 Mar 2010

what next an unqualified failure in charge of education"

Balls by name and Balls by nature. ;)

By james016 on 19 Mar 2010

Perhaps he's an expert on Viruses?

Someone misread the job spec!

By milliganp on 19 Mar 2010

Unqualified for his brief? Who isn't...

"the appointment... was made in line with the usual employment procedures in the civil service."

In fairness, employing someone completely unqualified to do highly paid and important government work DOES sound pretty standard these days.

All being equal, perhaps when those in government fall ill with some nasty communicable pathogen they'll call on the services of a web developer and a systems analyst to sort things out...

As for: "We asked BIS what those procedures are and how much Towler is being paid, but it refused to comment."

Can I smell a Freedom of Information Act 2000 request in the offing?

By Mr_John_T on 19 Mar 2010

Not necessarily a bad thing...

One of my brothers-in-law studied Chemical Biology at Oxford and he's now non-Executive Director in charge of IT and Communications at a rather large investment bank. Another one studied Physics (I forget the exact discipline) and he's a well-respected financial journalist - he just finished writing a guide to large-scale investments within Mexico (designed for governments and multi-national corporations). My two eldest sisters studied English at Oxford and one is a housewife (has been since the year after she graduated) and the other is a barrister, qualified-accountant and has sat on the boards of two NHS trusts and is currently a director of Shelter. My youngest sister (they're all still older than me, mind!) studied English and Psychology at Surrey and is now an accomplished translation specialist. My dad studied Advanced Mathematics and was a director at BT before retiring. He is now a part-time ICT technician in a school (as a job to keep him busy) and I'm his boss. As Network Manager, my degree was English and American Literature.

So, as long as he's good at his job, who cares what his qualifications are?

How about we actually see what he's like before jumping to conclusions? Or is that too much sanity to ask of forumites?

By bioreit on 19 Mar 2010

Another way

Or how about this: When Obama tabled his plans for revolutionsing the healthcare system in America, did people start questioning his competency in this particular field? I mean, he's not exactly a world-renowned doctor, or a shining light in the medical profession, is he?

All he needed to sort out the nitty-gritty details was a team of people around and below him who *did* know what they were talking about.

As long as Towler has a competent and knowledgeable team who can advise him, all they need from Towler is a strong, guiding hand and good leadership qualities.

I actually put forward the notion that having a department filled with and run purely by specialists of that particular field would run aground very quickly - technical people may not necessarily be very good at other aspects of such a job. I know my previous boss was amazing as a Network Manager, who knew everything about that network inside-out and back-to-front. But he didn't document anything, his people skills were bordering on non-existent and he could be rude and abrasive.

By bioreit on 19 Mar 2010

Missed point

@Bioreit
you seem to have missed the point that a journalist should never let facts or common sense get in the way of a good headline.

By kurtnielsen on 20 Mar 2010

bioreit, I understand your point, which is obvious enough, (I myself studied physics for example) but I think maybe you're over-simplifying it.

I assume that your brothers-in-law and your sisters didn't just wander in from getting their degrees/the bar and walk straight to the top of their current chosen fields - they came in at lower levels and worked their way up, gaining the required knowledge and experience over a period of time.

This chap has done the complete opposite, and with no knowledge or experience of this particular field has been placed in charge of it. Obviously the man at the top shouldn't need to know the minutiae of all beneath him, but a sound and basic general working knowledge should really be a must.

I think the point is that the civil service, (by their own reckoning) have approximately 532,000 people working for them. Ignoring the possibility of bringing in outside expertise for a moment, was there really no-one in that 532,000 strong group better suited to this role than a man with zero experience of it?

Your comparison to Obama doesn't really stack up, as to continue with that analogy, Towler is supposed to be the expert brought in by Obama, not be Obama himself.

Towler is demonstrably an intelligent man, but that's not the question or the point.

By Mr_John_T on 20 Mar 2010

And KurtNielsen, perhaps you should read an article further than the 'good headline' before criticising for a lack of facts and common sense - Perhaps even as far down as the example given of criticism for not being to articulate their own aims.

Still, mustn't let facts or common sense get in the way of a good insult...

By Mr_John_T on 20 Mar 2010

This is why I don't buy comics anymore... If I want a laugh I just ask "whats the goverment been up to".

By anthonysjones on 20 Mar 2010

Those people saying a Biologist cannot be a Head of Broadband policy assume that the Head of a Department spends most of his time doing nitty gritty technical work; they don't - they probably spend 80% of their time managing people, and the other 20% managing expectations of politicians.

What is important is that he can manage teams of people, and having a scientific and analytical background can quickly understand complex systems and manage the people who look after them.

As for whether he has any relevant expertise or not, as a manager his track record is exactly what one would expect for a senior civil service post: Oxbridge followed by various junior but progressively more senior posts in government departments.

By SwissMac on 20 Mar 2010

@ Mr_John_T

I was going to reply to your later post, but SwissMac has put the point I was going to make far more eloquently than I was going to.

I will, however, point out that in your first post you said "All being equal, perhaps when those in government fall ill with some nasty communicable pathogen they'll call on the services of a web developer and a systems analyst to sort things out..."

This is a complete (and I can only assume, deliberate) misunderstanding and miscomparison of those two types of situations: Towler is not being called in to personally come and fix consumers' broadband lines - he's not going to pull on some overalls and string some fibre down some pipes - expect in some god-awful PR photo-op. He's in charge of the people doing that, in the same way that the person(s) in overall charge of virologists working on the pathogen you mentioned would be people and business managers, rather than qualified doctors. If I was a patient in a hospital, I'd want to know that the doctors and nurses were qualified and experienced in their relevant fields and that the hospital bosses were qualified and experienced in theirs, not the other way around, as you seem to think this news article is saying it would be.

By bioreit on 20 Mar 2010

OK, before I answer, yes bioreit - I was being sarcastic in my first post! (Perhaps I shouldn't have been, but hey, it's too late for that now...).

I understand your and SwissMac's argument perfectly well, but I don't think you seem to have really appreciated mine.

All I'm saying is, however intelligent Mr Towler is, he doesn't have any working knowledge or experience of IT or telecoms, which when being put in his position would surely be something of a benefit - as up till now his department hasn't even been able to articulate their aims without tripping over themselves.

If they don't know what their aims are, how on earth are we supposed to have confidence in their ability to fulfil them?

One way or another, future broadband roll-out & expansion and the upgrading of current systems is going to cost our country billions, probably tens of billions of pounds. I personally would like the man in charge of deciding how that is going to take place to have a working knowledge of this field.

To be blunt, what he studied at university is of far less relevance to me than what he has done since.

Look at the private sector:
- You don't get put in charge of Marks and Spencer's without decades of retail experience.
- You don't take charge of a law firm without first having known and worked in law.
- The same can be said of engineering, manufacturing - pretty much everything.

It is seemingly only in government and government sponsored bodies that someone can take the lead in a sector they previously knew absolutely nothing about.

Likewise, Cabinet Ministers being 'promoted' from defence to education to health in the space of a few years or even months is ludicrous - it's no wonder every government time-scale and budget is always blown, as by the time the guy in charge has properly got to grips with his (or her) role, they get moved on!

You give the example of the chief execs of a hospital, well, personally, I think hospitals probably would be better run if those in charge actually knew a little more of medicine and patient care.

I understand the need for the characteristics both yourself and SwissMac listed, it just seems to me to defy belief that those same characteristics couldn't be found in someone with a good, solid industry background and relevant knowledge to go with them.

By Mr_John_T on 20 Mar 2010

One coin...

Although I wouldn't like to presume to speak on SwissMac's behalf, I believe that he and I, and yourself, are arguing from roughyl the same stance, only that we differ from yourself on the qualities we believe a government department head should possess.

Myself (and I think SwissMac has this point as well) believe that to be an effective head of a government department, you need first and foremost experience in being a senior civil servant, good managerial skills and other similar qualities, whereas you place technical expertise and personal experience of the particular field at the top of your list.

I don't have any experience of hospital management beyond some of my sister's grumblings, but I do have plenty of experience of schools (maybe I should hvae picked this first, then!) and I can tell you that in the main school I work in and the two others, time and again teachers are promoted to managerial positions and are worse than useless - even the ones who have 'relevant' qualifications and experience.

I would rather we had a Head who was a purely managerial person, rather than a career teacher, especially given that our Head does no teaching. I would also rather we had a Business Manager who was actually capable of running a business, rather than a Deputy Head who's been 'promoted' to get him out of the classroom.

Whoever the government appointed to run this department would need to be able to survive in the civil service environment from the get-go - an industry person would need a period of adjustment which would lead to huge delays for what I personally believe would be no real benefit. Towler is obviously adept at being in and leading different areas of government poilcy implementation, seeing as previously he was with aerospace and trade policy.

I still firmly believe that personal knowledge of the details of broadband technology is irrelevant to his job - as a consumer, he will have his own experiences of broadband in the UK, which as far as I'm concerned, is the only qualification he needs to know something needs to be done to sort it out!

By bioreit on 20 Mar 2010

Right. There is no correlation whatsoever between competence in a field and a job in government. This chap is obviously aiming for a role as a permanent secretary and is simply job hopping to build up experience.

His worth, or lack of, is irrelevant to his promotion prospects within government.

Senior civil servants are not promoted (or paid) on the basis of ability. This is why every level of government, form education to defence is the shambolic mess it is.

Not nice, not pleasant, but true.

Hell, the board of OFCOM are a bunch of jobs for the boys wasters sitting on a quango costing millions and providing nothing whatsoever except to ensure BT don't have to do anything.

By bubbles16 on 20 Mar 2010

The Missing Link here is...

what happens when you put Comp Sci graduates in charge of things? I used to do induction training of the graduates in a tres posh Merchant Bank and the Comp Scis were lethal: forever burbling on about the invalid Backus-Naur score of the Timesheet system, or machine-coding things on the VAX. The only way to make them productive was to keep them OFF technology subjects ALTOGETHER.

By Steve_Cassidy on 21 Mar 2010

Bubbles16

"Right. There is no correlation whatsoever between competence in a field and a job in government."

See, problem there is that "competence in a field" is only *your* own very personal and narrow definition of that field. Yes, according to PC Pro's article, he has no vast technical expertise within the arena of broadband technology. But he has what appears to be decades of experience in government, at least one of which was a senior position. Seeing as he's heading up a *government policy programme*, I'd bloomin' well hope he was "competent" in the "field" of working in a government environment.

And as I said before, if he's experienced UK ISP broadband before, as far as I'm concerned, that's all the qualification and competency he needs in that particular aspect of it.

By bioreit on 21 Mar 2010

Different priorities...

Hi bioreit,

You said: "I believe that he and I, and yourself, are arguing from roughly the same stance, only that we differ from yourself on the qualities we believe a government department head should possess."

And I think that's a fair call.

I think my main point is that someone put in charge of something as big, important and expensive as this should have BOTH skill sets - that is proven senior managerial and co-ordination skills AND intimate industry knowledge and expertise in the relevant field.

You are saying that the leadership skills should be enough on their own, whereas I don't feel the two abilities are, (or should be) mutually exclusive - hence I think the man in charge should have both from the offset.

Sure, an intelligent individual will be able to pick up the requisite specialist knowledge over time, but wouldn't life be that much easier and more productive if someone had just been able to come in and hit the ground running?

Anyone in charge of rolling out broadband for a private enterprise, (such as Virgin or BT for example) will not only have extensive working knowledge of the field, but will also have extensive knowledge of management too - and while managing the civil service will no doubt be slightly different from managing a private department or company, I just think it's less of a leap than moving from aerospace or an embassy job to telecoms.

Personally, if the civil service couldn't find the perfect candidate internally, I think they should have poached him from private industry, rather than just go for the best they had available from their own pool.

Regardless, we've got him now so us talking about it doesn't change things!

We all want him to excel, so even if some of us aren't overly happy with the choice, let's just wish him the best of luck and hope he does a good job...

(He could even start by making sure his new department adheres to the principles of these guys: www.plainenglish.co.uk)

By Mr_John_T on 22 Mar 2010

Competent support

@bioreit
You have hit the crux of the matter. The manager needs to manage and his support needs the expertise. As an engineer and ex-civil servant I saw the inside workings. Ever since the days of Margaret Thatcher the Civil Service has been trying to slim down by getting rid of people. The administrators selected those to go so professional expertise went first. Administrators have to be on top and expertise they believe should be "on tap not on top". The Health Service IT debacles illustrate the result. There are not enough experts left in the Civil Service to specify the technical requirements so administrators give inadequate briefs to external consultants who at great cost produce the answer to the requirement. This however bears little relation to the need.

By misceng on 25 Mar 2010

cengprofessional

Another instance of government sleaze - give jobs to friends and acquaintances no matter whether they are qualified or not. IT is now so complex that even professionals need to specialise - if this guy tries to achieve an understanding sufficient to do his job it will (hopefully) blow his brains out.

By cengprofessional on 25 Mar 2010

Non IT/Telecomms = better end-user perspective?

By not being an IT or telecomms "expert", may we be getting someone with a better end-user perspective on delivering effective broadband services? A country like ours should be at the top of the league in providing Broadband services to its citizens. Over to you Mr. Towler - please prove me right!

By Gz_mags2mk669ed0 on 25 Mar 2010

Non IT/Telecomms = better end-user perspective?

By not being an IT or telecomms "expert", may we be getting someone with a better end-user perspective on delivering effective broadband services? A country like ours should be at the top of the league in providing Broadband services to its citizens. Over to you Mr. Towler - please prove me right!

By Gz_mags2mk669ed0 on 25 Mar 2010