I shall look very carefully then John!

I am going to have to approach this in a more sombre manner with a link to yesterday afternoon’s conference on YouTube.

https://youtu.be/UTnsMn9yMnY

PS.I still wonder who chose the music, not that I am criticising, it’s a bit lively than expected.

I highly recommend that you watch this on YouTube.You may wish to watch it in sections to absorb the detail. Dame Judith Hackett presentation was outstanding and her response to questions  was more so. The IETs President Air Marshall Sir Julian Young presentation and answers to questions from the audience set out the professional views of the IET in detail and in particular the need for individual competence and accountability in our industry. 

I have only got halfway through but thus far I would not share JPs view. I found the delivery disjointed and boring. All the while a voice in my head was trying to persuade me that I had better things to do. I recognise that I am being churlish but if this is the IETs idea of reaching out to busy professionals, it’s likely to be a struggle to get their attention.

By the way, if PowerPoint slides are to be used, talking over the wording does not make for clear communication.
Read the slide word for word by all means and then discuss the points.

 I am generally on side with the direction of travel in terms of competence but after 30years wearing a part-time tutors hat, I am convinced that the key imperative that drives the need for competence is necessity rather than persuasion.

I'm also only part way through the video so I might not have heard the fully story yet, but I must confess to some uneasiness...

It seems to me that the basic problem is that of 'abstract management' - i.e. those who decide if things are right or not (usually) don't actually understand the basic principles or details of the thing they're dealing with themselves, so can't exercise their own judgement about it - instead they rely on 3rd parties to supply all the necessary information and simply say it's OK if they are in possession of sufficient quantities of bit of paper (physical or electronic) which say "OK" on them. That would be all well and good if all the bits of paper had reliable information on them ... but clearly they don't. We've all seen enough 'drive-by' EICRs, or green PAT stickers on things with broken c.p.c.s. or completely fabricated CE certificcates from the Far East to know that's the case. Even bit of paper that are of themselves correct and accurage, they can get mis-interpreted because the abstract management technique doesn't require those in charge to understand the differences and subtleties between different products or situations. Like the "Qualified Electrician" and a 10kVA 3-phase UPS without a local means of Earthing  - turns out the qualifications where basically that of a Domestic Installer and he knew nothing about on-site generation - but it got the "qualified" box ticked.

As far as I can tell, everyone involved in Grenfell was in possession of bit of paper that said that their bit was OK. Any suggestions to the contrary could then be dismissed as there was "proof" that everything was satisfactory. Administrative procedure trumps common sense.

If the basic problem is blindly relying on bits of paper, I'm not that sure than introducing yet another layer of paper (whether certifying people or products) is a sure fire solution...

   - Andy.