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4/03/2007

How do you feel about the last quarter?

This is how I feel:


Anyway... last week's visit by the Hong Kong Commissioner got me thinking about comparing living in the US and HK again. One of the reason that companies prefer HK to Shanghai and Beijing, alleged by the HK Commissioner, is that of human capital. Specifically, ex-pats prefer to be in Hong Kong. Why? Because of quality of life: convenience, safety, international city, good entry point before being totally East Asian, and education. The last point, in my opinion, will be most significant. International schools in HK are far superior to those in China, so it you're an ex-pat and you have family, you would prefer HK.

Sadly, local schools can't really compare and aren't of consideration for any ex-pats. Hong Kong's education system is still as screwed up as it was fifteen years ago. They don't know which language to teach in (despite research that has shown the clear benefit of mother tongue education), they don't know what to teach, they force feed facts rather than facilitate thinking, they focus on memory rather than application, etc etc. Fundamentals are good for most students, but if they are thrown into the real world, it takes time to adjust.

Managing in Organizations, Managerial Decision Making, and Power and Influence are three organizational behavior classes that are very similar. In fact, I think I can go to one and learn all three! I'm only taking MiO and PaI right now, but I think I'm going to audit MDM just to finish the holy trinity.

Monday in P and I: with power, you can send short and spell-check-less emails; focusing on one thing only often gives you illusions about your lack of power or knowledge, asking is power, power acquired unintentionally seems more powerful than those collected intentionally, there are situational reasons for many things rather than dispositional reasons.

Tuesday in M in O: all of the above (I tell you, the similarities are scary) + negativity dominance, actor/observer bias, confirmation bias, and omission neglect. The combined conclusion? The most incompetent people are the most overconfident. (This statement, by the way, may suffer from both confirmation bias and omission neglect!) Well well... I guess I am sometimes quite incompetent.

Yup, and that last statement is a direct result of confirmation bias. haha!

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