A World of Change (Part 3): Commodities, Quality, and the Human Element

One technical writer in the recent debate about offshoring, quality, and job transition stated that the change of jobs from being a specialty to a commodity labor was not new. "Commoditization is a fact of business and life. Its the reason DVD players cost $50.00 now instead of $1000 as they did in 1996. Its also the reason why tech writers get $30 now an hour instead of the $65 they got in 1998. Everything, including labor, gets commoditized and becomes less-expensive per unit. "

I think I would agree with that statement in terms of education, with a few exceptions. Here are some:

1 - Textbooks: It seems the cost of texts has only increased over time.
2 - Tuition and Fees: If competition brings down prices, it hasn't done that in higher ed.
3 - Multimedia: Though media duplication has become very inexpensive, the cost of producing and developing education multimedia is still very high. What's the rumored quote that is always tossed around $40,000 for every 1 hour of multimedia training. That has stayed about the same for several years, despite increases in software, hardware, and drops in duplication costs.

One writer was not convinced that commoditization is such a good thing, saying "when you remove the humanity from the product, you get a commodity and the quality goes down."

Other writers argued that commoditizing does not always mean lowering the standard of quality. In some cases, it may improve the standard.

"...cars are about as "commoditized" as you can get--yet their quality in terms of durability and safety is far, far above what it was only a decade or so ago. Good kitchen knives and cookware--which until recently was beyond the reach of those with average income, ditto. Flashlight batteries, computers and computer components...
True, many things suffer from commoditization. We have not yet found a way to "de-humanize" writing (thank God!) or the creation of art..."

And lastly, "I believe that what many folks are truly upset about is not so much the commoditization that has allowed an increase in the standard of living for millions, but the *depersonalization* that so often accompanies it."

Is there a balance in all this? How far should humans be pushed out of education, and where do we cross the line where de-humanizing or depersonalizing something takes away more than it benefits?

A World of Change (Part 2): Education Services as Commodities?

Continuing from the San Jose Mercury Times article Caught in the pull of globalization,

"...many executives, economists and academics say that offshoring jobs ultimately helps American companies compete in a global economy, especially in tight economic times. And companies say that to stay competitive, they have no choice but to hire the low-cost labor available.

'In business, there are only two levers: the cost side and the revenue side. Since the economy is not improving, you redirect your cost. There's no other way,'' said Ajit Gupta, chief executive and co-founder of Santa Clara-based Speedera Networks."

Competing in the education sector, balancing costs and revenues is just as tricky. University administrators all over the US are trimming budgets, cutting costs, and trying to deal with ever decreasing financial support. I imagine that they haven't overlooked distance education, independent study, and replacing faculty with lower paid employees as options for meeting their financial obligations.

"'It has always been the trend that as soon as technology products and services become commodities, then they face competition from overseas producers,' said Steve Cochrane, senior economist at Economy.com. 'The American economy and the global economy have been going through this transformation ever since the 1960s, at least.'"

And what of educational products and services? Can education be reduced to commodities, quantifiable subunits that are exchanged and inserted when and wherever needed. Until the last few decades, most instructional technologists and educators would probably have said no.

A World of Change (Part 1): Offshoring and Job Transition

A recent heated debate (see it all in the Nov.2003 archives) on a technical writing discussion list has raised a lot of thoughts in my mind about globalization, economics, and how professions change over time in individual and global ways. The debate which lasted for the good part of a week exposed many different views and opinions. The catalyst of the exchange was an article that appeared in the San Jose Mercury Times, Caught in the pull of globalization, reporting what many people and corporations think of the trend to send technical jobs overseas to cheaper labor markets such as India and China.

Many who responded on the discussion list had bitter feelings about it like those in the article. The tech writing industry has been hit very hard, some people complaining of unemployment that has lasted months and even years. For those personally affected by the decline in jobs, the resentment was obvious.

Although this article is mostly about programmers and other high-tech employees, I think it has relevance to TNE and the rapid changes that are taking place in education worldwide.

Summarizing the division, "On one side are American workers in Silicon Valley and elsewhere who feel anger, fear and profound uncertainty as white-collar tech jobs quickly move to lower-cost countries...

On the other side are business executives and economists who argue that the offshoring of jobs is unstoppable and ultimately healthy for the United States, spurring this country to shed certain jobs and create more sophisticated ones in order to stay atop the ladder of innovation. The shift of tech work overseas is just the latest chapter in decades of globalization, they argue."

This was a source of considerable debate for writers, some agreeing that the shift was good overall for the economy, others saying the promised job creation is not happening. With so much work going on with learning objects, instructional automatization, and electronic methods for delivering and duplicating courses, where do you think educators stand on this? I've met more than one professor out there who believed that contributing their intellectual property to an online course makes them obsolete. What do we need the professor for if we have the content and a cheaper Teaching Assistant can take the class?

How would administrators look at this? Does "Shedding certain jobs and creat[ing] more sophisticated ones" work here? It is happening, and many educators are going to be faced with this shift. The transition from the knowledge owner to the knowledge guide is a reality, but not something that sits well with a lot of educators.