Blog entry #3

The World is Flat Blog #3

The last 1/3 of the book discusses the following three subjects; Developing Countries and the Flat World, Companies and the Flat World and Geopolitics and the Flat World and the conclusion: Imagination.
Developing Countries and the Flat World discusses mainly China vs. the rest of the developing countries and mainly focusing on Mexico. The chapter discusses how the growth of China Vs the United States is based around this one quote from the Chinese, and reads; first we were afraid of the Wolf, then we wanted to dance with the Wolf, now we want to be the Wolf.” China has had such amazing growth in the flat world compared to the other countries that is has taken on producing some of the most imported products of Mexico such as toys and most importantly it has even taken over the manufacturing of Mexico’s prided statue The Virgin of Guadalupe. After the statue they went after the production of the lantern of Ramadan that Egyptian children carry around from house to house collecting candy like the American children do for Halloween.
China has managed in their decision to develop to get three main basic things right; the infrastructure to connect more of your there people with the flat world platform, from cheap labor to cell phones, the right education to get more of their people innovating and collaborating on the flat-world platform; and the right governance, from fiscal policy to the rule of law-to manage the flow between the people and the flat-world platform in the most productive way possible. (The World is Flat, Thomas Friedman p. 398). This is where they have outperformed the other countries like; Mexico, Egypt, North Korea the rest of Latin America.
Where this falls into the education discussion is that China is much more proactive in getting their people a good education by helping students to come to the US to study, where as Mexico is missing the boat on furthering their student’s education. So Chinese students are much better prepared to take on the changing world and keep up with innovation.
Companies and the Flat World is the next section and it talks about how small companies may not be able to outsource they may need to be able to do it all in house to cut expenses for their customers. Now that everyone has the same tools available to them thanks to the internet you have instead be the more creative one in order to keep your clients. It is the goal of the small company to now look big as the book says “and the small act big…. .One way in which these small companies can look big is by taking advantage very quickly of all the new tools for collaboration to reach farther quicker, wider and deeper. The big companies can compete is to sometimes look small like Starbucks has done where they let the customer decide what they want to drink offering the customer a “buffet “ of choices made up by the customer. The customer gets that homey feeling with their choices and the atmosphere of Starbucks coffee shops. Another way big companies can look small is by giving their customers the choice of customizing exactly what features and price they want to pay. Referred to in the book as “self-directed consumer”. “Big companies can act small by making their customers look big.”
The next section entitled “Geopolitics and the Flat World”. Globalization and culturalization, the internet allows all countries to post about their cultures, “uploading makes possible the globalization of the local”. This allows people worldwide to have the tools to create and unload their own content, their own countries news reports, their own opinions, their own music their own software. Friedman compares this freedom of expressing your culture to that of a pizza, where each country has its own toppings on their pizza; Japan has sushi, Bangkok, Thai. “The flat world is the pizza dough. It allows different cultures to season and flavor it as they like.”
People in India and China will now be able to innovate rather than having to emigrate, so local culture has a much better chance of being preserved. The internet allows for more people for example students to stay right in their home countries and get an education instead of having to travel to America.
In the conclusion Friedman talks about the negative aspects that the internet has brought to this country. The use of the internet for terrorism recruiting and communication and that like many things in this world that evil people find a way to make just about anything into a tool for mass destruction. And the computer has become their new source; from broadcasting beheadings as a scare tactic to communication and purchasing supplies for their terrorist plots. That is where once again we as parents and teachers come into play that we need to try and help our children to use the computer in a positive manner rather than to get caught up in some of the negative plots that are now being fabricated on the net.

The World is Flat part 2

The World is Flat
The second part of the book “The World Is Flat” is equally as interesting as the first part. Mr. Friedman the author talks about the “triple convergence” along with so many things but I just want to touch on a few that directly pertain to us as teachers and to our students. One is the fact that in order to stay competitive in both research and our students as it pertains to the job market that we need to direct our children and our students to become more technology savvy and to encourage a few more of our students to become scientists and mathematicians. He also talks about the CQ + PQ > IQ concept.
The triple convergence the first being collaboration where the web has allowed individuals, groups, universities and companies to come together and mutually benefit from each other for the purpose of innovation, education, production, research, entertainment etc. He used the example where Southwest airlines teamed up with us the consumer to be able to purchase and download our own tickets and this mutually benefits us by not having to take our precious time waiting in line to get our tickets and boarding passes and benefits the airlines because this cuts down on the need for employees to do this job. Convergence two, the introduction of the computer to speed up processes, but this couldn’t happen until employees learned how to use the various programs and the manufacturers had to update their plants in order to keep up with the increase in orders. The third convergence was the entering in of other countries who now had more access and could be more competitive with the U.S. Students in India were getting more educated and could take over jobs in their country that would be considered low wage here in the U.S. but were ok wages in India.
The next topic discussed in the book involved the fact that a lot of U.S. jobs are being taken away because of outsourcing to other countries. But in replacement we have new companies starting up here in the states that will offer employees new opportunities to come work for these companies. Friedman talks about we are also inventing or producing new items so there is a constant new opportunity for students to find work here in the U.S... The Internet has streamlined our jobs so that more people can do research and then this leaves more time for action on that research.
Where we as teachers come in to play is that we need to be encouraging our students both male and female to become interested in the math and sciences so that we can have our own researchers and scientists here in America who can compete with people of other countries as far as inventions upgrading etc. that is mainly taking place in other countries like Russia, China and India. It use to be the big cities were big employers of manufacturing plants that people could work at, now they are being replace by big medical facilities and technology hub our students have to be prepared to have the skills and knowledge to work in these new companies or else the jobs will go to students from other countries who have been working on those skills. Our technology and other inventions have been on a steady decline; where as the other countries are on a steady climb to the top. We need to be the ones as Steve Jobs of Apple computer puts it “to invent the next new thing” which in this case he was referring to the iPod, and not wait for our competitor companies to beat us to the punch.
The CQ + PQ > IQ concept stands for curiosity + passion for learning is greater than intellect. Our students have to have a certain amount of curiosity and passion to be lifelong learners and not just be very intelligent or great students. Students now more than ever need to want to discover new things and be self-educators and self-motivators so that they are just relying on what their teachers and parents are teaching them. So we as teachers need to develop that burning desire in our student’s not just complacency to just get s job.

The World is Flat

The World Is Flat is a an interesting book that discusses the fact that we are as a culture are becoming more dependent on our computers to survive and mostly to be competitive in our ever changing world. The first part of the book discusses how companies like IBM, HP, and Texas Instruments are moving their businesses to other countries like India where they can run their businesses cheaper through less payroll costs knowledgeable staff, and then communicate with their offices here in the States and elsewhere through the internet. The next part of the book discusses how large comapnies such as UPS an others, and how even Physicians offices, CPA's etc. are using computers and the internet to do a lot of outsourcing to other countries. The author talks about companies like McDonald's who don't take their business offices to other countries, but they cut theor payroll costs by computerizing their drive thru line so that all orders go through a call center, which is located elsewhere in the U.S. And how large companies such as Wal-Mart and especially UPS are using computers and the vast internet services for insourcing, in order to outpace and out perform their competition.

It didn't surprise me that large companies moved their offices to other countries to save labor costs because that has been happening for a while where it pertains to the manufacture of clothing, toys, etc.,but it did surprise me and I found it interesting that doctor's offices use the internet to send tests such as MRI's that are done after hours to a country like India, who have employees who read and write up a report on the MRI then download it and send it right back to the doctor who is able to get up in the morning and get the test results all while he was sleeping and with the time zone change the reader on the other side is working in the day. This also happens in the CPA's office where they may outsource thousands of tax returns to a compnay in India who prepares the returns and then electronically sends them back to the CPA firm allowing the firm to work on many clients at once.

Wal-mart was one of the pioneers of using computers to determine exactly what has been sold every hour, reorder the item and get the store replenished in a matter of days. Which can be very profitible during the holiday season.

UPS is even more amazing they are so far ahead of the game. They now have a new slogan which read: "Your World Synchronized". not only do they make sure that all packages that are shipped through their company are tracked and delivered on time bu they now run a lot smaller comapnies shipping programs. One example that I found especially interesting is how they have cut the costs for Toshiba's laptop repair service. As part Toshiba's warranty repair service, customers were told to drop off their laptop at a UPS station, UPS would send it to Toshiba who would repair the laptop, and send it back to the consumer using UPS. That was a lot of days spent in transit leaving the consumer without their computer. UPS instead now send the computer to their own repair shop where a technician repairs it and then UPS delivers the computer right back to the consumer in many less days.

This book is very interesting and got me thinking about how important it will be for us as teachers to make sure we become knowledgeable about computers ourselves so that we can teach our own students. This will help them to be more competitive in the job market instead of giving the jobs to employees in other countries. More students will own computers in the future especially students in foriegn countries, if we don't keep up with the rest of the world we are going to have fewer jobs available to our children here in the U.S. As parents we need to encourage our children to go into the engineering, computer science and other tech jobs so that we can ensure that they can become successful and marketable in the future when they are out looking for jobs.

The World Is Flat