Is it time sociology started researching incompetence?

Key Question Being Explored in This Insight:

There appears to be a mismatch between apparent incompetence in the world and the amount of sociological research it attracts. Edmund Chattoe-Brown outlines a sociology of incompetence.

View the page of: Edmund Chattoe-Brown

Institution: University of Leicester

Explore more insights in:

Social Sciences Sociology

Media Literacy Toolkit

Faculti's Media Literacy Toolkit helps viewers critically engage with academic insights by analyzing the research context, identifying perspectives, and encouraging thoughtful evaluation.

Critical Questions to Consider ▼

What assumptions does the research make?
Are there alternative perspectives not explored?
What are the limitations of the research method?

Bias and Perspective Awareness ▼

This research comes from University of Leicester . Reflect on how the institution's academic focus and research partnerships may shape the questions being explored.

Further Reading ▼

Read the Study

There appears to be a mismatch between apparent incompetence in the world and the amount of sociological research it attracts. Edmund Chattoe-Brown outlines a sociology of incompetence.

Image courtesy of interviewee. March 25, 2024

Log-in or Sign-up to Faculti
Currently viewing this subject insight as a guest. You have insight(s) remaining for this month. Login to view 8000+ figures on the platform.

Generating Workspace...

Export as PDF

This video video discusses the complexities of defining and assessing incompetence in various contexts, emphasizing that the perception of incompetence is often subjective and influenced by implicit standards. The speaker reflects on how incompetence is challenging to measure and how it can stem from external factors, such as unforeseen circumstances, rather than individual failure.

There is a focus on the difficulties of researching incompetence, as people tend to conceal their own shortcomings due to stigma, making survey data unreliable. The speaker proposes looking into existing data sources, such as official complaints and whistleblower reports, as potential insights into incompetence. Additionally, they suggest conducting experimental research to observe reactions to intentional incompetence in controlled settings.

This video video also highlights the broader societal implications of incompetence, including the significant effects of poor practices in fields like journalism and education, which may not be as visible as critical failures in areas like healthcare. The speaker calls for increased research to better understand incompetence and to develop systems for accountability and improvement across various professions. Overall, they aim to establish practical strategies to reduce incompetence in various fields by learning from high-profile failures and implementing better standards of accountability.

Language:

Export as PDF

X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

00:00.025 --> 00:02.805
The flippant answer is that nobody seems to be quite sure.

00:03.465 --> 00:06.725
Um, my answer is that you can get quite a long way

00:06.985 --> 00:09.525
by thinking of it as performance relative to a standard.

00:10.265 --> 00:11.885
Um, that's easy to understand.

00:11.905 --> 00:15.485
For something like packing up glassware, you can see

00:15.485 --> 00:16.645
how fast other people do it

00:16.645 --> 00:18.285
and then compare it with how fast

00:18.925 --> 00:20.365
a particular person can do it.

00:20.985 --> 00:23.885
It gets trickier when it's something like an organization,

00:24.345 --> 00:28.965
how effectively do an insurance company process insurance

00:28.965 --> 00:31.285
claims, how many mistakes get made,

00:31.345 --> 00:33.485
how many claims get the wrong determination.

00:34.105 --> 00:36.205
Um, and then when you add in things like power

00:36.265 --> 00:38.845
and secrecy, it can get really difficult.

00:39.145 --> 00:42.605
So to what extent was the horizon,

00:44.705 --> 00:47.045
fan of worms, a matter of incompetence

00:47.785 --> 00:51.165
or of kind of politicking or greed or whatever it is?

00:51.165 --> 00:52.245
So it can get really tricky,

00:52.465 --> 00:55.165
but that'll do for startles that'll kind of get you going

00:55.355 --> 00:57.805
with, with trying to research the topic is

00:57.805 --> 01:00.685
what is the standard and when do people meet it

01:00.685 --> 01:01.765
or fail to meet it?

01:02.145 --> 01:04.445
It took the reviewers of the article to help me

01:04.445 --> 01:07.365
to realize this, for which I'm very grateful,

01:07.675 --> 01:12.565
that these standards are very rarely objective set as it

01:12.565 --> 01:13.965
as it were by machines.

01:14.075 --> 01:16.845
They always require interpretation.

01:17.505 --> 01:21.245
Uh, unless you are doing a really mechanical job,

01:21.795 --> 01:24.325
there's always gonna be a certain amount of interpretation.

01:24.325 --> 01:27.165
There are gonna be things that aren't written down,

01:27.445 --> 01:28.645
standards that aren't written down.

01:29.265 --> 01:32.365
Um, and then somebody is going to have to say, well,

01:32.365 --> 01:34.845
you were incompetent based on the way we

01:34.845 --> 01:35.885
do things round here.

01:36.305 --> 01:38.405
Um, you may not have been incompetent in terms

01:38.405 --> 01:40.885
of the written rules, but you were

01:40.885 --> 01:43.285
nonetheless incompetent by the prevailing standards

01:43.585 --> 01:44.925
and people can then respond.

01:45.465 --> 01:47.885
Um, it wasn't made clear to me what the goals were.

01:48.225 --> 01:50.605
It wasn't made clear to me what the hidden agenda was.

01:51.105 --> 01:55.405
So I can't be responsible for failing to perform according

01:55.425 --> 01:58.325
to these standards that weren't, weren't made clear to me.

01:59.025 --> 02:01.285
Uh, so again, the the devil is in the details.

02:01.585 --> 02:05.445
Um, it starts off looking like a fairly simple animal,

02:05.865 --> 02:07.605
but if we actually look at accusations

02:07.625 --> 02:09.685
and counter accusations of incompetence,

02:09.685 --> 02:12.525
it rapidly gets quite complicated

02:12.585 --> 02:14.645
and subjective, potentially subjective.

02:14.985 --> 02:18.485
We notice the really disastrous cases when bridges fall down

02:18.545 --> 02:19.765
and patients die.

02:20.385 --> 02:24.485
Um, but I suspect probably it's important everywhere.

02:24.825 --> 02:26.805
The difficulty is it's not equally visible.

02:27.465 --> 02:30.725
So what's the, what's the cost

02:30.725 --> 02:32.485
of poor journalism, for example?

02:32.825 --> 02:35.285
How much does that affect our society when people

02:35.345 --> 02:36.525
report things that aren't true?

02:37.265 --> 02:40.125
Um, what's the cost of bad universities?

02:40.385 --> 02:41.525
Bad academic training.

02:42.115 --> 02:44.325
They're not as obvious as people dying

02:44.345 --> 02:45.605
or bridges falling down.

02:45.665 --> 02:49.245
But the effects can be, can be pretty much incalculable.

02:49.405 --> 02:52.365
I mean, how much harm can a bad teacher do over the years

02:52.365 --> 02:54.845
putting off students, not allowing them

02:54.865 --> 02:56.565
to get reach their full potential?

02:56.785 --> 02:58.605
Um, I think this is one of the reasons I want

02:58.605 --> 03:00.805
to explore the topic, not just for its own interest,

03:00.905 --> 03:04.125
but to get some sense of just what the cost might be.

03:04.635 --> 03:06.645
It's a bit of an oddity in the sense that

03:06.645 --> 03:08.725
what academics are supposed to do is they're supposed

03:08.725 --> 03:10.085
to start with a literature review.

03:10.705 --> 03:12.725
And I tried that and it worked really badly

03:13.155 --> 03:16.965
because, a lot of people use in competence

03:17.685 --> 03:19.285
without really knowing what they're talking about.

03:19.295 --> 03:22.205
There are a whole bunch of medical, uses

03:22.205 --> 03:24.485
of incompetence like incompetent cervix,

03:24.495 --> 03:27.205
which affects your ability to give birth,

03:27.425 --> 03:29.005
and incompetent to plead in court.

03:29.545 --> 03:30.805
So I thought what I'm, what I'm gonna have

03:30.805 --> 03:32.045
to do is I'm gonna have to step back

03:32.045 --> 03:33.645
and I'm gonna have to say, well, how do people

03:34.205 --> 03:36.605
actually use this term somewhere

03:36.605 --> 03:38.645
where it matters somewhere sociological?

03:39.385 --> 03:42.525
So the reason I scrap the British Journal of Sociology is

03:42.525 --> 03:43.805
because it's a good quality journal.

03:44.075 --> 03:45.165
It's a general journal.

03:45.425 --> 03:48.205
So if people are doing incompetence research,

03:48.305 --> 03:49.405
it should be visible there.

03:49.825 --> 03:52.125
Um, and I thought, well, we have

03:52.125 --> 03:54.085
to start from absolute first principles.

03:54.105 --> 03:57.325
So what can we learn by what people say about the word?

03:57.865 --> 03:59.405
And then maybe we can go on

03:59.405 --> 04:00.685
to do a proper literature review.

04:01.105 --> 04:04.845
And it was nice to have my hypothesis confirmed

04:05.315 --> 04:08.525
that this is not really a topic of research in sociology,

04:08.985 --> 04:12.405
but it was also interesting to see just how unformed

04:13.365 --> 04:15.205
people's ideas were about incompetence.

04:15.825 --> 04:19.605
So peer review is supposed to ensure a certain quality of,

04:19.905 --> 04:21.925
research published,

04:22.545 --> 04:24.445
and yet there were people calling each other names.

04:25.225 --> 04:27.405
So a significant fraction of my sample were,

04:27.405 --> 04:30.325
were just unjustified accusations of incompetence

04:30.825 --> 04:34.365
to the government, to organizations, one scholar by another.

04:35.025 --> 04:37.765
And I was kind of like, surely peer review is supposed

04:37.765 --> 04:38.805
to get rid of this stuff.

04:39.025 --> 04:41.245
You, you shouldn't have random name calling.

04:42.105 --> 04:45.965
Um, so my, my basic working hypothesis was confirmed.

04:45.995 --> 04:49.485
Most people use this word as if it's obvious what it means.

04:49.865 --> 04:51.845
And actually, I'm not sure it is so obvious.

04:52.665 --> 04:56.045
Um, but then more interesting things came up in the details.

04:56.785 --> 05:01.255
So for example, the idea of attribution,

05:02.275 --> 05:03.975
you assume somebody's incompetent

05:03.975 --> 05:05.095
because something has gone wrong.

05:05.795 --> 05:08.295
So for example, somebody turns up for a meeting, you say,

05:08.295 --> 05:09.775
they're, they're incompetent.

05:10.475 --> 05:12.575
Um, but actually the train was late,

05:13.235 --> 05:14.535
so they're not incompetent.

05:14.535 --> 05:17.175
The railway company potentially is incompetent,

05:17.795 --> 05:20.655
but maybe the train broke down and that was unavoidable.

05:21.275 --> 05:23.855
So maybe nobody's incompetent, they're just unlucky.

05:24.555 --> 05:28.575
So how we establish reasonably that somebody has

05:29.405 --> 05:32.055
behaved in competently again, is not so simple.

05:32.755 --> 05:36.095
We have to make sure we don't just jump to conclusions about

05:36.095 --> 05:37.175
what other people have done

05:37.235 --> 05:38.895
and should have done and so on and so forth.

05:39.515 --> 05:41.055
Um, so that would be one example,

05:41.075 --> 05:45.415
but that was a very small sample of the whole population.

05:45.415 --> 05:49.375
That was just one kind of flash of insight in a sea of sort

05:49.375 --> 05:50.455
of sloppy usage.

05:51.475 --> 05:52.775
So the plan now is to try

05:52.775 --> 05:55.095
and do the proper literature review with a bit more kind

05:55.095 --> 05:56.775
of information and try and figure out

05:56.775 --> 05:57.775
What I missed.

05:58.185 --> 06:01.405
Um, but it's interesting that this phrase is so widely used

06:01.405 --> 06:02.605
and so little understood.

06:03.155 --> 06:05.645
Well, this was something that was occupying me a lot,

06:05.885 --> 06:07.445
probably on about three different dimensions.

06:07.515 --> 06:11.535
Firstly, people don't want to admit to incompetence,

06:11.835 --> 06:14.375
and as the horizon of fair shows, they will go

06:14.375 --> 06:19.055
to almost any length to cover up previous incompetence,

06:19.345 --> 06:20.935
doing shocking things, frankly.

06:21.595 --> 06:24.335
Um, so we are not going to be able to just ask people,

06:24.715 --> 06:27.055
we can't collect a survey of incompetence

06:27.055 --> 06:29.495
and ask them questions about their marital status

06:29.555 --> 06:30.615
or their age or whatever.

06:31.195 --> 06:34.935
Um, we might be able to do, research,

06:35.415 --> 06:37.455
ethnographic research, covert research,

06:37.675 --> 06:40.695
but sociology is quite uncomfortable with misleading people.

06:41.195 --> 06:43.095
You just sneak into an organization

06:43.115 --> 06:44.175
and see what you can see.

06:44.835 --> 06:46.095
Um, so that's tricky.

06:46.835 --> 06:48.935
So what I'm proposing is that we have

06:48.935 --> 06:51.015
to start in two directions.

06:51.075 --> 06:53.175
One is to try and find data that's already there.

06:53.835 --> 06:57.175
So to analyze things like industrial tribunals,

06:57.735 --> 07:00.575
official complaints, whistleblowers reports,

07:00.745 --> 07:02.495
these things are kind of floating out there,

07:02.515 --> 07:04.895
but they've never been used as far as I can see

07:05.395 --> 07:07.815
to inform a proper insight into incompetence.

07:08.195 --> 07:10.295
And the other approach is to take a kind

07:10.295 --> 07:11.415
of experimental approach.

07:11.635 --> 07:13.655
So we'll say, well, let's set up a situation.

07:13.705 --> 07:15.175
Let's get people to do a task

07:16.035 --> 07:18.975
and then deliberately make one of those people incompetent.

07:18.975 --> 07:21.735
They'll be in the, in the pay of the researcher

07:22.115 --> 07:23.895
and then see how other people respond to that.

07:24.035 --> 07:25.815
Do they freeze them outta the exercise?

07:25.915 --> 07:28.255
Do they try and talk them out of their incompetence?

07:28.955 --> 07:30.495
Do they put them in a particular role

07:30.505 --> 07:31.535
where it doesn't matter?

07:32.115 --> 07:34.775
So we have to kind of control the environment so

07:34.775 --> 07:36.375
that we can see what we want to see,

07:36.765 --> 07:39.575
because finding it in its natural environment is actually

07:39.575 --> 07:41.695
quite tricky for ethical reasons.

07:41.835 --> 07:44.095
And because it's, it's quite heavily disapproved of,

07:44.615 --> 07:46.335
I think one of the problems with a field like this

07:46.335 --> 07:48.735
that hasn't jelled is it's hard to know,

07:49.555 --> 07:51.535
how far it will go.

07:51.675 --> 07:54.735
So for example, there's a whole area in law of negligence,

07:55.355 --> 07:57.095
and I have no idea at this stage

07:57.315 --> 07:59.615
how much negligence overlaps with incompetence.

07:59.615 --> 08:01.655
And it's one of the things I, I'd like to find out.

08:02.275 --> 08:04.935
Um, but I suspect I'll have to proceed as I go

08:05.195 --> 08:06.895
and this will give me more insight,

08:06.895 --> 08:08.735
which will then suggest more research.

08:09.435 --> 08:12.375
Um, I have this fantasy that I will set up an email address

08:12.375 --> 08:15.255
and people just email me their tales of incompetence,

08:15.545 --> 08:17.815
which I think would be fascinating data.

08:18.475 --> 08:21.375
Um, and once people get used to the idea, they tend to react

08:21.375 --> 08:24.055
and say, yes, let me tell you about this thing

08:24.055 --> 08:25.095
that happens to me.

08:25.955 --> 08:28.895
Um, so I think I'm never gonna be short of data,

08:29.595 --> 08:30.695
but it will be a start.

08:30.755 --> 08:33.255
It will allow us to control the environment to the point

08:33.255 --> 08:35.495
where we start to get rich understandings of

08:35.835 --> 08:38.095
how people decide that other people are incompetent,

08:38.095 --> 08:42.095
how they respond to deciding that somebody is incompetent,

08:42.435 --> 08:45.615
how they make judgements, in social situations.

08:45.715 --> 08:47.775
So we'll be, we'll have more to work with.

08:48.075 --> 08:49.735
It won't be the definitive solution

08:49.735 --> 08:51.775
because this seems to be so, so new.

08:52.355 --> 08:54.375
If we can understanding in competence better,

08:55.025 --> 08:57.365
better we might be able to do some things about it.

08:58.225 --> 09:01.085
Um, one of the things that occurs to me is the,

09:01.225 --> 09:04.165
the importance of power in various forms in being able

09:04.165 --> 09:05.645
to cover up incompetence.

09:06.105 --> 09:08.685
And I think it's really important that we engage with that

09:08.685 --> 09:11.205
and try to figure out how to minimize the ability to,

09:11.705 --> 09:14.125
to cover up incompetence.

09:14.625 --> 09:19.445
Um, and these high profile media scandals like Lucy Let Be

09:19.445 --> 09:22.005
or Horizon give us some insight into

09:22.005 --> 09:23.525
how badly wrong things can go.

09:23.665 --> 09:26.805
But the thing you keep returning to is if people have power,

09:26.805 --> 09:28.205
they have the power to cover things up

09:29.005 --> 09:31.505
and they seem to go to any lengths to do that.

09:31.525 --> 09:35.305
So I think that the main aim for me is to start being able

09:35.305 --> 09:37.265
to say sensible things about how we would

09:38.495 --> 09:39.675
reduce incompetence.

09:40.215 --> 09:43.235
Um, you know, in some areas like medicine may have really

09:43.235 --> 09:45.875
good systems in place, you now have professional training

09:45.935 --> 09:49.315
to certain standards you have kind of interviewing

09:49.315 --> 09:50.555
and all sorts of things to find out

09:50.555 --> 09:51.635
how competent people are.

09:51.635 --> 09:53.075
And there are mistakes made.

09:53.165 --> 09:55.355
There are doctors who turn out to be incompetent,

09:55.575 --> 09:57.795
but I suspect they're the tiny minority.

09:58.775 --> 10:00.515
So what we need to do is we need to try

10:00.515 --> 10:02.675
and get these systems in place in, in other fields,

10:02.735 --> 10:06.075
in teaching and universities in business to try

10:06.075 --> 10:08.395
and reduce the amount of incompetence there is.

10:08.895 --> 10:10.675
Um, I hate to to say

10:10.675 --> 10:13.515
that the main aim is we need more research,

10:13.575 --> 10:15.955
but unfortunately I fear it is true in this case.

10:16.015 --> 10:19.955
We know so little about the phenomenon, even how

10:19.955 --> 10:22.755
to use the word that we are gonna have to do some more work

10:22.775 --> 10:26.075
before we we start to deliver policy value.

10:26.315 --> 10:27.755
I really hope we can do that.

10:28.055 --> 10:30.995
We can start giving practical advice on how

10:30.995 --> 10:34.195
to root out incompetence and, and minimize it

10:34.195 --> 10:36.995
and set up systems to make it less of a problem.

Quick Answers

Understanding Incompetence in Performance Standards

00:00:00 - The flippant answer is that nobody seems to be quite sure. my answer is that you can get quite a long way by thinking of it as performance relative to a standard. that's easy to understand. For something like packing up glassware, you can see how fast other people do it and then compare it with how fast a particular person can do it. It gets trickier when it's something like an organization, how effectively do an insurance company process insurance claims, how many mistakes get made,
00:00:34 - and then when you add in things like power and secrecy, it can get really difficult. So to what extent was the horizon, fan of worms, a matter of incompetence or of kind of politicking or greed or whatever it is? So it can get really tricky, but that'll do for startles that'll kind of get you going with, with trying to research the topic is what is the standard and when do people meet it or fail to meet it?
00:01:04 - to realize this, for which I'm very grateful, that these standards are very rarely objective set as it as it were by machines. They always require interpretation. unless you are doing a really mechanical job, there's always gonna be a certain amount of interpretation. There are gonna be things that aren't written down, standards that aren't written down. and then somebody is going to have to say, well,
00:01:34 - do things round here. you may not have been incompetent in terms of the written rules, but you were nonetheless incompetent by the prevailing standards and people can then respond. it wasn't made clear to me what the goals were. It wasn't made clear to me what the hidden agenda was. So I can't be responsible for failing to perform according to these standards that weren't, weren't made clear to me. so again, the the devil is in the details. it starts off looking like a fairly simple animal,
00:02:07 - and counter accusations of incompetence, it rapidly gets quite complicated and subjective, potentially subjective. We notice the really disastrous cases when bridges fall down and patients die. but I suspect probably it's important everywhere. The difficulty is it's not equally visible. So what's the, what's the cost of poor journalism, for example? How much does that affect our society when people report things that aren't true?
00:02:40 - Bad academic training. They're not as obvious as people dying or bridges falling down. But the effects can be, can be pretty much incalculable. I mean, how much harm can a bad teacher do over the years putting off students, not allowing them to get reach their full potential? I think this is one of the reasons I want to explore the topic, not just for its own interest, but to get some sense of just what the cost might be. It's a bit of an oddity in the sense that what academics are supposed to do is they're supposed

Exploring the Complexity of Incompetence

00:03:10 - And I tried that and it worked really badly because, a lot of people use in competence without really knowing what they're talking about. There are a whole bunch of medical, uses of incompetence like incompetent cervix, which affects your ability to give birth, and incompetent to plead in court. So I thought what I'm, what I'm gonna have to do is I'm gonna have to step back and I'm gonna have to say, well, how do people actually use this term somewhere where it matters somewhere sociological?
00:03:42 - because it's a good quality journal. It's a general journal. So if people are doing incompetence research, it should be visible there. and I thought, well, we have to start from absolute first principles. So what can we learn by what people say about the word? And then maybe we can go on to do a proper literature review. And it was nice to have my hypothesis confirmed that this is not really a topic of research in sociology, but it was also interesting to see just how unformed
00:04:15 - So peer review is supposed to ensure a certain quality of, research published, and yet there were people calling each other names. So a significant fraction of my sample were, were just unjustified accusations of incompetence to the government, to organizations, one scholar by another. And I was kind of like, surely peer review is supposed to get rid of this stuff. You, you shouldn't have random name calling. so my, my basic working hypothesis was confirmed.
00:04:49 - And actually, I'm not sure it is so obvious. but then more interesting things came up in the details. So for example, the idea of attribution, you assume somebody's incompetent because something has gone wrong. So for example, somebody turns up for a meeting, you say, they're, they're incompetent. but actually the train was late, so they're not incompetent. The railway company potentially is incompetent,
00:05:21 - So maybe nobody's incompetent, they're just unlucky. So how we establish reasonably that somebody has behaved in competently again, is not so simple. We have to make sure we don't just jump to conclusions about what other people have done and should have done and so on and so forth. so that would be one example, but that was a very small sample of the whole population. That was just one kind of flash of insight in a sea of sort
00:05:51 - So the plan now is to try and do the proper literature review with a bit more kind of information and try and figure out What I missed. but it's interesting that this phrase is so widely used and so little understood. Well, this was something that was occupying me a lot, probably on about three different dimensions. Firstly, people don't want to admit to incompetence, and as the horizon of fair shows, they will go to almost any length to cover up previous incompetence, doing shocking things, frankly.

Researching Incompetence: Challenges and Solutions

00:06:24 - we can't collect a survey of incompetence and ask them questions about their marital status or their age or whatever. we might be able to do, research, ethnographic research, covert research, but sociology is quite uncomfortable with misleading people. You just sneak into an organization and see what you can see. so that's tricky. So what I'm proposing is that we have to start in two directions. One is to try and find data that's already there.
00:06:57 - official complaints, whistleblowers reports, these things are kind of floating out there, but they've never been used as far as I can see to inform a proper insight into incompetence. And the other approach is to take a kind of experimental approach. So we'll say, well, let's set up a situation. Let's get people to do a task and then deliberately make one of those people incompetent. They'll be in the, in the pay of the researcher and then see how other people respond to that.
00:07:25 - Do they try and talk them out of their incompetence? Do they put them in a particular role where it doesn't matter? So we have to kind of control the environment so that we can see what we want to see, because finding it in its natural environment is actually quite tricky for ethical reasons. And because it's, it's quite heavily disapproved of, I think one of the problems with a field like this that hasn't jelled is it's hard to know, how far it will go. So for example, there's a whole area in law of negligence,
00:07:57 - how much negligence overlaps with incompetence. And it's one of the things I, I'd like to find out. but I suspect I'll have to proceed as I go and this will give me more insight, which will then suggest more research. I have this fantasy that I will set up an email address and people just email me their tales of incompetence, which I think would be fascinating data. and once people get used to the idea, they tend to react and say, yes, let me tell you about this thing that happens to me.
00:08:29 - but it will be a start. It will allow us to control the environment to the point where we start to get rich understandings of how people decide that other people are incompetent, how they respond to deciding that somebody is incompetent, how they make judgements, in social situations. So we'll be, we'll have more to work with. It won't be the definitive solution because this seems to be so, so new. If we can understanding in competence better, better we might be able to do some things about it.
00:09:01 - the importance of power in various forms in being able to cover up incompetence. And I think it's really important that we engage with that and try to figure out how to minimize the ability to, to cover up incompetence. and these high profile media scandals like Lucy Let Be or Horizon give us some insight into how badly wrong things can go. But the thing you keep returning to is if people have power, they have the power to cover things up

Strategies for Reducing Incompetence Across Fields

00:09:31 - So I think that the main aim for me is to start being able to say sensible things about how we would reduce incompetence. you know, in some areas like medicine may have really good systems in place, you now have professional training to certain standards you have kind of interviewing and all sorts of things to find out how competent people are. And there are mistakes made. There are doctors who turn out to be incompetent, but I suspect they're the tiny minority. So what we need to do is we need to try
00:10:02 - in teaching and universities in business to try and reduce the amount of incompetence there is. I hate to to say that the main aim is we need more research, but unfortunately I fear it is true in this case. We know so little about the phenomenon, even how to use the word that we are gonna have to do some more work before we we start to deliver policy value. I really hope we can do that. We can start giving practical advice on how
00:10:34 - and set up systems to make it less of a problem.

Faculti AI can make mistakes

Research

Policy

Analysis

Data

Originals

Explainers

Podcasts