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October 28-30th, 2013

The Presidio, San Francisco
~musings on our third conference~

Yámana Science and Technology held its third National working conference ~ 'Mapping the Systems of Science and Technology' ~ in San Francisco on Oct 28th-30th.  It was our first event outside of the beltway.  Our 2010 and 2012 'UnSummits' were held in the Washington DC area, and were an official part of the USA Science and Engineering Festival.  We called ourselves the 'think tank' part of the festival. 

This event was held in sync with the Bay Area Science Festival -- yet it is telling that we were not part of that festival.  Though we had made inquiries into becoming an official part of that event, the question of who can make that decision became a barrier that was not overcome.  In the end, we were 'stand-alone.'

I feel like a manifesto of some sort should come out of this event.  The complexity, emotion, diversity and new ground seem to call for a large 'aha!' that can be captured in a rallying cry.  Several of us at the event spoke of a 'birthing' .... a pivotal point in time where new life is breathed into something precious.

Perhaps it was.

First a nod to the festivals.  Larry Bock has been a gracious and generous supporter of our work, even as he may be working at slightly different parts of the 'system' of science.  We (the founders of Yámana Science and Technology) are scientists and technology specialists - several of us with PhDs, and all of us with many years' experience in academia, medicine, or industry.  Larry is hoping to inspire more children in the USA to become interested in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math).  

Larry's desire to take on the monumental task of running a festival is born of being a serial entrepreneur of life science companies, and looking far and wide (often overseas) for good talent to hire for STEM jobs.  

We, however, are part of the industry that is 'super-saturated.'  The PhD and technology worker population that is over-qualified and that feels we need to be working on different things in science, in different ways.  Yet Larry sees enough overlap in initiative, derring-do, and vision, that he gave a 'yes' in 2010 to support our cause and let us be officially included in his event.

I myself am a graduate of the University of California, San Diego, as are two of my co-founders of Yámana Science and Technology.  We've had a long history with UC San Francisco, which is the grantee for the Bay Area Science Festival.  I knew of that festival before it was born - on the first year, when NSF did not fund the grant application, and on the subsequent year, when it did.  I attended the first International Public Science Event Conference in 2011, in Washington DC, where festival officials gathered and shared best practices and ideas in this burgeoning field.  Our conference venue was due to the suggestion of the wonderful Rebecca Smith, who was part of the granting process that got the Bay Area Science Festival going.  

When I wanted to know if we could partner-up here on the West Coast, there was no 'go to' person like Larry Bock - at least not one that I could identify.  

I only mention this because this was the beginning ground-rumble of what was writ large in the dynamics of our conference.  

The conference was a wonderful thing.  People were engaged, dynamic, happy to be there, and sometimes not.  There was excitement, energy, new learning, and even some very emotional parts.

Why?

Because of two dominant dynamics.

One - the planet is in trouble.  One session, where we outlined desired headlines from a future we wish to create, spoke of overcoming issues such as bee colony collapse, CO₂ emissions, and trash in the Pacific gyre. Notes from the working sessions are captured here.

 

Yet the scientists from academia and basic research were engaged in discussions about their careers.

The two worlds seemed quite separate.  Some people got angry.  Angry that the scientists were 'belly button gazing' when the world's ecosystems are collapsing(!).  

Yet I can attest as to one reason why this disconnection has occured. 

For scientists, their own ecosystem is collapsing.  I maintain that many, if not most, have entered science as a career to make a difference on the planet.  I believe they are striving with great heart to do exactly that.  But the extreme competition, the exponential growth of PhDs without concomitant growth of jobs for which they've been trained, the hyper-competition for grants and extreme pressure for 'high impact' publications makes their career a seeming battle for survival.  When you're so concerned about your own existence, the needs of the planet become fading and existential.  Perhaps.

I say that a new conversation potentially emerged from our event.  The daunting challenge of the 'Ivory Tower' emerged full force from the back-ground.  The urgency of crashing populations of various dominant species, such as salmon, played full throttle for me.  And the urgency of addressing livelihood and sustenance for our scientists-in-training came on like a train on greased rails.  This was accentuated by the presence, on the first day, of both Michael Teitelbaum - who is clear that we don't need more PhD scientists in an already saturated workforce population - and my son, who is applying for PhD programs in physics, because of an inner drive to 'do' science at the level only now possible, in our current explorations of the Universe.  Who wouldn't want to know the things one learns while obtaining a PhD.  But then what to do with that knowledge....

It will take a birthing for these two worlds to drop behind, and a new world to emerge.

Innovate + Educate: Bringing Inspiring Conversations about through TEDxLivermore

Alex Eckert of Livermore High during rehearsal

 When Yámana Science and Technology hosts our Science 'UnSummits' (first in 2010, most recently in 2012) one of our goals is to share new ideas and emerging trends on how work gets ‘done,’ especially in the scientific and technical sector. 

I believe people have a natural desire to contribute and a built-in wish to thrive (shared by all living things).  I also believe that our current evolution and opportunity is to envision a way for all to thrive.  That’s my theory, and I’m sticking to it.  And I’ve been spending a good bit of time looking for places that this is happening.  The scrum environment is one of these trends.  ‘The Starfish and the Spider’ points to this too.  Tribal Leadership, the rise in non-profits, the ‘Blessed Unrest’ that drives us forward, with the goal of mutual thriving on the horizon.

I got to participate quite heavily in bringing this message to a warm and engaged audience at the June 8^th TEDxLivermore event at Las Positas College. This intense day of stage and speaker management capped a year and a half of weekly meetings with one of the most fun teams I’ve ever been on:  Roz Hamar, Director of Valley Montessori School, Stacy Drury, our project manager (truly wonderful in this position!), Kathy Ohm as speaker coach, Michelle Eastman, Jill Miller for PR, Kate Mullen who was heavily engaged at the outset, and the list goes on.  We had so much fun!  As we got close to the event day, we gave up the idea of carrying out efficient and matter-of-fact meetings, as we were having too much fun in the covering of every detail and sharing our minds and opinions while we were at it.

How did I find this wonderful opportunity for spreading ‘ideas worth sharing?’  In a word, Dale Kaye (ok, make that two words).  When I met Dale she was the very forward-thinking President of the Chamber of Commerce in Livermore CA.  Almost immediately she shared with me her vision for an 'Idea Festival' in Livermore - to share emerging trends and innovative practices in high tech.  Now the Executive Director of Innovation Tri-Valley Leadership Group, Dale has not stopped thinking about ways to connect people, ideas and vision.
I’m thinking about the TEDx approach through the lens of complexity and self-organization.  Unlike our bootstrapped events at the Science ‘UnSummits,’ where we have 1-2 cameras, one person doing all the streaming and projection, me as host, and everything done from the ground-up, TEDx provides a format that requires a highly evolved village.  People do the jobs they are trained to do, with heart and soul, while improvisation and bootstrapping still operated for our all-volunteer planning team.  For me it’s a hybrid and a reminder of how exhilarating it is to work with people who are really good at what they are doing.

I suspect one of the major benefits of the more highly organized TEDx events is the online talks after the event.  The speakers spent considerable time making this ‘the best talk of their lives,’ which to me is a bit of hyperbole and a really big dash of pressure.  But, that being said, it also brought out clear, succinct messages that have vision and weight behind them.  This is likely a highly effective lever for change through inspiration.

Jeremy Brown (@SocialJeremy) tweeted this photo capturing our opening innovators - The Basement Boys featuring Matt Roads, Marshall Williams and Andrew Wilke

We are Kings - Graduation day thoughts

On May 21st I attended my son's graduation at UCBerkeley, from the physics department.  Nick is a goofy kid.  One of the things I love about him, and my daughter, is they leaven their serious/science sides with the circus arts.  Cassandra does acro-balance (think Cirque du Soleil) and Nick does Parcour.  They both juggle - though Cassandra is the far more practiced juggler (and in fact runs a circus camp in Prescott Arizona during the summer months).  And one is studying dark matter and the other teaches middle school science.  I definitely have a mother's bias and tons of pride.

Two things struck me about the graduation.

First:  One of the PhD recipients carried her very young son in her arms as she walked the stage to receive her diploma.  The loudest cheers were for her and the wee one.  Given that the statistics from Mary Ann Mason et al.'s work indicate a child is a hindrance to a women's career, particularly in the physical sciences (while, interestingly, leading to slightly higher tenure rates for men), it is interesting that the crowd loved the image and act of this young PhD recipient - an opening of arms or show of love for children and the act of creation, as it were.

The other thing that struck me was the 'we are kings' (and perhaps queens) attitude, which was replete in the talks.  The department chairs and deans were clear that these students were tops dogs, and would achieve greatly, as representatives of the pinnacle of the scientific heap.  Even as they mentioned, multiple times, that many of them would not go into physics or astrophysics for careers.  A deft way of handling the lack of jobs they face at the professorial level.  I currently believe in innovative choices on the job market (you know, like all the physics PhDs that went to Wall Street to work, and the many entrepreneurs currently emerging).  But I wonder.  Are we moving fast enough in giving grad students the training they will really need for working well with others, in the new flat structures emerging in some of the most innovative and successful start-ups?  Will this end up being the pinnacle of their own careers for many of them?

On the flip side of that, I was also sitting with a new appreciation for the love of knowledge that was so visible to me in the room.  These students, especially the PhD recipients, have been through dark times, almost surely (see Uri Alon's great talk here).  And are emerging onto an uncertain job landscape (it's estimated that a full 60% of current PhD students and post-docs in science will have to leave science for lack of jobs).  Yet the pure love of what they get to chew on, think about, understand and explore just shone through.  I was in love with it.  I could feel the joy.  I was renewed in my feeling for 'pure thought' and intellectualism.  Hmmmm.... something to think about.

Science Headfirst

I'm Kennan Kellaris Salinero, and I'm on a mission.

The mission is to see that science takes its best - the beauty of the discovery, our love of understanding bits and pieces of the universe, creating new capabilities in the world - and elegantly outgrows its worst - the tournament model for success, arrogance, and our attraction to pedestals (and standing on them).

Why?  Several reasons. 

I have two sisters that have chronic illnesses.  Chronic illness is on the rise in general, from what I see.   

Indeed there seem to be several mysteries on the rise..... 'out of balances' that could use an elegant understanding of the whole system.  And I suggest that many of these 'out of balances' come, unintentionally and inadvertently, from science and technology itself.  Think plastics and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.  Who better to deal with the outcomes of science than scientists?  We have terrific opportunities to jump in a make a difference, and I see our younger generation, and passionate 'elders' of science, doing so.  But is it enough?  Fast enough, big enough, visionary enough?

Science itself, as an industry, is experiencing fairly cataclysmic stressors.  Some say we don't have enough scientists and engineers in this country, some say we have too many.  And it's likely that your mind immediately jumped to funding and the mantra "Science needs more funding."

Ok, yes, maybe, more money is always a nice thing.

But the change I'm wishing to see and help along is in the realm of 'being.'  How are we 'being' as scientists?  And what sort of 'doing' is this prompting?

Because it's in the 'doing' of science that major change is being called forth.  How do we work together?  How do we interact with society?  How do we raise our 'young' (the next generation of scientists)?  How do we teach science?  What do we study, and what do we fail to study?  What is our reward system, and what does that promote?  What do we reward?  All of these are things we are 'doing.'  And I see a huge opportunity for a major shift in the 'doing' of science.  And I think we are ready.

So I'm out here, in a space that Michael Margolis, evangelist for narratives to get work done, describes as the heretic calling back to the tribe.  I believe we, as a community have the ability to actively create how we want science to 'be.'  By learning where we really are right now, by being present to the costs of the current way of doing things, and by calling out our best vision of what we want to be.

And really, as I do this, I'm not going Headfirst so much as I'm traveling Heartfirst.  And I invite those of you ready to do so to join me in following our hearts.  And hey, we can still use our heads.  We're scientists, right?