Tag archives for Open University - Page 2
Innovation – what exactly is innovation?
Innovation, like strategy, is constantly talked about yet greatly misunderstood. Government and business alike talk of innovation as driving economic growth. Innovation is a Holy Grail. So what is it? What is Innovation? I think that the best definition is 'an idea that is developed and implemented to bring something new into being'. Lots of people confuse ideas with innovation. I have this great idea for a self-cleaning car. Am I not innovative? Unless you build the self-cleaning car, I don't believe that you are. Ideas are easy. We all have ideas all the time. To be innovative the idea itself does not have to be novel. However the product, service or system you develop as a result should be. The key thing is to bring something new. Incremental Innovation How new is new? It could be a very small increment over what has existed before.…
Themself – now available on kindle
Today is publication day for my latest book Themself - Confessions of an open university creative writing student. As the sub-title suggests it is about my experience of studying creative writing with the OU. Although Themself goes further than that and includes the things I've learnt from my experience of writing, studying and self publishing. Themself - Confessions of an open university creative writing student You'll find some of the content in Themself here on the blog, but only about half of it. You'll also find that I've edited it since I first published it on the blog. Although I've tried hard to keep to the original character of the contemporary blog posts about how I was feeling. The bits I've updated are where I'm summarising what I've learnt. There is also a lot of new material. All of the stories and poems…
Looking Back at 2015
I posted some new year's resolutions for 2015 last January. So I feel I owe you an update on how I got on with them. It's progress but not full achievement. I made three resolutions 1. Write more 2. Read more paper books 3. Have a healthier lifestyle 1. Write More I'm not sure that I can count this as an unqualified success. I set some specific measures that I haven't fully achieved. However I did meet some of them, and I managed to write a lot of blog posts too. I was consistently blogging three times a week until I got promoted at work and started a 60 point level 3 undergraduate course with the open university. This is a partial success. I'm parking it for now though. I've got another 60 pointer (but only at level 2) to do…
B203 Exam tomorrow
The exam for B203 is tomorrow afternoon, I can't honestly say that I've done enough prep for it but all I need is a pass. I've already done enough to secure a 2:1 for my degree and this is the last of the mandatory modules I need to do. It's also the least favourite of the modules I've done. Tomorrow night it will be done, barring the need for a resit if I fail the exam. Instead of blogging I've been cramming theory on Operations Management, Information Management, Accounting & Finance, Marketing and HR Management into my head. I've also been putting my notes into a personal wiki that you can find at if you too are one of the people studying B203 with the open university. Let me know if you find it useful. Next up will be T317…
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B203 Information Management
Information Management Framework (Photo credit: Wikipedia) I spent Friday immersed in information management, courtesy of the last (of six) assignments for the Open University course B203 (Business Functions in Context). Up until I started this module every time someone mentioned the term 'Information Manager' I internally translated it to 'Librarian'. Generally I've not enjoyed B203 as much as the previous six course, probably because it is too wide (it covers Operations, Marketing, Finance, HR & Information Management). Also some of the text books are just dire, especially the Marketing and Information Management ones. Information Management != Librarian English: The relationship between Information Science, Computer Science, Information Systems and Management. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) What I have learnt is that information management is not about being a librarian, nor an archivist. I'd already separated it conceptually from Information Technology (IT or ICT)…