10 years since Christchurch earthquake

 

Today marks a decade since a devastating series of earthquakes, changed the lives of all in Christchurch and Canterbury. My blogs of the time include the following, found here and here. 

Several media articles mark the event along with a memorial service held at lunch time. Some of note include memories of the event from a group of teenagers, who were five years old at the time and experienced the earthquake whilst at Redcliffs school (where the cliff behind the school collapsed); then and now pictures featured in The Press this morning; and stories from local businesses of the difficult decade of struggle and challenge to continue. 

After the physical earthquakes, came many years of struggle for many, seeing their homes ‘red-zoned’, moving and settling into new homes, mostly into the suburbs ringing the city, and seeing so much of the physical geography of Christchurch change from month to month as large swathes of the city was demolished and very gradually rebuilt.

There were also other shared challenges, especially the 2017 Kaikoura earthquakes, the horrendous 2019 mosque attack and then the 2020 pandemic, still being played out this year as NZ awaits the effects of the roll out of a vaccination programme (beginning this week) and the populace lives behind closed borders.

All in, it has been 10 years of continual need to be ‘agile’, not only at work and home but through our entire community. The kindness of everyone has been the best attribute, supporting everyone through trying times. Dr. Mazharuddin Syed Ahmeh provides an example of how after witnessing the attack at the Linwood mosque, his family were cowering in fear in their home and then found their neighbours forming a ‘human wall’ outside their home that evening to protect his family.

Therefore, tragedy can, if there is resolve, be worked through. Resilience is a word that is used too often but experiencing the need to be resilient, does bring into focus, the hard work that is required, to be continually tough but also empathetic and kind. Kia kaha Christchurch. 

Digital transformation of learning organisations - book overview

 Published 2020 by Springer, open source/access downloadable this book edited by D. Ifenthaler, S. Hofhues, M. Egloffsteing and C. Helbig, details the outcomes of a research project, funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research which ran from 2017 to 2020.

The book has 2 parts, the first providing 3 chapters to overview/background/ frameworks for the project and the second detailing a findings/recommendations in 11 chapters.

Very brief overviews of each chapter are recorded in the preface -v -. 

The book covers a range of contexts and challenges within which digitisation is occuring. Contexts include education, social welfare, Swiss vocational schools etc. The human element is explored in several chapters as workers get to grips with 'smart machines' and how work requires 'hybridisation' and transformation for workers to understand implications and work through the challenges.

There are several chapters stressing the need for communication across all 'stakeholders' i.e. employers, workers, clients and the importance of leaderships within organisations to ensure transformation is critically thought through, planned and supported. There is also a chapter (chapter 13) on dealing with resistance to change, a common thread through many other pieces of work on transformational change.