Sir Ken Robinson – Do Schools Kill Creativity?

The Extra Mile

Success in life comes to those who are passionate about what they do. Successful people are those who “go the extra mile” both to achieve their own ambitions, and to deliver a service or an objective for others.

But, our world is made up of organisations full of people who don’t like what they are doing. Grumpy people who mooch to work, grit their teeth and get on with it, and watch the clock till they’re finished. They switch their personalities off when they get to work, and switch them back on again at the end of the day.

This is unhelpful to them, to  the organisations they work in, and the people they serve. It is corrosive to society’s well-being. We are happiest when we have a passion for what we do, and this is also when we are at our most efficient and effective.

Our education system continues to follow the Victorian model which marked out a chosen few for future management positions and gave the rest the minimum skills and knowledge needed to be a wage slave. This is at the root of the problem, but it is by no means the whole problem.

The School of the Extra Mile is about:

• changing education so it is about identifying people’s attitudes, aptitudes and aspirations and helping them make the most of them;
• changing people’s attitudes and aspirations so work is not something to be endured grudgingly till pay day;
• changing managers’ attitudes so they recognise a happy workforce is a productive workforce, and they know how to get one;
• changing policy and practice so more people are able to pursue their passions and make their careers out of them.