Remember my adventures in 2014 with the NHS? And before that in 2011? I am back in the mysteries of the NHS again, this time visiting an elderly close relative. Hence not much blogging of late. Back in 2014: The information management problems for hospitals are formidable. At each stage […]
Here is an interesting piece about Judith Gough, HM Ambassador to Ukraine, who is accompanied on her posting by her female civil partner: “the first full discussion with a member of the press about life as an out-and-proud ambassador”. Note the desperate improvisation of the FCO scouring its sprawling building […]
Here’s my latest piece for DIPLOMAT magazine, on global security or not. It starts with a quote immediately familiar to diligent readers here: WHO SAID THIS (the answer is at the end of this piece)? “Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos … Oh, and you […]
One of the worst parts of public speaking for a speaker is not knowing what else is going on while you orate. My book on the subject Speeches for Leaders talks about the perils of e-heckling: It gets worse. Imagine a woman leader giving a serious, substantive speech about global inequalities […]
Here is a bizarre article by one Sławomir Sierakowski over at Project Syndicate, who ought to know better. It gets off to a flying start with the title: The Polish Threat to Europe. Not, you note, A Polish Threat to Europe or even A Polish Threat to Europe? No, it’s the definite […]
It’s only reasonable that you get a sense of what’s to be found in my new book on leadership and public speaking, Speeches for Leaders. So try these ten soundbites: On practising a speech in advance Would orating mightily to oneself in front of the bathroom mirror really help? On […]
Here it is. The hardback version of my book on leadership and public speaking. Speeches for Leaders. As with the earlier ebook edition, this has been published by Diplomatic Courier in Washington, one of the world’s best magazines for diplomats and diplomacy. As a result the book is available via […]
Here’s my piece today for the Daily Telegraph on the mighty Owen Report on the murder by polonium poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko. With added Katyn: For anyone interested in the way governments operate, there is nothing more astonishing than the policy memorandum sent from Beria to Stalin in 1940, tersely […]
My previous post linked to the new gloomy piece by Robert Kaplan for the WSJ, in which he ponders the possibility of Europe reverting to deep historical fault-lines: The sturdy core of modern Europe approximates in large measure the Carolingian Empire founded by Charlemagne in the ninth century. The first […]
Around the planet the world’s networked seismographs will have revealed in seconds all sorts of things about North Korea’s latest big bomb test, hydrogen or otherwise. Notably that it was indeed a bomb (and not an earthquake) and where exactly the test took place. Other instruments will be tracing the […]
