Students and academics assume people will think they’re dumb and won’t take their ideas seriously if their writing isn't complex, dense and difficult to read.

The problem is real. As Rachel Toor writes, bad writing and bad thinking go hand in hand.

I prefer to turn this idea on its head: Crisp writing is a sign of neatly ordered thinking. Or as I said in a previous post: Good writing is direct, clear and precise. It is also unambiguous.

Much of Toor’s piece is about passive language – which she rightly condemns. Scientists and engineers sometimes need to use the passive voice, but for the most part the active voice is best.

She pulled much of the remainder or her piece from an  essay by George Orwell.

Academics need to read this. For the rest of us it is a wake up call.

See Bad Writing and Bad Thinking – Do Your Job Better – The Chronicle of Higher Education

All western economies are spending an ever higher share of their national output on so-called intangibles – research, teaching, branding and marketing, design – in the struggle for competitive advantage. And it is graduates who do most of the heavy lifting in these areas. The Work Foundation, of which I am executive vice-chair, calculates that in 1970 around a fifth of the workforce were "knowledge" workers with degrees or their equivalent; today it is two-fifths. By 2020 it will be half; by 2040 60%.

Will Hutton makes a case against cutting spending on higher education in The Guardian (Don't destroy our universities. Our future depends on them).

Stumped for a career direction?

Try asking yourself these ten questions. If you run into difficulties ask friends and family for an honest view of these factors.

There’s no magic formula, the answers won’t reveal your working future, but they will help you clarify matters and give you the insights you’ll need to choose a degree programme that plays to your strengths.

What are my favourite subjects?

It may sound like an obvious starting point, but you’d be surprised at the number of people who sign up for courses that don’t interest them.

Don’t spend the rest of your life, or at least the next few years, slaving over something that you find boring.

You’ll get a lot more out of higher education and your subsequent career if you work in an area you enjoy. If you think medicine sounds interesting then go for it, if it sends you to sleep, avoid it.

What are my academic achievements?

Take a look at your high school career. What subjects were you best at? To some extent your exam results will answer this question, but results might not accurately reflect your long-term performance.

Where did you consistently get good marks? You may have won a prize, come top or near the top of the class. You may have used your skills to tutor younger or weaker students in a subject area. Was there a subject where your friends asked you for homework help or recognised you as an expert?

What else turns me on?

What really excites your interest? What do you choose to do when you don’t have to do anything? Is there something that you love to do, perhaps it is a hobby or other leisure activity that you look forward to? In many cases these activities can form the basis of a career.

For example, if you love animals, think of veterinary science; if you enjoy spending time with computers then consider a career in information technology. Some connections are less obvious, if you enjoy tinkering with a car you may be suited to work as a computer engineer.

Am I creative?

You may like to express yourself through words, art, music or other artistic format. But there’s more to creativity than creative arts: businesses need creative thinking and the best scientists, engineers and mathematicians generally have a strong creative streak. It’s important to answer this question honestly.

It’s hard to accept a lack of creativity but this is not necessary a weakness; in some disciplines creativity is regarded with suspicion, think what the term “creative accountant” means.

Do I have good communications skills?

How good are you at expressing all those brilliant thoughts that pass through your head? Can you put them down on paper or speak about them in a way that makes things easy to understand or do you struggle? Could you stand in front of a group of people and explain a complex idea? How about a hall filled with hundreds of people?

Communications isn’t a one-way street, it’s just as important to listen to others and to use feedback.

How do I rate my people skills?

Although people skills are closely related to communication skills, there are differences. If you’re a good communicator you can relay or receive ideas, if you have good people skills you can pick up on feelings or mood. You also need to understand what motivates people and why they act in certain ways. Dealing with conflict is important. Knowing when to ask a subordinate to do a task is as important as knowing how to explain the mechanics of the task.

Is money important to me?

The best things in life are free, but cash can buy an awful lot of second-best things.

Ask yourself if  material rewards motivate you or if other things are more important. For example, you may want a career where you can help to make the world better, brighter or safer. Of course, with student loan debts and sky-high housing costs, you may feel you don’t have much choice but to take the money and run. If you’re not motivated by money, you’ll have a lot more interesting career option.

Do I need structure?

School life is highly structured, with timetabled lessons, strict hierarchies and so on, but university and the adult world of work isn’t always like that. Many people thrive in an unstructured environment and do their best work where there are fewer restrictions. Others are lost without a rule book. This is an area where you may change over time, but ask yourself if you feel safer on a highly structured course or if you’re ready to cut loose.

Am I internally or externally driven?

Some people are self-motivated. They can get up and work hard for long hours without anyone saying anything to them. They will make their own decisions about what to do and how to complete tasks. Other people need external motivating. This can take the form of a highly disciplined workplace in say the armed forces or it can come from colleagues operating in a team.

You’ll need self-motivation to get through university, but the quality is essential if you plan to work for yourself at a later date.

Can I put off my career decision?

There’s a lot of pressure on young people to make hard and fast decisions about their careers before they embark on a university degree. Some people feel comfortable with this; others are not ready to choose at this stage.

The good news is that you don’t have to make a firm commitment yet. Many university departments offer generalised degree programmes within a certain discipline. In most cases you can wait until the end of your first year before selecting a major subject. Other universities offer liberal studies degrees and BA programmes that will keep your employment options open.

How many hours will you work in your life?

In The Age of Unreason, Charles Handy says his generation, who started work in the 1950s, could expect to work around 100,000 hours during their lives.

Handy says in the 1950s employers expected the average Northern European to put in 47 hours of paid work and paid or unpaid overtime each week. Workers got five weeks paid holiday each year, making a working year of 47 weeks.

Northern European professional workers could expect to enjoy full employment from leaving school at roughly 18 years until retirement at 65. Give or take a few percent this works out at 100,000 hours.

Rapid changes in European employment

European employment changed by the mid-1980s. Then a person could expect to spend around 50,000 hours in the core workforce. They still worked 47 weeks a year. The week was a little shorter at 45 hours.

Although employees were no longer expected to show up at the office on a Saturday morning, the average working day was longer. In the 1980s, few professionals were paid overtime. The hours in excess of the 38 to 40 hours normally quoted in contracts were unpaid overtime.

The big difference came in the number of years worked. Skilled workers and professionals not only required a first university degree, but increasingly employers asked for a vocational qualification as well.

Things vary from country to country, but in the mid-1980s young European knowledge workers didn’t enter the workforce much before their early 20s. At the same time, the trend towards early retirement meant that few professionals worked past the age of 55.

Handy argues the pressure and stress of work meant few in the ‘core’ workforce would want to stay in their jobs past their 50^th birthday. Handy's estimate of 50,000 hours  is roughly 25 years by 47 weeks by 45 hours.

Workers didn't have it easy

You might imagine this means the 1980s workforce had it easy compared with their fathers  – that’s not sexist, statistically speaking not many mothers married to professional men worked during in the 1950s.

Today we can look at Handy’s numbers and reach a different conclusion.

The length of the practical working life is even shorter. While many knowledge workers can continue in full employment well into their sixth or seventh decade, few employers want workers to stay in the core workforce much past their mid-40s.

In other words, the period you can expect to stay in the core workforce is now around 20 years, roughly from the age of 25 to 45.

The working week has stretched back again. Our fathers may have fought for the right to a 40-hour week, but today’s average Australian full-time employee turns in 47 hours, usually with no overtime payment. New Zealand is similar.

This figure is for all workers. There are still unionised jobs where the working week is kept in the 37 to 40 hour range. This means many knowledge workers average more than 47 hours.

For the sake of argument (and easy arithmetic) we’ll assume a 50-hour week is normal in Australia. And as this Department of Labour report shows, if anything New Zealand knowledge workers put in an even longer working week – and with fewer leave days.

Holidays are history

Perhaps the most disturbing trend is reduced holidays. Although jobs have a nominal amount of annual leave, in practice few workers take all their leave.

In my last job I had four weeks leave a year, when I left after two years I was paid six weeks salary in lieu of unused holiday.

This is common – people trade unused holiday for cash when moving between jobs.

In some cases people don’t take leave because they worry things might happen in their absence. Others worry that by not being in place, their bosses might realise they are disposable. More commonly the pressure of work and thin staffing levels means that people can’t get adequate cover to take time off.

Despite this, most workers manage to grab a week or so around Christmas and a few days break here and there. Typically a modern Australian or New Zealand knowledge worker might enjoy the arithmetically convenient total of two weeks leave, or a working year of 50 weeks.

That gives us a total of 50 by 50 by 20 or 50,000 hours. In other words, we cram the same number of working hours into fewer years.

However there are two major differences between the modern working life and the situation that Handy described in the 1980s.

Higher education is no picnic

First, today’s higher education is no picnic. Sure students had to work at learning in the 1970s and early 80s, but they had the luxury of choosing courses that were interesting and not those leading to a career.

It is one thing to study when the subject is fascinating, it is another thing to plough through dry vocational course matter. Furthermore, educational resources are stretched and there’s less money for students. Consequently many slave at minimal wage jobs while studying.

Any calculation of lifetime working hours should add around 48 hours a week for a 48 week year for each year spent in higher education. If you take a first degree and a vocational postgraduate course that could be a total of 16,000 hours devoted to the educational system.

Second, although the core workforce is better paid than in the past, higher tax rates and higher costs associated with working and getting educated mean that few earn enough during their more productive years to take them through the rest of their lives.

In other words, knowledge workers need to work long past their use-by date. You can cut the numbers how you like, but each way I do the calculations I reach the same conclusion: today’s knowledge workers can expect to spend at least 100,000 hours at work.

That’s pretty much the same as workers faced in the 1950s.

Investing in higher education would boost the Australian economy more than tax cuts or pouring government money into industry. That’s the verdict of a KPMG report commissioned by Australia’s universities, who, let’s face it, stand to gain the most from an investment in higher education.

The numbers look good. According to the report Australia’s average annual GDP could climb by an extra A$1.6 billion over the next ten years. Reaching an annual average of A$38 billion by the 2020s.

Those benefits depend on Australia’s federal government following the recommendations made in a higher education review (The Bradley Review). Bradley recommended spending A$6.5 billion on higher education over four years, then spending the OECD average of one percent of GDP in each following year.

KPMG says while the cost is modest, the pay-off would be unusually large.

Last week’s Australian federal government budget spending commitment to higher education fell well short of the amount recommended.

See:

New report shows university reforms will drive growth

Despite the global financial crisis, Australia and New Zealand still face a shortage of key information technology skills. Many experts believe that shortage will be more acute three or four years from now when today’s school students finish tertiary education.

So if you’re looking for a solid career with long-term prospects, IT could be right for you.

Here are ten ways to improve your IT career prospects:

1. Choose your undergraduate course carefully. In particular, look for university departments with close industry links and a culture or track record of high graduate employment levels. These are more important than an institution’s wider reputation. University admissions departments have this kind of information. If they are unwilling to answer questions on these subjects it's likely they do poorly in these areas.
2. If you are still at school, choose courses that align with the entry requirements of the best undergraduate departments. Make sure you do plenty of relevant groundwork before University; this will help your grades later. Don’t neglect English or Commerce – both are highly valued by technology employers.
3. Hone your communications skills. If possible take school or undergraduate courses in writing and verbal communications. Take out-of-school opportunities to improve public speaking and similar skills. Many junior IT jobs require you to work on help desks and in similar places where you are dealing with customers (who may be inside or outside of the organisation you work for).
4. Learn to look professional. Develop an appropriate dress style. Know how to put on a tie and polish shoes. This doesn’t necessarily mean dark blue business suits. It does mean being presentable.
5. Start thinking like a professional. Make a habit of being punctual and well-mannered. Take a pride in every thing you do. Employers say this is where most otherwise good candidates miss out. But none of this means you have to become old before your time.
6. Maintain an interest in IT that goes beyond narrow specialty skills. Read trade publications and web sites. This will give you something to talk about at interviews and an early warning of employment trends.
7. Once you are in the work force, keep your skills up-to-date. If your employer offers any training or refresher options take as many as you can manage. If necessary learn new skills in your own time.
8. Think marketing. You need to sell yourself and sell your skills. Make sure your CV or resume puts you in the best possible light. But don’t overdo it.
9. Network extensively with colleagues, friends in associated industries and keep in touch with employment consultants – not all job vacancies are formally advertised. Use social networking tools. Find ways to network that suit your personality without looking creepy or pushy.
10. If possible consider finishing your degree and starting your career in the US or UK. Employers in those countries are more likely to hire fresh graduates and you’ll have no trouble finding work when you return to the antipodes.

Sadly Brian Corrigan’s Opportunities still there for graduates is behind The Australian Financial Review’s paid content wall.

Corrigan reports that after years of decline, student numbers are climbing again for information technology and computer science courses at Australia’s universities.

It appears people are using the recession to gain skills. That’s a smart move. Earning money is difficult right now. The cost of an education is the same as it was before the financial meltdown, but many other costs associated with studying are lower. So are interest rates, which makes taking a student loan easier.

Sydney’s University of Technology has seen postgraduate IT student numbers rise 25 percent this year. At Queensland University of Technology student numbers climbed 10 percent after falling every year since 2002 after the dotcom bust.

In the mid 2000s I wrote stories for the AFR about technology courses in higher education. At the time there was a fear courses would close  due to lack of demand despite industry’s need for trained IT workers.

Corrigan says there’s still a healthy demand for workers with computer qualifications in Australia. The recession and falling overall employment has barely touched technology with 10 percent fewer tech employers turning up at job fairs. This compares with  next to zero potential employers looking for recruits in other industries.

Further good news appears in Australian IT, where Fran Foo wrote about a rise in the number of computer related scholarships on offer in Scholarships defy crisis. She quotes ACS Foundation executive director John Ridge, who said about 20 new companies had started offering scholarships in the past six months even though the economy had turned south.

It’s not directly related, but Jennifer Foreshew’s Overseas hunt for 200 with IT skills also in today’s Australian IT underlines the message that tech workers with the right stuff are not doing it as tough as everyone else these days. In fact, Peoplebank Australia is planning to import between 150 and 200 tech workers this year.