Ladies and Gentlemen........

Ladies and gentlemen, the 2011 Bioconference saw a significant turn out from public as well as NUS faculty, staff, and students. Below are a few of my thoughts on the conference which contain many scientific implications for organizational interactions and behaviors.


I was rudely surprised Brad didn't show up when the well-known scholars from famous American and British faculties of genetic engineering, anthropology, sociology, psychology, neurobiology, evolution science, were sharing and discussing their expert knowledge on organizational interactions and behaviors; and at no cost with NUS students, staff, and the public! Guess what? I was seated in the back row of the lecture hall and being filled up with rarefied information on interactions including but NOT LIMITED TO----both interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships in the workplace, which the scholars say have an evolutionary social, economic, anthropological, political and EVEN BIOLOGICAL (NEURO AND PHYSICAL) basis that was first seen outside the workplace in more personal spaces of life.




To be honest, the ORAL PRESENTATIONS they gave to share their knowledge were breathtakingly high level, in terms of not only the content and structure, but also in eloquence, composure, confidence; and especially the high degree of language expression and vocabulary used that as I observed are so frequently associated with native English speakers from those superpower ‘Western’ countries.(you should know what I mean by western do you?). You could never get any minister of Singapore, or even the Singaporean with the best English language proficiency in spoken and written language expression and vocabulary, to express (speak ideas) as NATURAL and UNINHIBITED, without thinking twice ever what next few words to string in a rhetoric; simply because they, and you and I Singaporeans aren’t native enough to written AND ESPECIALLY SPOKEN English of the linguistics, style, enunciation, ways of expression of those superpower states.

For instance I remembered so clearly one of the ‘western’ panel experts, who became my overall favorite speaker of the day, for speaking smooth as silk (not fast mind you, but smooth is something different, something to do with style of expression). And I observed his smoothness lay in his perfect locution in which he expressed just like the way I have seen most academia or work professionals of native ‘Western’ origin.

Let me give an example of a few such expressions, which Singaporean subjects like you and I will deem unfit for formal speech and therefore not even dare to say it out in a formal presentation for only being appropriate in an expository or argumentative essay: but the native English speakers would speak the way they write, not as in word for word, but more in the form of the language expression----the creative ways they beautifully string words in a speech in many different kinds of orders that would obviously sound very good (good expert first, then only you can feel good smooth) to the untrained ears of non-native speakers like us Singaporeans. Ok without further ado, here go a few examples of superb language (speech) expression on a range of issues from anthropology to neurobiology and evolutionary biology and genetic engineering. Phrases are mostly word for word based on sharp memorization, unless otherwise stated.


1. “The problem with management in today’s organizations is their obsession with the bottomline, they want to increase productivity yet not be willing to give nap times for their workers in the afternoon who are the ones to help them achieve that productivity by being well-rested and ready to go. Well can’t they see the workers productivity is the extent to which they achieve the productivity?” (Only I and a few ‘Western’ visiting academics managed a chuckle for having captured this final pithy statement made here, while the rest of the Singaporean audience comprising of supposedly more rhetorically adjusted business and arts and social science students remained NONCHALENT to my shock. At first I had thought I was the person out of his mind for being the odd one finding the statement mirthful; but now I know about the ones who were inexcusably found wanting.)

2. “Positive organization behavior------what does that mean? Well the mutual care and trust it creates and helps elevate in organizational environments; the oxytocin, the building bridges and welfare it prompts; for all of these positive organizational behaviors cultivate.” (Again one can see the spoken conventions of fluent native English speakers right here, which become unconvention if spoken by Singaporeans in front of Singaporeans in some formal presentation or otherwise, for coming across as aloof, deviant, and crackpot! Singaporean context would demand Singaporean style of stringing sentences to an expression which I find very odd and hard on my ears these days after having listened to native speakers of English speak so well. It’s all well and fine to speak in Singaporean English style for boys in the army, but if you are speaking in a presentation, you odd to learn from the native masters of English expression both written and spoken, and this is different from asking you to produce all the range of American or British accents!!! NO!!!!! I am talking about the language expression of the words that they speak and create and string in sentences, not so much the voice-tones and accents.

3. This whole paragraph here is PURELY MY OWN STATEMENT and the sense I can achieve after listening to the lectures on workplace interactions.

You need to see that our neurobiology originated from that of hunter-gatherers, and it was a very basic and rudimentary heuristic for a small-knit community of only 40 or 50; perhaps 100; 150 to 200 upwards at most. And so we develop this strong trait of affiliation; we are built, from the evolutionary biological standpoint, to identify strongly with people closest to our ingroups; in other words we take a natural suspicion towards outgroups, and organizational management need to recognize that if they are to create mutually building relationships all-round at all levels of the hierarchy; where each level of the hierarchy is not only one ingroup unto itself, but one more outgroup unto other ingroups in other hierachies, they need to find a way to identify among groups; which is difficult but not outright impossible, or find a more inter-divisional structure and goal of organization and management that fit all groups.


4. “If you were to put a stranger next to some other stranger in an elevator with small confine spaces, he would almost certainly feel a certain level of self-awareness or self-consciousness which is indicative of some discomfort. Now ladies and gentlemen, I’m not saying it’s wrong to feel uncomfortable or is there anything abnormal about your feeling uncomfortable, because by evolutionary and neuro biology, that is the most natural feeling in the world. I just don’t want you to next time feel uncomfortable about feeling uncomfortable!” (The last statement here again demonstrates a very original language (spoken) expression that sets in motion in you the feeling of good confidence, eloquence, smoothness, of the speaker. It is times and statements at strategic positions in an oral presentation like these that really attract the attention of your audience, presuming your audience are themselves very good native English speakers and writers like perhaps Brad, for the half-choked English of the Vietnamese and even Singaporean locals or otherwise can NEVER find any attractive value in the language expression of the native English speakers if they cannot understand or catch the gist of an idea output in its expression. I’m also not saying I have any grievances about my classmates' Singaporean English ways of expression, both speaking and writing, for I once came from such a state of decrepit too. We all grow and learn.


5. This last statement here is mine, again gleaned over and summarize from the lecture in pithy sentences that show the sort of native genius of language expression of ‘Westerners’:

“Rewards and benefits tend to find the wrong kinds of leaders, because real leaders do not seek for the rewards and benefits of their leaderships, or vice versa; which follows if real leaders had any reward or benefit associated with their positions of authority, they deflect them all away so that they become equally redistributed amongst the ruled for their reward and benefit instead.”


Buenas senoras y senores