The best talks I ever saw live happened in the same conference. It was the IPPN conference in 2012. Imagine this as a lineup – Mary Robinson, who needs no introduction; Michael Fullan, one of the world’s greatest thinkers in education; Ben Waldon, a Shakespearean actor who tours the world giving talks on leadership; and David Puttnam, the film director and a former advisor on education to the UK government. They don’t make conferences like that anymore. The reason I bring this conference up is because of the last name I brought up, David Puttnam, who was talking about educational leadership at the time. While many have said it since, it was the first time I heard somebody say “the children we are teaching today will be doing jobs that do not yet exist.” Ten years later, we are starting to see the saplings of these seeds emerging. For example, there was no such thing as a social media influencer or an eSports coach, never mind a podcast producer! In this episode, I want to tell you about my dream job. It is one that also doesn’t exist. Yet. And if I were the Minister for Education, I’d not only be creating the job, I’d be quitting my ministry and taking it on myself!
