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| In the heart of Death Star House, the Unifying Calendar of Everything |
I recently received a little gift from the Economic and Social Research Council’s chief executive, Paul Boyle.
“I am pleased to attach a report,” he wrote, “which
summarises the general progress that has been made under the council’s demand
management strategy, along with a digest of statistics for your own
institution, which I hope you will find useful.”
For me, a data-fixated research manager, this was a very
welcome present. Here, I hoped, was evidence of the value of our internal
peer-review system. Here were hard facts. Here, I hoped, was something to crow
about.
Unfortunately, the data presented by the ESRC obfuscated
as much as they illuminated.
