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11.09
Olympic Games Venue
By Terrance Malkinson
The
Olympic Games
are considered to be one of the world’s premier
athletic events. Rooted in history, the first
Olympic Games can be traced back to 776 BC. In
1960, Olympic-style games for athletes with a
disability were organized for the first time in
Rome and today an agreement between the
International Olympic Committee and the
International Paralympic Committee reaffirmed
that the Paralympic Games will always take place
shortly after the Olympic Games using the same
sporting venues and facilities. Headquartered in
Lausanne Switzerland, the IOC has a number of
important roles which encourage and support the
organization, development and coordination of
fair and equitable global sports.
Summer and winter games are held
every four years in a different location in the
world determined through a competitive bidding
process. Twenty winter and 26 summer games have been
held. Hosting the
Olympics is a complex and very expensive public
project beginning with preparing the bid. Venues
must be built, infrastructure must be improved,
and housing must be provided by the successful
bidder. Additionally, there is the consideration
of the long-term utility and economic
sustainability of complex and large facilities
after the Games have finished.
The
questions arises: "Is it in the best interest to
continue the process of constructing a massive
new venue for every game? One alternative
might be creating a permanent Olympic venue for
each of the Summer and Winter games. Once built,
it would never again be necessary to repeatedly
build duplicate and very expensive
infrastructure. The question arises where would
these two locations be and who would finance the
construction? There are many precedent examples
of global organizations that have a permanent
geographic basis of operation that is
financially supported by the world community.
With this model, scarce financial
resources could be used in other ways such as to
developing the human resources of athletics
including training of coaches, athletics
research, and scholarships for deserving
athletes.
What do you think? Would it be
better to reduce the cost of repetitive Olympic
construction by building two permanent venues
for the Summer and Winter Olympic events?
Further Reading
Other Bytes
Here are some of the things
going on in and around the engineering
community:
-
Three best
practices for handling the challenges
associated with an overseas assignment are
discussed by Mark Clouse and Michael Watkins
in: "Three Keys to Getting an Overseas
Assignment Right” (Harvard Business
Review, 87(10): 115-119, October 2009,
www.hbr.org). Following an opening
discussion of the challenges and
opportunities presented by an overseas
assignment the authors discuss three best
practices which include: establishing family
support, building credibility and openness,
and understanding the new regulatory
environment that you are operating in.
-
The cover story
in The Economist (392: #8650, 26 September
2009,
www.economist.com) is a special 19-page
report on telecoms in emerging markets —
"The Power of Mobile Money." Articles focus
on how new communication technologies are
beneficially transforming developing
countries to the benefit of their citizens.
This is a high growth area which is now
experiencing greater growth than that in the
developed countries. Interestingly one of
the reasons why mobile phones are so
valuable to people in the developing
countries is that they are providing
wireless access to telecommunications for
the very first time bypassing building wired
infrastructure. Trends, including the rise
of home grown mobile operators, telecom
equipment maker growth, and the development
of new phone-based services are discussed.
-
"Roughing up
the Middle Class: How Work, Savings, and
Marriage Get Punished” is the feature in
Forbes. (184 (6): 88-93, 5 October 2009,
www.forbes.com). Janet Novack and
Stephane Fitch provide stories of
middle-class Americans who are discovering
that chasing the pay raise or second
paycheck doesn’t always mean living better.
They raise the question that that perhaps it
is time to work less.
-
In a series of
five articles the October 2009 issue of
Harvard Business Review (87-10)
discusses risk. Articles include "Managing
Risk in the New World," "Mapping Your Fraud
Risks," "The Six Mistakes Executives Make in
Risk Management," How Vulnerable is your
Business to Consumer Debt?" and "Making the
Financial Markets Safe."
-
Technology has
enormous benefits however it is important to
learn how to use these tools effectively in
a way that they do not take over the
workplace through distractions and
interruptions. Geraldine Market provides you
with strategies to maintain or regain
control of your time in Training and
Development (63(9): 68-69, September
2009,
www.astd.org/TD).
-
In challenging
economic times it is difficult to be
optimistic. Peter Coy in "The Case for
Optimism (BusinessWeek #4144, pp.
40-46, 24 August 2009,
www.businessweek.com) discusses the
importance of no matter how pessimistic you
might feel that you owe it to yourself to at
least consider the case for optimism. The
author believes that practical people
"should open their minds to opportunities to
be seized upon just as much as to the
dangers to be dodged." An interesting time
line is provided entitled "A Brief History
of Optimism."
-
Hospital health
care costs can be expensive. David Whelan
discusses in "Cut Your Doctor Bill” how to
get yourself a deal (Forbes,
184(2):62-64, 3 August 3 2009,
www.forbes.com). Strategies and stories
of people who successfully negotiated a
lower bill are provided. An inset is
provided of websites that publish the prices
of medical procedures which might help you
when negotiating.
Terrance
Malkinson is a communications specialist,
business analyst and futurist. He is Vice-Chair
of the IEEE-USA Communications Committee, an
international correspondent for IEEE-USA
Today's Engineer Online, editor-in-chief of
IEEE-USA Today's Engineer Digest, and
associate editor for IEEE Canadian Review.
He was an elected Senator of the University of
Calgary and an elected Governor of the IEEE
Engineering Management Society as well as an
elected Administrative Committee member of the
IEEE Professional Communication Society. He has
been the editor of several IEEE conference
proceedings, and past editor of IEEE
Engineering Management. He is the author of
more than 360 publications, and is an
accomplished triathlete. His career path
includes being an accomplished technical
supervisor and medical researcher at the
University of Calgary a business proposal
manager for the General Electric Company, and an
associate for Sears Canada Inc. Currently, he is
with the School of Health and Public
Safety/Applied Research and Innovation Services
at SAIT Polytechnic in Calgary Canada.
The author is
grateful to the professional support of the
Haskayne School of Business Library at the
University of Calgary. He can be reached at
todaysengineer@ieee.org.
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