Editorial

Citation

French, N. (2013), "Editorial", Journal of Property Investment & Finance, Vol. 31 No. 6. https://doi.org/10.1108/jpif.2013.11231faa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Journal of Property Investment & Finance, Volume 31, Issue 6

A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing (Wilde, 1892) Lady Windermere’s Fan.

The great thing about getting older is that, not only do we have more experience and knowledge, but we also have the comfortable reference point of “it wasn’t like that in my day”. And whilst I can honestly say that I have never said that about the music of today, in a professional sense, I am seeing things change quite rapidly in both teaching and research. And whilst, my own experiences are predominantly UK based, I know that from talking with my international colleagues that the observations that follow are the same worldwide, to a lesser or greater extent. I am also aware that the subsequent comments do, probably, qualify me for the title of “grumpy old man”.

With regards to university teaching, I have now been teaching for over 30 years. And, of those 30, for 22 of those years I have been Course Director of one-year postgraduate programmes. In that time, I have seen that the amount of work required of the students to obtain a degree has lessened, if not year by year, with a constant trend. Looking at the assessment regime of the first MSc programme that I ran in 1990, today (at all UK Universities) we are asking for only (say) 60 percent of that previously required. In my mind, less coursework and less examination leads to less work and less understanding. But it is a battle to keep standards high. I have no doubt that students today are as bright and as keen as they have ever been but there is definitely a change in the way they expect to learn. The term “reading for a degree” has pretty much become a redundant term. It is almost impossible to get students to read. They have come through an education system where they have been rewarded marks for repetition and the statement of facts. What they have never been taught is how to think. Yet, critical thinking is what they need in the real world. We are failing our students if we do not teach them to think. We all know that clients do not pay purely for the repetition of data. Whilst collating data is useful, it is the value added by interpretation and expert opinion that determines the reputation of the property professional. The expert needs to determine trends, understand markets, identify the impact of market drivers and proffer advice. These are skills that are frequently missing when students leave University. And whilst it is appreciated that these are skills that are eventually imbued in them during their formative working years, it is very different to how it used to be and very different, in my opinion, of how it should be.

And it is not just industry that is being affected by this lack of critical thinking. Academic research is suffering equally. As well as having taught from a very early age, I was also, thanks to the Founding Editor of The Journal of Property Valuation[1], Andrew Baum, I have been involved with reviewing academic papers from my early 20s. Admittedly, to begin with my editing was more that of a copy editor but over time I developed the skill of reading academic papers, even if peripheral to my own area of expertise, with a critical eye. Indeed, for the majority of my time as Editor of this journal, I have been the initial gatekeeper as I only send papers for review if I feel that the papers are of a suitable quality for review by our Editorial Board. Up until only a few years ago, I might have returned one or two papers a year because the quality was not sufficiently high. Today, it is, maybe, one paper per month. And most of those rejects relate to papers from young academics that have recently completed their PhDs, Indeed, I have had to create a new standard reject letter that says:

Before I can send this paper for review, you will need to incorporate more of the existing literature and a full exposition in your introduction and conclusions on why your paper is important. Your conclusions should be a substantive part of the paper. It may be a strong quantitative analysis but I can’t pass it for review in its current form as I know that the Editorial Board will want to see evidence on how the analysis and the results can be applied in practice.

In other words, the same lacunae of critical thinking and understanding that affects the work of some recent graduates manifests itself in the research papers of the new generation of academics. This is partly due to the way in which they are now educated; albeit you would hope that having undertaken a PhD that this impact is significantly lessened. But it is also because of the way in which research is now judged. Quantitative research is seen to be more worthy than qualitative research and, as such, the vast majority of papers submitted to this journal, and others, have a numerical bent. In itself, that is not an issue. My own interest in an academic life was fuelled by reading the numerical based papers of my university’s tutors. In particular, the papers and books by Andrew Baum and Peter Byrne (amongst others) sculptured my view of what should be considered as good academic writing. Clear, easy to read and erudite with insights and conclusions that say something new. They might be quantitative in nature but they tell a story and provide an overview of why the findings of the paper are important and their likely impact in practice.

I am not alone in this view, Newell (2012) highlighted the same issue by saying:

Some of the best papers that I have read are not embedded in excessive financial methodology, but are simple incisive papers in key areas of property. Some of the worst papers that I have read are so embedded in excessive financial methodology that I have no idea what they are trying to show.

The new generation of researchers need to understand that running financial models on a new property data set is, in itself, not worthy of publication. The authors must inform the reader of impact of their findings and why the results are important. Just as clients pay property consultants for insights and added value, the same should be expected of published academic work. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, there is a difference between knowing a number and knowing its importance.

Nick French

Note

1. The Journal of Valuation was the original name of this journal, the Journal of Property Investment & Finance.