Dean Pemberton
TBC
There’s an old saying about not simply giving a person a fish, but instead taking the time to teach them how to fish. The problem is we often stop there. In complex systems, that still isn’t enough. The real multiplier is teaching people how to teach others how to fish. At a time when technology increasingly rewards individual optimisation and personal success, this keynote asks a different question: how do we protect our ability to teach skills into the future while still pushing the boundaries of knowledge, in the same way previous generations did when they landed on the moon or unlocked atomic energy? The answer lies in recognising that prosperity grows when more people are empowered to do their best. Capability scales when we design systems that teach widely, teach deliberately, and teach across generations. This talk explores how capability actually scales (pun intended), and why individual expertise, no matter how impressive, rarely scales on its own. Drawing on years of travelling and teaching technical workshops with the Network Startup Resource Center (NSRC), a consistent pattern emerges. The further people are from easy access to technology, the greater the hunger to learn, build skills, and earn a place in that world. Where access is closer and more assumed, learning is more easily treated as optional, or quietly squandered. From teacher training colleges in remote Bhutan, to Internet exchange points in Laos, to a computer science university in Myanmar where 90 percent of staff and students are women, the contexts differ dramatically. What connects them is not the tools, but the intent: education as a pathway to agency, resilience, and community. Resilient systems don’t come from heroes, hand-offs, or clever fixes. They come from environments where knowledge spreads, judgement is shared, and people are trusted to pass capability on. Skills only endure when they can be taught across generations. The goal of this session is to leave the audience energised and grounded, not because the future feels easy, but because they understand where real leverage lives: building people who can build people.