Free Nonsense

“Trumpeterian?... Not really.”

By Nuno Campos*

After the results of the US election, what better thing to do than write an article for the “Free Nonsense” section? That way I can write all the nonsense I want, and surely if I address serious subjects also, no one will notice.

At a time when much is said about building walls, the department where I work, the SAPE [Industry Partnership Service], aims at doing the exact opposite: building bridges, promoting partnerships in and outside the institution.

Promoting synergies, interconnecting profiles, addressing the market – all this is necessary for a research and development institute to be efficient and sustainable and to be committed to its strategy of solving real problems.

Yeah, it’s not exactly funny… so back to Trump! By the way, have you trumpeted Donald? http://trumpdonald.org/ (you’re welcome!).

Generally speaking, INESC TEC hosts geniuses, brainiacs,... intelligent people with great potential to turn “nothing” into “a lot”. That same creativity can also result in “something” or “something great”. Our goal at SAPE is to make those “great things” possible.

Now, back to Trump again… one of the most interesting phenomena in politics is the “Realpolitik”, which consists of applying realism in political management. Deep down, it’s about coming up with ideas and bringing them closer to what is executable and to what stakeholders need. I know this has nothing to do with Trump, but this is in fact what we try to do at SAPE.

As an institution, INESC TEC is becoming more and more international, as has been increasing its presence – through knowledge generation and technological development – in an increasing number of countries and areas of expertise. Moreover, INESC TEC keeps opening its gates to international researchers, trying to promote the dissemination of knowledge… in essence, something that Trump would never do…

The problem with this thing with the candidates is, of course, that there were no suitable alternatives. Sometimes, that “more of the same” thing is not the most convincing solution if we take into consideration the contemporary challenges. For that reason, we at SAPE also want to encourage our genius researchers and try to guarantee that the numb drive and innovation bias are just good ideas in the “trumpetian” idealism. 

In summary, we ate SAPE work hard every day to prevent us from being “trumped”.

Keep up the good work!

*Collaborator at the Industry Partnership Service (SAPE)