Not everyone learns the same way. Some people need extensive knowledge and preparation to build their confidence before starting a new task; others prefer to learn through trial and error. Some people learn well in groups while others prefer to learn independently. If you know what your team members prefer, you can offer guidance to each individual. Ask your direct reports what they prefer a hands-on experience or do they prefer some time to think on their own before tying. If you notice someone struggling, ask what you can do that would be most helpful.

Learn how others learn

Letting someone know that you struggled to learn the skill you’re now teaching them can ease the pressure people may feel to "look good" in front of the boss. Stay empathic and keep your past struggles in mind. “I know this is hard, and the fact that I’m here probably makes it harder. Would it help to hear an experience I had struggling to learn something similar and how I got through it?”

Be judicious when comparing your own learning journey

Any new skill is a process of “three steps forward, two steps back,” especially in the early weeks of learning. Agree with your learner when you will check in on progress. for some, it may be every week, and for others, every month may be more appropriate.

Check in periodically

Once you've given someone "a lesson," they may be more sensitive to your scrutiny. You don't want them thinking that every time they present, they'll be evaluated. Rather than letting them become hypervigilant, set expectations about how and when your next observation of their performance will be. When you have observed them, ask how did they feel that went? What would they say went well, and what would they do differently?

Reinforce learning through observation, reflection, and coaching

Great teachers know that learning is a consequence of thinking, not of teaching. Ask open-ended questions to draw out what specifically the person is struggling with. Help them make connections between previous relevant experience and previously developed skills. For example, someone struggling to learn how to write technical content for a non-technical audience: "Tell me about a time when you had to explain your work to a friend or family member who didn't understand it. How did you do it?"

Ask questions to draw out learning needs and reservations

Sometimes it's helpful to demonstrate to learners how something is done. Ask your learner if it would be helpful to demonstrate. Ensure that you're not conveying that this is precisely how they should do it. After you offer a demonstration, ask your learner, "What did you see that was helpful?"

Demonstrate when helpful

If the task you're asking someone to take on has a particular sense of urgency, you will feel a sense of impatience, even frustration, as your learner works to apply new skills. <ul><li>Ensure you have realistic expectations and don't signal disappointment or frustration, as this can interfere with your learner's progress and confidence.</li><li>Maintain a posture of compassion and grace as your learner faces the challenges of building a new skill.</li></ul>

Manage your expectations

Newer leaders sometimes assume their team has the skill or knowledge to successfully carry out the work they have assigned to them. But it may not be the case. Some may be willing to acknowledge their need for help and readily ask for it. Others may not and instead search the internet to instruct them on how to tackle the task. Instead of leaving things to chance, effective leaders can learn to be inspired teachers.

Effective leaders are teachers

Newer leaders sometimes assume their team has the skill or knowledge to successfully carry out the work they have assigned to them, but this may not necessarily be the case. Someone may be struggling with a particular task and might be hesitant to seek out help. To be an inspiring and approachable leader, here’s what you can do: Be a model learner. Be open when you don’t know the answer to a question or the solution to a problem, and acknowledge your mistakes when you are in the wrong. Learn how others learn. Accept that not everyone learns in the same way. Some like to dive in to their tasks right away while others need deeper knowledge and preparation in order to complete the task at hand. Ask questions to draw out learning needs and reservations. Open-ended questions can help you decipher what a person on your team may be struggling with. Help them build their confidence. Be judicious when comparing your own learning journey. Share moments where you struggled to learn the skill you are now teaching, but not in a way that diminishes their struggle. Demonstrate when helpful, but always check in with your learner first by asking, “Would it be helpful for me to demonstrate this for you?” Reinforce learning through observation, reflection, and coaching. Once you’ve given someone a lesson, they may be more sensitive to your scrutiny as they practice mastering their new skill or task. Set expectations about how and when your next observation of their performance will happen. Manage your expectations. It’s important to remember to not signal disappointment or frustration as this may hinder your learner’s progress as well as confidence. Check in periodically. Having regular check-ins signals to your learner that you care about their progress, and remain available to support, affirm, and coach them as needed.

career

Career

education

Learning & Education

leadershipandmanagement

Leadership & Management

To Be a Good Manager, You Have to Be a Good Teacher

<ul><li>Break down the big strategic goal into questions relating to different parts of your operations or business process. This will help to anchor the strategy-devising process within the organisation.</li><li>Come up with questions rather than searching for answers. This can reveal hidden possibilities and angles you may not have thought of.</li></ul> This exercise will result in a series of sub-questions grouped by subject area.

Break it down

Take a strict look at what your clients really want. Instead of drawing up customer profiles, companies should consider what individuals wish to achieve in that specific circumstance. <ul><li>The entire organisation should be involved in the strategy development process, not just the corporate strategy team.</li><li>The process of devising and revising strategy should be continuous. Define the ultimate outcome, then continually adjust and adapt the strategy.</li><li>Companies should define their goal, but the strategy for achieving that end state should not be fixed.</li></ul>

How to rethink strategy

The past few years have produced unprecedented disruptions, and companies find it near impossible to plan for the future. Such a volatile environment needs a new approach to strategy. It requires an approach that relies less on looking at what the company can do and more on imagining what it could do.

Turning a world of uncertainty into a world of possibility

Identify which strategic options from the previous step best deliver on each of the sub-questions. <ol><li>Define what success looks like for the process in question,</li><li>then run the new solution in parallel to the existing one.</li></ol> When the alternative solution outperforms the incumbent one, shelve the existing process. Continuously challenge existing solutions. For each process, ask:<ol><li>Is this part of our true value proposition?</li><li>Do we have the capabilities and resources to master this area?</li></ol> Only do the things for which you can answer yes to both questions.

Identify the best options

The first step is to find your big audacious goal to stretch your business and expand its value creation. A key source of inspiration can be customer problems and desires, which change all the time. Ask them what they want instead of guessing. Also ask other stakeholders for new ideas - investors, government bodies, local communities, and employees.

Find the big audacious goal

Take each sub-question and generate ideas and strategic options. You no longer think about the questions but look for strategic ideas. Look at what top performers in your own industry and elsewhere do.

Generate ideas

strategy

Strategy

problemsolving

Problem Solving

4 Steps to Creating a Strategy in an Uncertain World

Peer coaching can consist of pairs, triads, or small groups of participants that meet in person or remotely. Sessions start with goal-setting and end with action planning. These sessions can address organisational issues, specific skill development priorities, and more. Key questions:<ol><li>What do we want to accomplish during this session?</li><li>What have we learned from this session?</li><li>What next steps will we take?</li></ol>

How peer coaching works

<ul><li>Leaders will emerge if they are given the right environment. Peer to peer coaching can help to create that environment.</li><li>Create a process to identify peer coaching participants.</li><li>Offer to onboard new participants.</li><li>Consider using a group facilitator in the beginning to help set expectations and ground rules.</li><li>Encourage participants to commit to a risk-free, nonjudgmental, and psychologically safe environment.</li><li>Create opportunities for peer coaching groups to share accomplishments with their primary teams.</li><li>Place an end date on each round of peer coaching.</li></ul>

Guidelines for a successful peer coaching program

Peer coaching involves colleagues with the same level of experience and position to commit to helping each other by sharing insights, feedback, and best practices. Peer coaching can play an important role in building a resilient, high-performing organization while allowing remote workers to connect and engage with one another from afar.

Peer coaching

<ul><li>Participants gain an outside perspective of their own performance and receive accountability.</li><li>The cross-functional relationships that are formed create a support network that participants can rely on to help them solve problems.</li><li>Peer coaching helps develop skills that lead to greater efficiency and productivity.</li><li>Peer coaches learn to collaborate and communicate effectively.</li><li>Participants learn to give and receive feedback in a constructive way.</li><li>They build confidence and leadership skills, such as empathy and social awareness.</li></ul>

The benefits of peer coaching for individuals and organizations

Accepting feedback gracefully and changing behaviours accordingly do not come naturally to most people. It may be because feedback hasn't been presented in an effective way. Peer coaching is entirely dependent on the free exchange of actionable feedback. It can only work if all parties feel safe and have each other's best interest at heart.

The importance of learning how to give and receive feedback 

Peer coaching shares some practices with mentoring programs that pair experienced employees with junior ones for professional development. <ul><li>However, mentoring is a one-way relationship between people on different hierarchical levels.</li><li>Peer coaching is two-way, with participants on the same level and equally giving and receiving to help each other grow.</li></ul>

Peer coaching is similar to mentoring

In some organisations, peer coaching is an inherent aspect of a team’s culture and happens organically. Other organisations implement a more formal structure, with defined requirements for serving as a peer coach and sessions held on a regular schedule. Ideally, peer coaching becomes ingrained in organisational culture with or without a formal program.

Ways to implement peer coaching

Peer coaching can play a key role in building high-performing teams, while allowing remote workers to connect with one another from afar. 

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Personal Development

communication

Communication

business

Business

The power of peer coaching (and how to do it well)

Initially, the tech company was the lean, innovative underdog that took on the powerful status quo to free the consumer from how they viewed ideas, institutions and service delivery. But tech can no longer claim that. The so-called tech disruptors of today have unchallenged access, funding, and regulatory support. Disruption is sold as a one-way street where technology can change a social space if it is static but can't be changed in return. Yet, today's disruption is happening through users and networks, not tech companies.

Technological disruption

The promise of disruption is much restrained by terms set by tech companies themselves. Companies increasingly try to prevent the ability to use and build upon existing technologies in ways that the original company does not approve of. However, tech is never the first or last mover of change. It is just one of the forces within a complex social world. To design better technology means to take it out of the centre. Technology that responds to people's needs sees users as more than just passive recipients will be best able to harness its power.

The promise of disruption

Grab and Gojek were mobility platforms meant to disrupt the city's existing motorbike taxi market by creating a driver workforce that was anonymised. Instead, the Grab and Gojek drivers used WhatsApp to create thousands of DIY community spaces. Loose driver groups changed into independent, cross-company communities that were organised by drivers for drivers. Yet, this type of disruption is not considered as such. Tech companies label Uber as an innovative disruption while motorbike taxis that provide a similar service are deemed dangerous or chaotic.

Example of disruption

There's a wave of innovation led by users and networks, not tech companies.

There's a wave of innovation that we're failing to recognize—and it's being led by users and networks, not tech companies.

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Technology & The Future

entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship

creativity

Creativity

startup

Startups

‘Disruption’ Is a Two-Way Street

It is important to understand the difference between knowledge-telling and knowledge building. <ul><li>Knowledge-telling is a shallow engagement with knowledge, generally by reading or memorising without analysing or reflecting.</li><li>Knowledge-building is engaging deeply with study material by analysing it in-depth and looking at it from various angles.</li></ul>

Knowledge-telling and knowledge-building

“Education with inert ideas is not only useless: it is, above all things, harmful—Corruptio optimi, pessima [the corruption of the best is the worst of all].”

Bloom's taxonomy describes six major types of abilities based on educational goals:<ul><li>Remembering: Recalling the relevant information from long-term memory.</li><li>Understanding information: Interpreting it, summarising, explaining, and giving relevant examples.</li><li>Application: Implementing information.</li><li>Analysing, such as organising it and understanding how these parts relate to each other.</li><li>Evaluating: Critiquing the information and making relevant judgments.</li><li>Creating new things based on the information.</li></ul>

Six types of abilities in the context of educational goals

Inert knowledge is learning information without understanding it, which means you have a limited ability to recognise, express or use it. <ul><li>For example, memorising a math formula without understanding its meaning or implication. Students can learn stuff, pass examinations, and not understand what they have memorised.</li><li>Inert knowledge in language learning is memorising a grammatical rule without understanding what the rule means or how to use it.</li></ul>

Inert knowledge: Learning without understanding

The person knows something, but doesn't understand it, and can't do much with it. <ul><li>They don't understand what the knowledge means, its implications, or how it connects to other knowledge.</li><li>When it's presented in different ways or contexts, they do not recognise it.</li><li>They are unable to apply it in practice or don't know how to use it when there are minor adjustments.</li></ul>

When knowledge is considered inert

There are two main approaches in education to avoid inert knowledge: Teach in a way that encourages the development of active knowledge. When teaching students about a certain concept,<ul><li>help them to understand what it means,</li><li>how it connects to other things, and</li><li>how to apply the information in practice.</li></ul> Encourage people to learn in a way that encourages the development of active knowledge.<ul><li>Explain the concept of inert knowledge to students.</li><li>Explain why it is a problem</li><li>Encourage them to ask themselves guiding questions when they learn new material.</li></ul>

Avoiding inert knowledge in education

“You need facts to make sense; they are the basis for understanding, but they are never enough. Inertia as pathology describes those states of mind where people come to know something but simply can’t go beyond the facts, can’t synthesize them, think with them, or apply them in another situation.”

To Be a Good Manager, You Have to Be a Good Teacher

4 Steps to Creating a Strategy in an Uncertain World

The power of peer coaching (and how to do it well)

It's time to Read like a Pro.

‘Disruption’ Is a Two-Way Street

It's time to
Read like a Pro.