As learners, we should do everything we can to give ourselves a better chance to change our brains when trying to learn new skills. Learning about neuroplasticity and the best way to encourage that brain state would be a good place to start, and then we can move on with our lifetime of learning.
One of the things I have talked about for years regarding college education is that, by its nature, it will always be behind. Think about it. You start a four-year degree program to learn technology skills. By the time you complete the four years and maybe even an advanced degree, everything you’ve learned is outdated. Technology changes that quickly. You enter a workplace using the next versions of everything you know. A version you don’t know much about because it’s so new that college programs haven’t even started incorporating it yet.
And by “so new,” I’m saying it’s been updated within the last few years.
I’ve also spoken to some in-house trainers who see this up close. People come to them because they lack some knowledge and hope the training will help them because their manager hasn’t given them clear direction. They don’t realize that they haven’t been getting a clear direction. They assume there is some skill or knowledge they are missing. Where do you go when there’s a skill you need? To Training and Development!
But the trainer can’t give you that clear direction about your job. That has to come from your manager.
I completely agree with this assessment of how we’ve defined “management” in the past:
“Historically, corporate America’s approach to management has been:
Push management as the only track for career growth
Promote top individual contributors to manage
Provide little to no training
This is true. If you’re struggling to find new hires, you need to grow the people you have to take on more, and you don’t grow them without a plan on how to do that.
It would help if you had a talent development plan. Without it, you’ll find increasingly essential roles in your organization with no one to do the work.
That doesn’t seem like a good situation.
I was part of a conversation at work recently about giving good presentations, and the art of telling a story was a big part of the discussion. Stories matter. Whether giving a presentation, pitching a new idea, making a sale, or training customers, the story brings people along to what we’re trying to tell them. The story puts everything in context. When I’m training, it’s the stories about how we used that technology to make things easier or what happened when we failed to properly use the technology that helps people understand the “why.”.