The perils of spoon feeding
In knowledge work, it is often tempting to oversimplify or tell someone else what to do and how to do it. This leaves little room for experimentation, learning and growth.
When it comes to learning new skills in knowledge work (see: Learning to learn or learning for a purpose?) people often think the following will help…
- a prescriptive set of best practices (in knowledge work, most of your work is either complex or complicated, and so best practices do not work)
- completing a short course / training and certification (we know from how the brain learns and remembers that you are unlikely to retain much of the information you learn in a 2-day course unless you take thoughtful notes, summarize, and put the learnings into your work / share with your colleagues etc.)
- a checklist to follow (checklists don’t work for complex or complicated work, however they can be used as a high-level procedure to check things off)
- a lengthy set of instructions (also known as a run book, these are often error prone and are best acting a set of requirements to automate a process instead)
- a combination of the above
There are other ineffective approaches I’ve likely forgotten; in this case I’m trying to be concise. One of the things that I see most often is a lack of context specific learning and practices. Specifically, I am referring to the domains from the Cynefin framework.
In order to decide how to respond, you need to know what context you are in, all work is not created equal and in knowledge work there is usually a group of people who are comfortable and used to working a certain way because that is how they have learned to do things either through formal education, courses or on the job. When someone’s way of working changes (either through their own or someone else's choosing), their whole can be tipped upside down. When this happens, how you respond and the guidance that you give can be potentially dangerous even if you have the best of intentions.
Anti-Patterns to look out for
- people asking for checklists (e.g. people need to know how to do their jobs and the checklists will help them remember how to do it.)
- people asking for overly specific examples of things when they are being introduced to a new concept (e.g. OKRs, ‘show me a very specific example that is just like my context’)
- people responding that you are being very theoretical, and they want more practical guidance (e.g. When you learn any new domain, you are bound to feel uncomfortable when something confronts your existing knowledge)
These types of changes can be hard for anyone, therefore people who understand change suggest things like ‘invite over inflict’ (Sooner Safer Happier) so that the individuals are the ones doing the exploration. The acceptance rate of anything new is far more palatable when people are motivated to learn.
In large companies, this can be a challenge in times of change. Organizations are often incentivized to get things done and start showing results. Organizations sometimes mistake change management with project / program management and therefore end up treating transformation like it is a project you deliver and then wind down at the end of a 2-year period. What people don’t often appreciate is once you go down the path of changing your ways of working, it never ends.
You do not simply learn Scrum and have them work in cross-functional teams and you are done. If only it was that easy!
One uncomfortable aspect is that we are in an ambiguous / uncertain world, the people teaching / sharing cannot answer all your questions. They can show you the door and you are going to have to walk through it. Changing ways of working is a journey, not a destination. The people teaching should be helping people how to learn, how to experiment and how to improve over time as a team.
Give people the tools and context (I do not mean JIRA), don’t give people the solutions. It is easy to tell people what to do, especially when you’ve seen things repeatedly, however, very rarely does that instruction stick and embed in a way that cultivates continuous learning and growth.
Was there a point?
As responsible practitioners and avid learners, take into consideration that there are no magic pills or silver bullets. All of this is challenging, and it requires effort, exploration, and learning. If you aren’t interested in learning new things, you are going to be in for a challenging ride. Remember that learning is key to getting better and you cannot learn just by reading books, work with your peers, get a mentor and get practicing. Then finally, pay it forward and share what you learn with others!
