Category Archives: Learning

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What Should You Study to Be More Valuable in the Workforce?

webucatorWith so much recent talk and public debate about education as our path to prosperity, I was asked recently by a career training program what I believed were some key areas of focus students should pursue to assure job readiness. While I hardly consider myself a subject matter expert in this complex arena, the question certainly got me thinking about what I am looking for when I hire or when I recommend people for open positions. Here are three items I hope are obvious, but unfortunately may not be obvious enough.

Critical Thinking: These two words are so overused and misunderstood they are becoming clichés even before they are broadly adopted in practice. When I advocate critical thinking, I am talking about the ability to apply abstraction to a real-world problem, wrestle with the alternatives and implications in abstraction, and then synthesize the relevant tangents to a firm set of hypotheses that can be tested against the original problem. Here’s an example: Suppose the sales on your company’s website are trending poorly after a period of hyper growth and you are tasked with attacking the problem. The first thing I want you to do is abstract the problem, noting all the possible reasons sales could be down from seasonality to price to competition to product selection—you name it, the variables are endless. Now I want you to challenge your own reasoning against every one of those possibilities as they might apply in other real-word scenarios that are similar to yet somewhat different from your own business, whether it’s storefront sales or online sales in a different industry segment. Next I want you to narrow the possibilities to a set of concepts you can test so you are not boiling the ocean for an answer. Then of course I want you to act, where acting means collecting data that proves or disproves your hypotheses so you can make a recommendation. Studying math, science, philosophy, or the arts can help you learn critical thinking, but I promise you when you enter the workplace, the number of people you find who are really good at this will always be too few. That’s an opportunity for you to shine!

Fast Iteration: Coming directly down the path from critical thinking is fast iteration. What this means is that after you abstract a problem, you don’t have an endless amount of time to serve up your practical solution—competition is always coming at you without pause. You may have heard the phrase, “fail fast, fail often.” This is a mantra of Silicon Valley culture, where failure is often encouraged if it results in learning that can be applied. Fast iteration means framing a rough solution for a problem, testing it in application, reading the data and interpreting it quickly, and then putting a new version of your solution to test that incorporates the results of your prior test. Sometimes you’ll hear this referred to as A/B testing or multivariate testing. This is a fancy way of saying take something that sort of works, make a change of one kind or another, send some of your customers to the original version and others to the new version and see which one performs better. Then take the knowledge of what performs better and repeat the cycle, with a champion version of the work being the best one you have and the challenger being one where changes are being made. This cycle continues endlessly, and the faster you can make changes and test new assumptions, the faster you will make continual progress. Want to know what you should learn from science labs like chemistry and physics? Learn this method of inquiry. It can help you sell shoes, put rockets into outer space, cure disease, or make better ice cream.

Results-Driven Teamwork: This one flows nicely from fast iteration. I don’t care if you are the smartest person in the room if you can’t work well with others. Even if you are the smartest person in the room, you still can’t get things done as quickly as a small team of people who are all reasonably smart. We used to time people playing a really difficult computer game that would take the average person about 40 hours to solve alone. Two people could solve it together in about 25 hours. Three people could solve it in about 10 hours. Four people could solve it in about 3 hours. Funny enough, adding more than four people created diminishing returns, which also brings its own learning. The point is there is exponential leverage in putting teams against projects to work together by exchanging ideas and challenging each other’s thinking to move at lightning speed past dead ends and serve up new ideas that can be vetted and recalculated with extraordinary results. Most complicated challenges in the workplace today are broken down and resolved by individuals sharing ideas and refining plans, not so much resolving design by committee as building consensus through collaboration. Software engineering is a good example of this, as libraries can be compiled from contributors all over the world, many of whom you might never meet in person. You can learn this skill participating in team sports, playing in an orchestra, performing in a play, or being on the debate team—anywhere you have to be great at what you are doing, but the whole result is beyond what you could do on your own. That’s today’s workplace, a collection of specialized talents interacting as an empowered collective.

Obviously this is not meant to be a comprehensive framework for anyone’s curriculum, but I think if you embrace concepts like these, you will put yourself on a path to being a lifelong learner. Make no mistake: If you want to be successful, learning only begins in school. What you most need to learn from formal instruction is how to continue your learning on the job and off the job. If you learn how to learn again and again, your core skills will never become obsolete because you will be continually replenishing them year after year. Remember also the intangible values and qualities you bring into the workforce are as or more important than your learned skills. Think resilience, perseverance, integrity, flexibility, openness, honesty, and a positive attitude. More than a prestigious diploma, what you need to take from school is the ability to think on your feet, work well with others, embrace nonstop change, and never consider your learning mission complete.

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When Reunions Work

High school and college reunions can be terrifying. When former classmates tell you that “you look the same,” how can that be? It might be a nice way of saying you look marvelous now, but does it also mean you looked 30 years older than you were back then? Does anyone really want to hear this? Does anyone really want to be in a conversation where looks come up at all? Or lifetime accomplishments? Or lack of lifetime accomplishments? Or thinly veiled comparisons of someone else’s bragging rights to your own?Paul Simon Art Garfunkel

Suppose it didn’t have to be that way. Suppose there was another way to do a reunion that was enlightening, uplifting, and actually fun. I’ve recently returned from one of those, and I wanted to share what I thought made it a success, along with the last few I attended.

Don’t focus on the then, focus on the next-to-be.

Reminiscing is not that interesting. If you’re like most people, it gets old quickly. At the college reunion I just attended, I found myself spending almost no time talking about the good ol’ days (or the not-so-good ol’ days). I spent most of my time talking about the future, what dreams and plans people currently have and how they are setting out to realize them. It was almost uncanny how little we talked about ourselves as 20-year-old people decades ago and how much we talked about ourselves as 80-year-old people decades from now. My sense is we all got the same memo: You can’t change the past, but you can invent the future. Hmm, which is more interesting, something you can still do something about, or something that is etched in stone? No question, hearing what people still wanted to do with their lives was a rallying cry for engagement, something we could share and something we looked forward to discussing again in five years when we next gathered.

Don’t just talk to people you knew—meet people you could have known and can still get to know now.

Unless you went to a very small school, it’s unlikely you knew everyone in your class. No doubt there is easy measure in finding a familiar face at a crowded party, but maybe that’s only half the story. Or less than half the story. We all had personal interests back then, took specific classes, might have lived in assigned dorms that kept our circle of encounters more contained than it could have been. Here you are now, surrounded by people with whom you might have only a timeline in common, but they have the same number of decades of learning that you do. Can you make new friends later in life? You can if you try. So try. Doors open when people connect, opportunities are unlocked, ideas are shaped and molded. You might even get to hear some new jokes, since you already know the ones your old friends keep telling.

Don’t worry about your perceived shortcomings; see if you can help someone.

We all have dreams. Something many of us have in common is that as we get older our dreams are less grand in perceived scope than they might have been when we were earlier on the path. That doesn’t mean they are less profound. Presume everyone around you has met challenges, overcome some, might be stuck by others. There, you have something else in common. As you network around the floor, think in terms of how perhaps you can offer a tiny bit of assistance to someone else, rather than what they could do for you. Can you listen to one of their eerie stories without judgment and lend a caring ear? Can you introduce someone looking for a job to a friend in your outside network? Do you know a decent insurance broker, honest painting contractor, in-network doctor, or responsible dog sitter who might help someone out of jam? Some of the reunion takes place at the reunion, but it doesn’t have to end there. We have email, texting, Facebook, LinkedIn, and an ancient contraption called the telephone for staying in touch and helping a classmate move forward. All you have to do is put up your hand and offer.

Don’t bring a resume, bring an appetite for good conversation.

One of the things I have enjoyed most about my reunions has been the opportunity to re-engage in abundant dialogue. I’m not talking about chit-chat or exchange of war story credentials or detailed itemizing of the Bluetooth extensions in your low-interest leased car. I’m talking about give-and-take discussion noting how the world has changed in the decades since we left campus. I’m talking about spirited but cordial debate of leaders in public office and business who impact our decision making. I’m talking about a deep verbal dive into a historical biography you and someone else read, a poem that caused you to rethink your values, a comedian who changed your point of view on a political topic through laughter, a social cause that changed the fairness in your community. If you’re at all like me, what you miss most about your school days was the absurd appropriateness of philosophical meandering, the complete normalcy of spending endless hours talking about which artist did or didn’t change the landscape of a craft, the actual line items in a Congressional bill that contradict each other because they are only meant to sound good. When you have financial obligations and work obligations and family obligations and almost no discretionary time in your daily routine, where do you get the refreshing power of pure intellectual exercise? If you haven’t had a good long non-consequential talk in a while, try it at the reunion. You may find it is a bucket or two more consequential than you otherwise believed.

Still not convinced? No worries, the Wayback Machine is not for everyone, but let me leave you with this: When I mention vacationing on a cruise ship or allocating PTO for a class reunion, the reaction is often a visceral: “That’s not for me.” I used to feel that way. Then I actually went on a cruise and had the time of my life, because I did it my way, with lots of daily shore activities and very few trips to the buffet. I had little desire for many years to go to a reunion and reminisce, so when I finally did go, I did anything but reminisce. If you haven’t actually done something, you may not know what it is, so don’t rule it out just because you think you know what it is. You can make any event into the adventure you want if you approach it with an open mind and a reasonable amount of humor.

Connecting with others is a gift that in many ways is without equal. Give that naysayer in you another try. I hope like me you have a blast.

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Reading to Kids

Reading to KidsLast weekend my wife and I had the inspiring opportunity to spend the morning with five energetic first graders through a Los Angeles non-profit program called Reading to Kids.  As it is said about so many volunteer opportunities, I am sure we got way more out of it than the children.  It was an eye-opener on any number of levels.

Reading to Kids follows a simple but profound philosophy, that “the single most important activity for building the knowledge required for eventual success in reading is reading aloud to children,” cited in the 1985 report of the Commission on Reading.  On the second Saturday of each month, volunteer recruits gather at one of seven underserved elementary schools near downtown Los Angeles, and are assigned in pairs to read an age appropriate book to small groups of kids beginning in Kindergarten and advancing to Grade 5.  The books are selected by the regular curriculum teachers at each of the seven schools, and are all award winners by well-known authors for children.

Training is provided on arrival, and new volunteers are paired with experienced participants, some of whom have shown up more than 50 times for the three-hour block!  After training and a chance to review the book, readers meet their groups on the playground, where parents are waiting with their eager kids to line up and walk the volunteer pairs to an assigned classroom.  Everyone is there because they want to be, even the school principal who walks around to make sure everything is going well.  The children are happy, exceptionally well-behaved, curious, excited, thankful, warm, all of that, well beyond expectations, even the shy ones.

We started as instructed with a thematic overview and picture tour of our assigned book — A Sick Day for Amos McGee — then read the book and acted out the characters, many of whom were animals from the zoo (I won’t spoil the ending).  We asked tons of questions of the children before turning each page, which they more than answered.  After we finished the book and discussion, we did an arts and crafts project about the book’s theme of friendship, making Valentine cards which the kids took home (some gave their artwork to the volunteer adult readers to say thank you).  At the end of the morning, every child is awarded a prize book to take home with them after a brief farewell ceremony.  A copy of each read-aloud book is then donated to the school’s library.

It’s that simple.  It’s beautifully organized, and we even went to lunch afterward with many of the other readers at a nearby restaurant that offered free snack trays.

Why in the world am I writing about this on my business blog?

It’s no secret that I have spent a reasonable amount of my career around children’s media, and that I have some deep convictions about the necessary link in learning between education and entertainment.  This experience was different.  What I saw before me at this Los Angeles Unified School District facility — surely in need of financial investment — were five young people as motivated about learning as any I have encountered in all my travels and focus tests.  There was one minor difference, English was their second language, even though they were growing up here in Southern California.  For my thinking, that actually put them at the head of the class — how many six-year olds do you know already equally fluent in two languages?  These children knew most of the words on the pages of our book, they had opinions about all the characters, they were willing to go out on a limb and predict how the story would twist and turn, and they were clearly able to interpret the moral of the story, that when we are at our weakest, we most depend on our friends.

These kids were amazing.  They have all the potential in the world.  They are ready to dream and learn and help each other and work hard.  As we drove home and I looked around at parts of Los Angeles where many of us don’t spend enough time, I wondered, where will these kids be in five years when they hit middle school?  In ten years when they are in high school?  Will they go to college?  Will they have the kinds of opportunities that will let their dreams come true?  I couldn’t know, but that’s what I wanted to happen.

We allow the subject of education to be politicized, but it’s not really a political topic in my mind.  Year after year, I fill out the surveys sent to me by government leaders, local and national, whichever party is in power, always asking for my priorities.  My priority for tax dollars never changes, I believe the priority has to be education.  If we want these kids to have good lives, they need education.  If we want our economy to thrive, we need an educated population.  If we want a new generation of businesses to be born and staffed, education is the proven route to success.  The thing is, at six years old on a Saturday morning, the kids are showing up, their parents are bringing them, so what they need they already want.  How can we not see that of every possible investment we could make with a taxpayer dollar, this is the one that will pay off?

Is there inefficiency in school districts and administration?  Of course.  Will these bright young kids soon enough become less exuberant adolescents?  History would seem to confirm that.  Do we have competing priorities for underserved community needs?  Without a doubt.  All of those are realities, which simply makes them challenges.  What I want to see are those first graders I met last weekend on a path to realize the same kinds of dreams we all share.  I think in a nation as great as ours we have a moral responsibility to make that happen, broadly for the greater good.

What can we all do to think globally and act locally?  First off, try a little volunteering.  Reading to Kids is one fine program among many, find one that makes a difference in your home town and sign up.  You will do good, and it will do your soul good.  Second, as the national debate on budget control escalates to hyperbole, think hard about where money should be saved and invested, with an emphasis on the notion of capital that can provide a return on investment, where human capital is the most precious resource we can nurture.  Third, if you are investing in your own future, consider investing in the future of our communities with whatever dollars you can afford, in the form of a donation, directed to a program you find of value.

Reading will always be one of the most magical experiences we enjoy as human beings.  A love of reading brings a love of learning, and that is a gift of boundless reward.  Spend three hours reading a children’s storybook to some kids you’ve never met and you might just learn more than they do.  I did.

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The Art and Science of Coaching

Most great athletes wouldn’t think of stepping into competition without a coach, both in practice running skill drills and on the sidelines during an event for strategy and encouragement.  Where you find a great business leader, there is often a similar proxy — a mentor helping guide them, either a current boss, a past boss, or a colleague who just cares enough to help.  When you want a coach and aren’t lucky enough to have a mentor, where can you turn?  Some have tried executive coaches, paid professionals hired to fill the role, sometimes successful, sometimes not.  Because I find the role of being a mentor the most satisfying aspect of my career, I have taken up an interest in coaching over the past few years and learned through experience some stuff worth sharing.

John Vercelli, with whom I teach the Executive Coaching Workshop at Coaches Training Institute, recently sent me an article from Human Resources Executive that largely captures why we created our new program.  The article, by Andrew R. McIlvaine, pretty much says everything I was intending to write in a post here, not the least of which is:

Too many executive coaches lack the business experience necessary to help clients.  But others say such experience isn’t necessary to effect real change — and in some cases, it may even be a hindrance.

John and I are somewhere in the middle (surprised, huh?).  We believe it is virtually impossible to be an executive coach if someone hasn’t developed empathy for the job of the executive.  Yet we also believe that just because someone has significant executive experience, that may not qualify them to be a world-class executive coach.

That’s why we decided to lead the Executive Coaching Workshop together, and are having a blast doing so.  John is a longtime member of the faculty at CTI and now serves as Director of Corporate Programs.  I have taken courses at CTI, but I am not a certified coach.   I have immense respect for the work of the coach, but that’s really John’s expertise as one of the senior curriculum designers for CTI.  My role in this program is to help prepare a new wave of coaches to step into the corporate arena by placing them in real world simulations that illustrate the weight of walking in an executive’s shoes.

We can no more substitute a lifetime of making business decisions in a few intense days of training than we can alter the personality of someone who doesn’t appreciate empathy to exhibit it.  What we can do is paint a picture of what high level business decision-making is like day-to-day as well as year to year, and how a good coach can add value to that decision-making by helping frame the context of situations as a resource and sounding board rather than an “answer machine.”  The combination of John’s co-active creativity and my goal oriented pragmatism — both tempered by true commitment to human potential and respect for the individual as well as the team — seems to be working.  Here are a few things we have learned in the initial trials:

1. Role-Playing Creates Memorable Models: When we take prospective executive coaches and load them up in exercises with the burdens of time bound goals, intense competition, market forces, unforgiving shareholders, management hierarchies, and corporate politics, they start to understand the client by becoming the client.  Of course this is no substitute for the reality of the client’s struggles, but it’s a good start down a path toward empathy.  If you have a little high-octane improv you want to try out, there’s nothing quite like giving your material a no-fault test run.

2. Intellectual Curiosity Can’t Be Faked: If you want to cheer people on, you need to be interested in what they do.  As obvious as it may sound, an expressed interest in business is prerequisite to being a recommended executive coach.  Reading the Wall Street Journal regularly, digging into corporate annual reports, subscribing to industry email newsletters, participating in webinars — all of these help to build a shared vocabulary around profit and loss, return on investment, and growth opportunities.  Where prospective executive coaches don’t find the subject matter naturally interesting, easy flowing dialogue is not easy.

3. It Takes a Toolkit: There is no single path to success for the executive, and there is surely no single connect-the-dots methodology for successful executive coaching.  The dynamics of today’s business environment are fierce and opaque, creating a landscape of ambiguity that has to be constantly reevaluated and balanced.  There is no reward without risk, and helping the executive to consider risk requires an establishment of trust and credibility that constantly has to be reinforced.  We believe empathy is possible through extrapolation of life experience, but thin analogies will only get you so far.  Experience and knowledge compound over time to broaden the context of dialogue, convincing us that process is your friend to the extent you have the personal resources to chart new paths under immense pressure.

How deep can organizations go with coaching?  A recent post in Psychology Today suggests that even a CEO can benefit strong from an executive coach, although building that level of trust and empathy is no small task.  The point is that everyone can benefit from a sounding board, and in a perfect world everyone would have one that embodies a level playing field of shared knowledge.  Since that business utopia is unlikely to emerge anytime soon, we think great executive coaches will be increasingly in demand, but like anything worth the money, the difference between good and great can be considerable.

The science of coaching is most likely to be revealed through improved business results, the scoreboard of performance upon which the client’s metrics will be formally evaluated.  The art of coaching may seem more abstract, as each coach will undoubtedly develop his or her own style for working with the client to achieve the anticipated metrics, but without concrete improvements in financials, style won’t much matter.  John and I believe you can’t have one without the other, and it is the integration of this vision that motivates us to help fill that toolkit.