Thirty years ago, graduating college meant stepping into a world vastly different from today’s hyper-connected landscape. Email was nascent, the internet as we know it was non-existent, and YouTube was decades away from being conceived. Imagine the effort involved in trying to Learn Something New back then.
It wasn’t quite walking uphill both ways in the snow, but acquiring new knowledge was undeniably more laborious. Your options were largely limited to finding an experienced mentor or immersing yourself in books, experimenting and learning through trial and error.
Learning was a deliberate, often slow process. Instant answers were unavailable. Reaching out with questions meant physical letters or phone calls, not quick emails or social media queries. The idea of asking a stranger for advice on a platform like Twitter (now X) was unthinkable.
Mastering a new skill or understanding a new concept required significant dedication and time – a stark contrast to the readily available resources of today. I won’t delve into a nostalgic “back in my day” rant, but to give you context, consider that hard drives were a mere 40MB and cost hundreds of dollars.
Are You Stuck in 1993 When It Comes to Learning?
I once heard a story about a photography professor who divided his class into two groups to explore different learning methodologies.
The first group was tasked with focusing on theory. They meticulously studied lighting, composition, and every technical aspect of photography. However, they were only required to take a few photographs, aiming for that single, perfect shot at the end of the semester. Their grade hinged on this elusive masterpiece.
The second group, in contrast, was graded solely on the volume of their work. They were encouraged to take as many photos as possible, with quantity being the primary metric for evaluation, not quality.
The astonishing outcome? The students who focused on taking more photos, the quantity-driven group, consistently produced higher quality photographs.
The more you do, the better you become, and the more effectively you learn something new. More at-bats lead to better learning.
Yet, many individuals still prioritize accumulating theoretical knowledge – becoming “book smart” – before daring to venture out and apply what they’ve learned. As the insightful Mike Tyson famously said, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.”
Today, we are bombarded with learning resources. Platforms like Twitter, YouTube, email, online courses, and countless others are readily accessible. The crucial shift is that these resources are not just for pre-learning; they are invaluable tools to use while you are actively learning something new, in the midst of the process.
Three Fundamental Truths About Learning Something New
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Action Ignites Understanding: Learn Better By Doing First. You truly start to grasp what you need to know after you’ve taken the plunge and started trying. Until you encounter real-world challenges and hit roadblocks, you won’t even know the right questions to ask. Therefore, it’s more effective to dive in, get your hands dirty, and accumulate some practical experience before getting bogged down in extensive theoretical study.
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Quantity Breeds Quality: Learning Improves with Repetition. “Practice makes perfect” isn’t just a cliché; it’s a cornerstone of effective learning. Repetition, consistent effort, and numerous attempts are essential for mastery. This is why I consistently emphasize the importance of “more at-bats” with my coaching clients, whether they are learning new business strategies or honing existing skills.
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Embrace the Struggle: Hard Learning is More Effective Learning. There’s a scientific term for the cognitive friction in learning: disfluency. Research consistently demonstrates that when learning is challenging (in a productive way), retention and understanding are significantly enhanced. As Princeton University advises its students, think of it like weightlifting. Lifting heavier weights, while initially harder, builds greater strength than consistently using lighter weights. This “desirable difficulty” pushes your brain to work harder, resulting in deeper and more lasting learning when you learn something new.
The Urgency of Continuous Learning: More At-Bats Required
It’s common to see individuals on Twitter (now X) offering coaching and guidance to others. While the desire to help is commendable, it’s sometimes surprising to see people offering advice in areas where their own experience is limited. Imagine someone with only three months of digital agency experience deciding to coach seasoned agency owners, or someone who sold their first product company suddenly becoming a guru for all entrepreneurs. Their “data set” is often based on a sample size of one.
While the impulse to assist others is admirable, a broader base of experience – more “at-bats” in various situations – lends greater credibility and effectiveness to any guidance offered. We all benefit from continuous learning and expanding our own data sets.
Practical Steps to Learn Something New Effectively
If you aim to acquire a new skill or master a new strategy, consider these actionable steps. The first step is arguably the most challenging:
1. Become Comfortable with Making Mistakes. Remember why teachers encouraged us to use pencils for initial math assignments? It was to facilitate easy corrections, to erase errors and try again. Holding yourself to an impossible standard of perfection on your first attempt is counterproductive. Granting yourself permission to struggle, to stumble, and to learn from errors is often the most critical hurdle to overcome when you learn something new.
2. Cultivate a Growth Mindset. If you haven’t yet encountered the work of Carol Dweck and her book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, it’s highly recommended. A growth mindset is the belief that your abilities and intelligence are not fixed traits but can be developed through dedication and hard work. Embracing this perspective fundamentally transforms your approach to learning, making the process of acquiring new skills significantly less daunting and more rewarding.
3. Seek Expert Guidance: Get a Coach. It might seem self-serving for a coach to recommend hiring a coach, but the value is undeniable. The prevalence of coaches in professional sports – nutrition coaches, strength coaches, mental coaches – underscores their effectiveness. When you are serious about learning something new, finding someone who possesses the expertise you seek and can provide targeted direction is an invaluable investment.
4. Fuel Your Learning with Passion and Enthusiasm. The book How People Learn offers profound insights into effective learning. A key takeaway, particularly relevant to instructional design, is that personal interest and genuine excitement about the subject matter are far more influential than many other factors. Your intrinsic motivation and energy are powerful catalysts in the learning process when you learn something new.
5. Tailor Your Learning Path to Your Motivations. While learning styles as a rigid concept have been debunked, understanding your motivations is crucial. Matching your learning approach to your personal drivers can significantly enhance your effectiveness. Tools like the Motivation Code assessment (MCode) can help you map your motivational profile, providing valuable insights into how you can best approach learning.
- If you are a Driver, structure your learning around a series of tasks and challenges to conquer.
- If you are a Relator, prioritize informational interviews and conversations with experts to guide your learning journey.
- If you are an Orchestrator, create or join a learning cohort to learn collaboratively.
Understanding your core motivations allows you to channel your energy more effectively when you learn something new, creating a more engaging and personalized learning experience.
The Imperative of Lifelong Learning in Today’s World
In 2017, the World Economic Forum highlighted the accelerating pace of skill obsolescence, estimating the half-life of business skills to be just 5 years. Drawing a parallel from the concept of radioactive decay, the half-life of a skill signifies the time it takes for its relevance and applicability to diminish by half.
Skills acquired today might remain highly relevant for the initial 5 years, but their value progressively declines thereafter, potentially becoming obsolete within another 5 to 7 years. Contrast this with previous generations; the skills our parents acquired often had a much longer shelf life – my father’s skills, for instance, had a half-life of approximately 20 years.
A recent Harvard Business Review article underscores this accelerating trend, suggesting that the half-life of business skills has now shrunk to a mere 2.5 years, with some tech-related skills becoming outdated even faster.
In this rapidly evolving landscape, embracing lifelong learning is not just advantageous – it is absolutely essential. The ability to continuously learn something new, adapt, and reskill is the most critical skill you can cultivate to thrive in the modern world.
