Welcome to the next article in the series ‘Why don’t people learn?’ We have reached the fourth step in the learning cycle. We may learn a theory from books, or we may have formed a theory based on experience. Now, we need to consider using it in real-life situations. If I have formed a theory about traffic signals, such as the one mentioned in my last article, how can I use it? I can consider changing my route, or the speed, or the travel time, or the vehicle. I can consider utilizing the time that I spend at a red light to do some useful work (such as catching up on the news!). Actually, implementing any such decision will start a new learning cycle of experience, observation, generalization etc. I have dealt with these three steps in my earlier articles. This leaves us to wonder why people don’t experiment and why they don’t learn from it.
Application of any theory requires the presence
of a problem, knowing the theory, applying the theory in a different situation
and then actually pushing yourself to try it. Thus, we can see that the first
step is knowing the problem. We often know the symptom of the problem, but not the
actual problem. Me feeling feverish is not the problem. The virus that is
causing the fever is the problem. If we analyze the problem, in most cases, the
answer is quite open and clear. If it is possible to solve it easily, then we
should solve it without worrying about the learning cycle. You will find the
application of your theory at a later date.
However, there are times when there is a
dilemma or contradiction. For example, I need more surface area for good absorption,
but I cannot increase the volume. This is a contradiction. This is where we
need to apply what we know in a creative way. These problems are already solved
somewhere. The concept of ‘segmentation’ is used to solve the above given contradiction.
For example, use the powder form of the material so that you get a higher
surface area and less volume. There are techniques like TRIZ[1]
which will help you. The trick is to use the technique successfully in your particular
situation. The company finds that the manager has limited time to guide the
team. However, team members need individual time with a senior due to the critical
nature of the job. The company undertakes an organization structure redesign
exercise, where each team is regrouped into smaller sub-teams in such a way
that the issue of individual attention is addressed. We can see that we are
applying the concept of segmentation in this situation.
As we saw above, the first step was to
define the problem and understand the contradiction. The next step is to think of
an innovative solution. There are different blocks here too. The first is that
you don’t have a big repository of theories. As Abraham Maslow said in 1966,
"I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you
have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.”[2]
So, how do I build a bigger toolbox? By more experience, more observation, more generalization and looking
for more theories. This is where my comment in the first article becomes
relevant. If we go through experience with a very short-term objective, we cannot
build a big repository of theories. My comment that “knowing” is not bad is
also pertinent here. Read books, go through training programs, collect
knowledge from numerous sources. It will be useful sometime later.
The following step is to find a parallel
between the problem at hand and the theory. This is where imagination and
lateral thinking is required. A lot is written about ‘stimulating the right
brain’, but there are many blocks in coming up with such a connection.
The most important block is personal
block due to fear of failure. You are trying to do something which can
potentially fail, and you feel insecure. You need to ask yourself – Does
failure really harm you? The managers have to remove this fear from their subordinates.
We have to also define what we mean by failure. Culturally, we strive for ‘perfection’
all the time. When a child comes home with 99 out of 100 marks in the exam, the
first reaction is of the parent is “Where did you lose that one mark?”, even
when success is defined at getting 35 marks to pass.
That does not mean that failures don’t
matter. Sometimes failures are expensive. Since people strived for perfection,
many small improvements got introduced in every walk of life. It is not failure
itself but how we treat failure that is the issue. People react to failure
either as something to be dreaded or something to be ignored. Instead, failure
should be treated as a challenge. If the organization’s culture is such that
there is stigma associated with failure, then people will not experiment.
Developing new ideas is sometimes a team effort, but if the culture is not open
towards failure, such exchange is blocked, leading to less experimentation.
Finding this parallel between an old
generalization and a new issue is often a “Eureka!” moment. However, though it is a parallel, it is a
different situation and one needs to identify the differences and think about
how to deal with them. If one is adamant on maintaining the status quo, all
these differences will become ‘one more issue’ and the new idea will be lost.
One more major block at this level is that
of ‘laziness’. It hits when we want to convert the new idea to reality. Once
the new idea is identified, the thinking has to shift from lateral thinking and
ideation to structured planning and assessment. Left brain activities like risk assessment, estimation, planning,
scheduling are required before the next phase of experiencing starts. This is
where meticulousness on the drawing board matters. The best of artists,
painters, musicians, writers will agree that they work hard to bring the
initial idea to final form. That hard work requires method, system and
structured hard work. People do not
convert a new idea to a new experience because they either do not know how
to go about some of the activities I just listed, or they are too lazy to work
on this drawing board exercise.
Does that mean we are always going through
these steps to come up with a new idea? Well, sometimes, it is not elaborate.
When I decide to change my route due to my theory about traffic signals, I will
probably go through a process of evaluating alternatives and implementing, but
that will happen so quickly (mostly just while walking to the parking lot) that
I do not notice. The cost of failure is very low and hence, the level of
evaluation and preparation is low. However, in the organization, most people probably
do not experiment because one or more reasons that are relevant at that point.
So, what if I am not experimenting? If I
am not experimenting, a new learning cycle does not start. You may have one
more theory to talk about, but you have not learnt enough. Kolb also describes ‘learning
style’ which says that you tend to learn majorly in one of the given four steps.
Knowing your style will help you give opportunities to learn more, and work
with yourselves when you are going through other parts of the cycle. Thus, for
a manager, the lecture on a new theory on motivation is boring, and trying to
use it within the team requires a lot of preparation. Regardless, he goes
through it because he knows that the experience will be very enriching for him
as his learning style is ‘experiential’.
With this, we have come to the end of this series. In these articles, we addressed the learning cycle
and tried to identify what could go wrong while learning.
How do you like this series? Do let me know.
[1] TRIZ is
"a problem-solving, analysis and forecasting tool derived from the study
of patterns of invention in the global patent literature". It was developed
by Genrich Altshuller and his colleagues.
[2] This concept is known as ‘Law of Instrument’. Various people have
contributed on similar lines.
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