A goad is a long sharp stick used to poke things. My whole life I have felt like one of these. A goad is a tool used mainly to make some unfortunate animal do something it doesn’t want to do. A poke here and a poke there… the animal unwillingly obeys. At times I have met people I played the goad with. These are the people that need a poke in the right direction… a sharp stab to the left and right.

Iron sharpens iron

Some times you have to be the person who stands up and says something to guide people in the right direction. I can tell you from personal experience… it isn’t always that easy. Often, very often in my line of work, you can make a suggestion but because of your status in the eyes of others you may not get through. The important thing in this case is not to push against the pressure but navigate around it. You really need to think through your position and take it from there.

When to goad when not to goad

Use your head and your gut to learn when to goad. People may not be ready to be pushed or shoved in the right direction. But, there is a time and a place to guide people to get them where they need to be. Excusitis can be paralysing … so what better way to help others overcoming by being a goad?

A problem I have noticed in my line of work is that students that come to university lack life skills.  In an earlier post I laid out what I thought I felt were core skills people need to make it in life.   As part of my creative projects this week I thought I would reinvent your standard business degree with a core life skills component.  Why?  Here is the crux of the problem:

Students need an education 

There’s a oxymoron for you!  Students need to be educated.  The majority of students that I see come through university preparing and writing papers for lecturers that I think are not that familiar with the outside world (myself included).  We give them theory or practice (like work integrated learning).   So either way they become indoctrinated either to a business practice or a theory.  Which is worse?  Both in my opinion.  A real education should involve training that teaches a person how to think creatively. I will be as blunt as I can when I say: at the very best university will help you think creatively.   At worse, you will turn into a memex machine.  A real education should impart life skills such as problem solving.  Life skills like ‘managing relationships’ and so on.

The conflict

At the heart of this conflict is the problem where life skills education is somehow seen to be seperate to the training the next generation of managers.  Here is a layout for your typical Business degree: Business Stats, Accounting, Marketing, Information Systems/Informatics, Business Communications, Policy and Governance, Economics.  These form the core ideals we think a graduate ought to have.   We assess core life skills like problem solving BUT we don’t not formally train them in how to actually do it.  We might expose them to problems but rarely do we impart the necessary life skills to make a difference.   So the conflict expressed is how do we get life skills into tertiary education to the extent where it’s training and not just mindless paperwork?

Synthesis of Life Skills and Tertiary Education 

My proposed solution involves a heavy implication and what I am about to say may at first seem simple but I have thought about this for a very long time.   Each subject should really form part of an overall structure where these skills are tested in each subject area.  That and there should be practical ways students can do this work as well as learn the ideas they need to.    So the synthesis I am suggesting involves:

1. Building a life skills based curricula: finding out what core skills are required to be involved in real world affairs and how we can help impart these at a university level.

2. Taking those skills and assessing them: using assessment that will require students to develop these skills in real world settings.  By this I mean, to get your degree you have to have been able to demonstrate a key level of the development of life skills.  Not just knowing them but being able to demonstrate the way in which you expressed them through assessment exercises.

3.Reflecting on 1 and 2 and developing a set of skills for lifelong learning: I am talking about creating the knowledge you need as a manager and also having the skills needed to develop as a manager.  It’s one thing to say I know something because I scored a good grade but it’s another story to say you can think creatively and offer new solutions when you are under pressure to do so.

The bottom line here is teaching people about management and then equipping them to do it.  So what does this mean for educators?  It means we have to get serious.  No longer is higher education just about critical thinking… it’s about creative thinking.  One of my students challenged me the other day and said, ‘University teaches people how to think critically but rarely teaches us how to think creativity.’  He caught me out and I really couldn’t agree more … after almost ten years in the system.  So for my first synthetic redesign I have created a rough design for merging practical skills with tertiary skills throughout the life of the degree.  Sure it’s muddy… but it’s a lot better than we have at the moment.

Technorati Tags: life skills, core skills, university, learning, problem solving, skills, lifelong learning

A life problem is a generic term that I use to describe issues that confront us on a daily basis. The problem of how to pay the bills, the problems of marriage and career and so on. Life problems are those that arise in our day to day lives that demand attention and simply will not go away until hey are solved. These are the issues of life, the pressing matters, the things we find to be a problem in our lives. Such problems are not given to easy answers and we might well think of them as a mess. Not every problem we have is a mess. Most of the time the problems we find in our day to day lives require little thought to fix but the matters of life (life problems) do require a lot more work. These kinds of things have many possible answers, no real clear solution and are often a matter of perspective more so than some uncontrollable circumstance.

Have you ever noticed how some things you do never seem to change no matter what it is you seem to do? What about the way in which you deal with people at work or how you talk to your children? These problems are the ones that matter yet when we look at them the world is full of conventional wisdom or “common sense” but most of that is of little value. People use sayings like, ‘Well that’s just the way it is.’ A risk averse person will often look at any given situation and say something like, ‘better than devil you know than you don’t.’ As conventional wisdom this is very sound but in life that’s of no use. Life involves risk. The greatest of the greatest always took risks.

Another one of my personal favourites is this one: ‘Ignore it and it will go away.’ It some cases this may be true. However, I have found in most cases if I ignore an issue it will become a bigger problem later on. There is a balance to be struck between proactively seeking an answer and laziness and that will be discussed later. One key point to note here is that problems do not exist as real things, like the sun, moon and stars. They exist in the conceptualisation of our hearts and minds. To understand this you will need to read on. For now, be content with this definition of a life problem: A situation in a person’s life that they think is troubling, worrisome and panic worthy.

Problems like this can be best thought of as a roll of movie film stock. Each picture on that strip of film is just another frame and so shows a different part of the
bigger picture for us to understand. This big picture shows us the way in which things interrelate and how the harmony or disharmony of it present itself to us. Life
problems are those that surround us and confront us with their complexity and interrelationships and quite often they befuddle us with more answers than questions.

Solving Life Problems?

Take as example the life problem of depression. Depression is caused by a variety of things, some known and some unknown that operate in the minds and hearts of human
beings. To say that all problems of depression can be reduced down to simple explanations is less than helpful. For example, not having enough money to pay the rent
makes me depressed because I feel as if I cannot provide for my family. I have been faced with this in recent times and a virtual carnival of emotions and random thoughts
go off in you that make you feel inadequate. Really though what makes me depressed is the idea that I am inadequate because I have linked the idea of my personal worth
to getting money to pay the rent. People around me reinforce it through the words of their mouth and the intentions they have toward me. I believe what they say… instead
of forming a better picture of myself which in essence stops the reason for the problem to occur.

Here is another example from my life. Recently my daughter became sick. So sick in fact that she stopped eating for three days. During this time I went through a roller coaster of emotions all the way from panic to full blown fear. I was making the situation worse because my fear and lack of restrain was obvious. After a time I settled down my emotions by thinking different thoughts about the situation. I used my faith and said to my daughter,’you are getting better all the time…’. I quoted scriptures to her and got her involved and guess that. She didn’t improve overnight but not more than a day later it was all over. The point is: my panic and fear created the problem. By changing my perspective slowly and surely I was able to see things differently.

Recognising things that won’t change

A friend of mine recently spoke to me about not being able to get a job in the academic profession he was in. Constantly he would complain, “I can never get a
permanent job – these just won’t let me in.” My response to him at first was one of sympathy – it must have been the system working against him. It was a conspiracy. Then one day a job came up that we could both apply for. We both applied. He didn’t even get an interview and I got that job. Yet he had more papers, more experience and was clearly more senior than me in that field. What was the difference? I studied an old job advertisement and I noticed it came with a warning “Must be enrolled in a PhD.” An opportunity came up for me to apply for a PhD so I took it and got in. Then I started looking for work and as this opportunity came up I applied as did my colleague. The key difference? He wasn’t enrolled in a PhD. The ad declared this clearly but he thought that they would make an exception for him (as I did for years).

Talking to those in the organization in question and speaking with other professionals I learned that they won’t employ someone who isn’t enrolled in a PhD. As a matter of fact if all the people that applied weren’t enrolled the job remains unfilled despite the fact that the need for the position continues. This changed my opinion on doing a PhD. They would rather leave a position unfilled? I had better do all I can to apply for that position so I better enrol in a PhD. He didn’t get that interview because he kept waiting for them to come to him. A job is nothing more than your employer hiring you to fix a problem they have. They need someone to do something, you get paid to do it and if you are good enough (according to their criteria) you should get promoted (if that’s what you want). What I recognised (not being able to control the academic standards) got me in a position where I could give a good interview and be hired – his understanding of the exact same thing worked in the opposite way. I have no doubt that if my friend had developed life skills (in this case learning and managing relationships) he would have pounded on that door until they let him in. As I understand it almost three years later – he is still floating from contract to contract – unable to land full time work. Now I am not a better person than he is, I have just taken my time to
develop my life skills to the extent where I can use them to help me instead of hindering me.

Now my colleague managed not to learn a simple fact. If the criteria says PhD enrolment required – then it’s likely they aren’t going to hire someone who isn’t – no matter how good you think you are. On the other hand – go and speak to people – build relationships with key individuals and learn what it takes to get that kind of job. This kind of skill is essential to managing life better, it’s not optional, and if you want to be successful you must submit yourself to a process of learning which at times is very stressful. In my situation I kept thinking do I really want to get a PhD? Do I really want to be an academic? Who cares if people call me doctor or not? On the other hand, what about the long term security of family?

Academic institutions in this age require a PhD before they are really serious about paying you so I had better get one. Did it cost me? Yes it did, my sanity mainly! My supervisor told me that doing a PhD is like banging your head up against a wall for three years until the wall disappears. A lot of this ‘head banging’ you will read on this website but more than this I hope you see yourself in it and learn from it.

Recognising things you can change

I once applied for a job and went to the interview deathly afraid that I wasn’t going to get the job. It showed when I got in there! So much so that they didn’t even
give me a call back after the job had been filled in. That was a terrible feeling! Since then, I use positive confessions and set my mind on the scriptures to help me.
Now does that always work? No. But what it does is allow me to focus my thoughts on something else so that I am not so nervous. Being positive during times like that
helps me to remained balanced and focused as I sweat it out in the job interview.

There are other things that we can change. We can question our own limiting beliefs. Think about the amount of times you have said, ‘it can’t be done’ when you knew in your eart that there was a chance it could be done. Remember all God needs is our faith and everything is possible from there. I have this saying which I think sums up what I am saying here: ‘People don’t have problems… people are the problem.’ More to come on that topic later. How can a problem exist if there are people around to make it real? We can change these things. We can change our attitude over a period of time by learning to refocus our thoughts on positive things. We can change our life by attaching positive or negative emotions to experiences we have had. With God’s help we can become whole, active and successful people as we learn to listen to his voice and follow his desires for us. These things are completely within our grasp to do. By reading the word of God we can get faith and by keeping healthy positive people around us… we can become like them.

So it’s not all one way street with life problems. There are things we can do and things that are God’s business. Some people I meet are struck with a paralysis: I can’t do anything because I might get in God’s way or even worse hey reason themselves out of tackling the problem. ‘Oh it’s too big,’ or ‘I can’t do it’ … remember whatever you believe… good or bad is what you will think is possible or isn’t possible. That which we can control we do with God’s help and that which we can’t control is 100% God’s problem. We need to carefully recognise which is which in our lives and take appropriate action!

Life problem ’solving’

We need to move away from this idea that problems are solved. Somethings they are re-solved… agreed upon and we reach the stage were we decide to live with it. Other times they are (dis)solved if we think of it in the same manner as the problem solving experts (like Russell Ackoff) do. However in life things can only really dissolve when the problem ceases to be there. How can this be? How can life problems dissolve? Well a lot of the times they dissolve as we allow our conception of them to change. Will you start doing this today? How about your wife or husband? Instead of grumbling about them under your breath why not start enjoying their qualities and ignoring their faults. Why should you overlook someone’s faults? Because you have so many of your own. We expect God to overlook our faults to love us… why not overlook someone else’s and learn to love them? I am not talking about every situation because remember there are things we cannot control. Certainly, we cannot control other people and yes they may leave you or worse. Still we can control what we do to a certain extent. With God’s help we can control how we feel and over time learn to master ourselves to react to such people in a positive way.

Recently I watched a person very close to me whose marriage fell completely apart. They are now divorced and in my opinion it was the best thing for that situation. That does not mean it’s the best for yours. Are you in an abusive relationship? Then ’solving’ your problem begins with you seeing a qualified counselor and getting out. There are no excuses for violence. None. There are so many life problems that are simply expectations that were never met. Why not change what you expected? Maybe you are unreasonable to expect anything from anyone because you are not perfect? The most simple definition of a problem I ever heard was when our expectations do not match what is really happening to us. I think there is merit in that simple definition. If you changed what you expected do you think that your circumstances would change? No. Jesus told us to expect the things we ask from God to come to pass before we see them. Why did he do that? I think it was because we expect things to happen based on deep down ideas and pictures about ourselves. All Jesus was really saying was … why not expect God to do something great for you and begin to talk about it before it even happens?

Life problems are people made and people sustained. We have a part we play. There are things we cannot control and what we need to do is focus on what our part is and leave the rest in God’s capable hands. The only real way to handle life problems is to learn how to shift perspectives but that is another article for another day. In the mean time start looking at how you make this problem real. Start asking yourself what can I control and what I can’t. Do your part and I am sure the rest will follow.

Technorati Tags: life problem, problems, problem

Recently in a dream I found myself driving a huge crane that was lifting big boulders.  To the side of the boulders were golden rocks that were just sitting there. The first thought that came to me when I woke up was… I am helping others getting work done but not doing what I need to do to make sure I continue to succeed.  The gold that I have waiting to be refined is sitting there as I do backbreaking labour for others … who probably don’t care!  I am doing the donkey work for others at the expense of my own work. 

Part of the harsh realities of life is that you must be careful in selecting what you do to help others.  I believe we should be helping others because it’s part of my values however, if we do too much for others and neglect what we need to do … our opportunities to grow may be missed.  How do you know you are lifting boulders for other people?

You have been doing something for a while and you are making no progress

If you walk up a hill one step at a time you will eventually get to the top.  However, if you begin to walk around in circles your destination will be the same as your starting point!  Have you been doing this for a while… could be you are helping others get ahead at the neglect of yourself?

There is just no time for me

Is this you as well?  The whole idea of time for yourself is important because you are accountable for you.  What I am saying is this: make time.  That’s great but with all the things I am doing there is simply not enough time right?  Wrong!  There could be some things you are doing for others that should be pushed aside.

People around me treat me like a dumping station

A hallmark of finding out that you are carrying boulders for others is the amount of things people just give you to do.  Now, there are some things that you should do and helping others is very important.   Don’t be a dumping station… only take on those things that you know you can do without hindering your own future. 

I just can’t say no

This one is a tough one.  I work with a person who just can’t say no and I am much the same myself.  However, if you want progress in things that are important, you must get tough.  I have had to say no to some opportunities recently because it would have hindered what I was trying to achieve strategically.  Learn that no is a positive way of keeping what’s important on track. 

When you incubate the dreams of your heart does it fill you with excitement… does it fill you with joy?  Then ask yourself this question: is it worth trading what the fulfillment of that for temporary acknowledgment of others?  Think for a minute… when that person gets a promotion or goes onto fulfil the goal they have how will that benefit you?   That doesn’t mean that you don’t do it because it won’t help you but if it interferes it what you should be doing…then you are creating long term damage.  Remember, you can help others carry boulders for you and you can help them but a sensible balance must be retained.    Part of coming into your own is spending quality time building your life vision day after day… minute after minute… second after second.   You can’t come into your own and do what you should if you are lifting boulders for others.

Special Thanks to Alex Blackwell who published this article earlier in the month as part of his series of ‘coming into your own’.

Technorati Tags: dream, incubate, balance

In a recent post I discussed making the right choices. To continue this I would like to say that most choices we have to make are of the heart and of the head. Heart decisions are the effective choice most of the time where as efficient ones are of the head. Head choices are come to through a reasoning process like this one. Clearly there are some choices we make that are the right ones and others which are the optimal ones. Recently I had to move house and thanks to the ridiculous prices of houses in Brisbane I can’t buy. So I have to rent. My daughter started school about 18 months ago so I began this process by figuring that I could move to a cheaper suburb and save some money. I thought I had this all figured out.

Then one night I heard my daughter crying herself to sleep. So I asked her what the problem was. She told me that she didn’t want to leave her school. So here I am with a choice to make. Do I move to save a few bucks or stay where I am and stretch. What’s the trade off in a situation like that. What’s ironic is that I wrote about this not more than a month ago and here I am having to make this kind of choice. What kind of reasoning process will help me here? If I move to save money my daughter will be upset and uprooted. On the other hand if I stay my daughter will be happy but I may have to move in another year because I can’t afford it. One of these decisions is an effective choice and the other is efficient… what do I do?

The pro’s and con’s in the lifehacker post simply do not apply to me and I suspect that a great majority of people find such things innocuous. My family is not a business and I shouldn’t make decisions that are business like so far as my children are concerned. What I should do is do what I can to stay near her school and give her a stable environment. If I can’t then all I can do is make the most effective choice I can. That is the right thing to do.

Effective Choices

Effective choices are often those of the heart. Once I was stuck in the middle of bitter argument between two colleagues which made me feel very uncomfortable. They just decided that (for whatever reason) they didn’t like each other anymore. The problem was, one was the boss and the other was an employee. Ultimately the employee lost because the boss had more power and eventually got rid of the other guy. I was caught in the middle of this and being a young academic at the time didn’t know as much about politics as I do right now. I had plenty of opportunity to warn the person being fired that this was their fate. However, I never did. A few years later the same thing happened to me (I got fired!) in a similar way. When it happened to me I realised I had been making ambitious choices to the detriment of those around me. Since then, I learned a valuable lesson: Always make the right choice. The choice that is most effective over the choice that is most efficient.

Effective choices are the right thing to do. In any given situation you will know what is right if you look into your heart. Ambition is good so long as it’s mixed with integrity. Why? Being the best should be your goal but if what you are doing is destroying other people to get there then you are not making effective choices. What do you want people to think about you after your gone? He was a mongrel… I am glad he is dead! No. I should think you want people to think about your integrity, your character and how no matter what you always made the choices that were the most effective.

Efficient Choices

We live in a business environment that is ‘process’ and ‘profit’ minded not ‘people’ minded. All you have to do is open up the latest copy of Business Review Weekly to see that most business people are trained as efficient thinkers. I have spent the best part of seven years working with people who can tell you every reason why the economy is failing yet not once mention how people are involved. We can hear of a lack of oil and then fear sets in. What happens next… people panic and the so-called ‘economy’ falls to bits. I recently watched Die Hard 4.0 (Live free or Die Hard) and they used this to great effect. People were in a panic and it caused huge problems for the economy. People are not part of the problem… people are the problem!

Efficient choices are those that are ‘optimally’ satisfying… given the known constraints. We have a whole swag of decision making practice built on the backbone of this kind of logic. The idea of satisficing… making the best choices with the amount of information you have is one such idea. No I know we don’t always have all the information but that doesn’t mean we go on and make decisions that rely on us being ‘optimal’ so far as our heart is concerned. People use such ideas as an excuse to make efficient decisions. Just because you don’t know something does not mean that you can say, ‘well I did my best.’ Nonsense! According to what? You did you best so far as you are concerned but what did you exclude? ‘Well I just didn’t have the information.’ You didn’t have it or you just didn’t look for it?

I wish more business people would start making effective choices and buck the current trend in this nation. This current plague of materialism is informing the decision making process so much that corporate people are forgetting the simplicity of human relationships. It’s very easy to make optimal decisions but much harder to make decisions that are real tough choices. It’s easy (optimal) to remove people out of the way but it’s just not the right thing to do. When it’s time to let someone go do so with tact in such a way that the person is left with their dignity not via text message!

In closing this article I would like to point out that what dictates the right choice is not management theory, not your work environment and not your friends. It’s you. You are totally 100% responsible for you. You can make the right choices right now by always looking at each situation and asking yourself this question: what is the right thing to do in this situation. Don’t ask: what is most efficient or the most optimal but rather what is right? You know this answer already so go ahead and start making these kinds of choices.

Technorati Tags: choices., Effective choices, argument, satisficing

The greatest thing you can ever do is make mistakes. I hear people say to me all the time… if only I could erase my past mistakes then I would be free. That, is a misunderstanding of epidemic proportions. If you erased your mistakes you would erase a great percentage of what you know and the information you have already got in your possession. Why would you want to do that? Because of how much it hurts.

The pain we feel we make drastic mistakes is terrible. When I failed in business for the second time I was devastated. I spent about a month in a complete daze because my whole world and all of my dreams came crashing down with it. To say that I was ruined would be an understatement. Then after a period of time I began to realise I know a few things about failing in business I could teach others. I began to share my stories of failure with people at the university where I work. The students gained genuine insight in what NOT to do. As a result of that my reputation as a not-so-bad teacher increased dramatically. The fruit of that was people following me into other courses and a great wrap from my boss.

When I was sharing with people the mistakes I had made I realised that one of the most important things for me to do is milk them for all their worth. It would be a tremendous shame if you simply let them slip through your fingers. What amazed me about this losing experience was that it has become leverage to me. Now, I can see others making similar mistakes and I can warn them about it. They often come back and thank me later. Now, I am still not physically rich but I am rich in knowledge and this I would argue is of much greater value.

Technorati Tags: mistakes, past mistakes, failing

My ideas about things are not the same as yours. As a matter of fact, what you have learned in your life up to this point may be entirely different to what I have learned. For the sake of simplicity, whatever you know about anything (your knowledge) is called you set of ideas. The set of ideas you have about things is very different to the set of ideas I have about things. If you are like me, you came from a background that is ‘working class’ which means the ideas I have about the world are largely shaped by those kinds of values. On the other hand you may be from a background where you had access to resources that were less than mine and you view things very differently to the way I do. The output of your ideas is your actions – that is what you think is what you do. Your thoughts are intrinsically linked to your actions. When you create new thoughts about something, in your mind you have already worked out how you are going to approach it. This is automatic.
For a moment stop and think of a problem you currently have. Write in the space below in one sentence what the problem is.

“…”

Now that you have done that, study the sentence above. What happens when you consider this problem? Did you automatically think of certain kinds of solutions? This is because you have been educated to think this way. Here is an example:

“The problem is my wife hates my guts.”

Some may say, “What have you done wrong? Do you need counselling? Are you getting divorced?” This is because when we are faced with a problem we automatically come up with solutions or an educated guess as to what the answer is likely to be. We have learned nothing! A guess is just that… a guess. Now this is not all bad news, this skill comes in very handy as well shall see later in this book.

As each new thought comes into your mind it gets filters through you’re your set of ideas about the world. Your view of the world will determine how you take action in the world. For example, if you have low self-esteem burrowing it’s way deep into your mind your actions, thoughts and reactions to the world outside will filter itself that perception of low self esteem. When your teacher at school said to you, “you will never amount to anything,” you took that idea and buried it in your mind. I am not a psychologist but I can tell you this – the bible tells us that as a man/woman thinks in their heart so are they. Say for example you are a young go getter looking for a way to improve your standing at work and go for a promotion. If you have confidence and faith in your abilities you are likely to create actions and take initiatives that will give you those kinds of opportunities. If on the other hand you lack confidence despite your abilities you will actively build that kind of reality around you. The people you associate with will support your low self esteem most likely, the job you take will agree with it, the way you interact with others will agree with it and so on. Your mindset of low self-esteem will build a reality around you that is entirely consistent with your thoughts. Another example of how our view of the world affects us is found in the words of our mouth.
Here is an exercise you can do to assess your view of the world, what comes out of your mouth. It is positive? When trouble comes, as to all of us it does, how do you respond verbally? Do you say: “that’s just my luck,” or something like, “Why does it always rain on me”. Why did you say that? You have not learned anything else. The way we see the world through our perceptions of it (deeply built into our subconscious) will negatively or positively affect the image we create. That picture we build of the world are deeply held assumptions about how it operates, what people are like and so on. Here are some examples:

“She’ll be right, mate.”
“What goes around comes around”
“What goes up must come down”
“You will never amount to anything”
“You’re just like your father”
“Everything happens for a reason”

Each one of these points of view holds behind a deeply held assumption about what the person who said it thinks. I would like to call these things ‘imaginations’ . These phrases are things people have built into their mind and are being expressed from their mind as words. An imagination is what I would call a micro view of the world that is held or bound to a certain way of thinking. For example the term, “you are just like your father,” automatically has a negative imagining attached to it. Why is it that being like your father is a bad thing? Maybe your father is a good person and that’s a compliment. This however, is very unlikely given the nature of people to use words to bring people ‘down’ to a certain perception of how they should think or act. The media are especially adept at this because they feed us imaginations all the time to engage with. What news we get, is given to us so we can form an imagination about it and turn it around in our mind. How often do we see a dodgy business on TV and instantly feelings of hatred and judgments immediately made. That imagination has now been built in you and you in turn build it into others by becoming an evangelist for your TV show. You spread the word by going to work and saying: “Did you see that business on TV – what a dodgy operation.”

That particular viewpoint expressed on television now creates a way of thinking about that place. There have been several classic examples of them getting it wrong and almost ruining businesses only to offer a brief apology as a way of operating in damage control. Too bad if it already has cost that business thousands. Why do they do it? They are trying to get you to build an imagination so you can engage with them and agree “what a terrible thing this is.” Every now and then they offer us imaginations to build our thinking on because most of us unfortunately have undeveloped viewpoints about things. That is, we have not learned anything except how to be spoon fed regular doses of whatever we are told. Our view of things is directly related to how we learn because what we do is build what we think on our imaginations of things.

Next time you watch the news ask yourself this question: “What is the news trying to get me imagine?” These things you begin to imagine will become part of the way you begin to view the world. If you grew up with racist parents, the chances are your parents built racism into your view of the world. You may think you aren’t racist but go and walk amongst those of another culture and see what comes out of your mind. You may not walk up to them uttering racist sentiment but in your mind there are ideas floating around that may convince you otherwise. Not that is real learning, breaking the conditions we have been led to believe and getting the experience to challenge our underlying assumptions.

We evaluate things through our view of the world and this gives us the toolkit for building learning skills into our life. How we view things will tell us how things can be learned. If you grew up loving science, you will take a scientific approach to life and usually rely on all things scientific to give you answers. You may use phrases like, “there is a system to everything”. This is an expression of how you think things work. We will call these kind of people “scientific people”. If you are given to this style of learning you will struggle with life because sometimes the answers are not as cut and dry. For example, Henry Ford was a great pioneer but time has shown that his management style is nothing short of abhorrent. Why? Because he saw people as “resources” and not as living beings with a mind, will and emotions. He approached management as a science, when it is more like an unstructured art. Modern works have even urged us to think of our spirit in the workplace which would make poor Henry do flips in his grave. People are not numbers, they are living beings with real families and real personalities. On one hand people are the greatest thing about a business but on the other the biggest enemy.

If your view of the world is less scientific and more open to other views you might be what I call “unscientific” and given to large bouts of intuition. If you are a ‘free’ thinker then you will evaluate everything that comes your way and form your opinions based on what you think is right and perhaps a feeling you have about it. You might be someone who questions everything, especially science and never stop learning. The unscientific approach to management would use techniques found in Semler’s Seven-Day Weekend :

Organizations rarely believe they’re to blame when an employee under performs. But if the organization doesn’t provide the opportunity for success, then people falter. At Semco we accept that every individual wants and needs a worthwhile pursuit in life. It’s up to us to provide the environment and opportunity for their gratification.

This kind of approach to building a workplace is different as the human resources are allowed to be more human. It’s a well-documented success story but it started by breaking the mold and breaking established business rules. The rule breakers are always learning and never accepting common ill-conceived points of view.

We will never land on the moon. What really? Never? People that make these kinds of statements about learning are scientific and evaluate everything objectively in their world view. That world view will only take knowledge from those that know and they will eventually have a head full of other people’s ideas. Every pattern, every notion and every single last idea will fall into what somebody else came up with unscientifically. Learning is unscientific because it takes that which is unknown and tries to make it known. Scientists who were pioneers where the most unscientific of them all. They used faith in every endeavour and relied on personal intuition and vision as well as there academic abilities.

When we learn we are applying the single most unique and profound ability we have – the ability to gain new insights and gain fresh information. If our view of the world tells us we can learn then we can. If we are willing to question the way things are and build for ourselves new mindsets about things (despite the cost) then we can learn. Everyone can learn. As a lecturer in a business school I have found quite often that my students do not want to learn, they want to collect facts, but they don’t want to learn. So often I get smart questions like, “What’s on the exam?” My response to this usually is to tell them precisely what’s on the exam – lots of questions about the things I wanted you to learn. Invariably almost nobody gets what I mean by that.

What knowledge do you need to build upon to get through life? That depends on what you plan to do with it. The primary skill you need to make it is learning. A friend of mine once told me this story about learning:

My boss told me to do a job and I told him I couldn’t do it and he said to me, “Oh well I guess your going to have tell the customer that we can’t complete the job and they won’t get what they have paid for. I said to him that I would go back and try. When I did try I found a way to make it work.”

The problem is we are no longer willing to try and learn what we need to make it in life. Our view of the world tells us we can’t but in fact we can. Students often ask me for answers, I only give them more questions. After a while they stop coming to see me, because they don’t realize or cannot understand that the things I am teaching to them can only be learned by them. If the courses I teach are going to be valuable to them at all then they need to learn the stuff for themselves. I could offer them a standard response and tell them the answer but what have they gained. Where was the struggle for new concepts, the trial and error process? What happened to that? When the objective of learning is to gain an answer, that person has lost the reason they set out to gain insights in the first place. Learning is the gaining of new information about something that you didn’t know before. However, learning comes from and goes to somewhere it’s not purely self-perpetuating. Your learning accumulates.

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