Learning and Unlearning?

The disinterested look on her face and constant yawning made it apparent she was not with us by choice.

Unlike the others in the webinar, who came across as being keen to learn more about the subject of community leadership, she was definitely not an engaged participant. I later learned she had been told by her Director to attend the training.

Clearly not a good choice for either her or the organization. It reinforced for me that it’s never a good idea to send people to courses they don’t want to go to.

Until an individual sees the need for growth, true learning is rarely going to occur. On the other hand, people do develop and change when they feel responsible for their own progress.

If you have experienced learning something new as a result of being passionate about a subject matter, that probably won’t be news to you.

Unfortunately, the reality is that, for the most part, our education systems and workplaces have encouraged us to believe that someone else is responsible for our learning and growth. Many still believe it is someone else’s job to tell them what they need to get better at and how to do it.

However, because the pace of change is faster and more complex than in the past, it’s necessary for each of us to think about the implications of changes and challenges and how they will impact our organizations, businesses, and communities. Unlike previous shifts in history, changes are occurring faster than we ever could have imagined.

To survive in this world of rapid and continuous change, it isn’t going to be enough to sign up ourselves or others for training sessions. Instead, we will need to embrace responsibility for our own learning and growth and ultimately manage ourselves.

American business guru Peter F. Drucker put it this way, “In a few hundred years, when the history of our time will be written from a long-term perspective, it is likely that the most important event historians will see is not technology, not the Internet, not e-commerce. It is an unprecedented change in the human condition. For the first time - literally - substantial and rapidly growing numbers of people have choices. For the first time, they will have to manage themselves. And society is totally unprepared for it.”

To get prepared for it, chances are we’ll need to unlearn our old ways before new theories, concepts, and approaches can be successfully identified and learned. And we’re going to have to do this in a much quicker fashion.

Unlearning and new learning are going to be necessary if we are to deal with complicated issues in our communities, especially because experts suggest that it takes an estimated 17 years for only 14% of new scientific discoveries to enter day-to-day practice and become commonplace. Adapting to change will need to be done much faster if we are to address today’s complex issues: climate change, global volatility, political, racial, and religious conflict, declining social mobility, etc. 

As the reluctant webinar was likely reflecting, unlearning and new learning can be scary and feel counter-intuitive. Even more challenging will be the need to teach ourselves and each other how to unlearn and absorb new learnings at the same time. Our ability to learn how to do so will be the difference between surviving and thriving.

Years ago, Alvin Toffler, the noted futurist and author of “Future Shock,” wrote, “The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who can’t read and write, but those who can’t learn, unlearn and relearn.”

My guess is that the woman who attended our webinar considers herself to be pretty literate. However, she might just find herself in a heap of trouble if she doesn’t see the value in taking responsibility for being future-ready by managing her own personal growth and development. That also means she will need to be committed to unlearning and relearning

Previous entry: Catalyzing Change: Canadian Social Innovators