Skills Sprint: How to Lead Your Own Learning by Sharing It

0:00Hi, I'm Helen. And I'm Sarah. And this is the final day of our Squiggly Skills Sprint. And before we dive into our topic for today, which is leading your own learning, we just wanted to say a massive thank you for being involved in the sprint. We have had thousands and thousands of people who have got involved in learning like lobsters, and we are really, really grateful. And also just want to recognise that it's a big commitment that you have made to your development too. So thank you for joining us and well done for making the commitment.

0:26Helen:and as a reminder just in case you missed day four you've still got that one to catch up on final fascinating fact about lobsters they eat the old shells that they get rid of as part of being an incredible self-sustaining growth system they're actually packed full of calcium so really good for helping them to grow and means they're not reliant on i don't know some passing crab or fish that they want to eat whatever it is lobsters love to eat but actually they they can almost sort guarantee their growth. And that's what we're really trying to help you to do to be able to be lobster like with your learning.

1:00So yesterday, when we talked about lead your own learning, we talked about adapting. And today we want to talk about sharing because sharing is such an effective way in which you can lead your own learning. And I think it's got a bit of a double win really for learning, because not only when you share does your learning last longer, because you have to reflect on what you know, you have to articulate it in a way that it makes it clear to other people, you spot what gaps that you've got. It's a really effective process for going through what you know. But also you're sharing that with someone else.

1:29So it helps them too. And I think when we have more teams that are sharing learning together, that learning is much more likely to become part of our culture as a team and as a company as well.

1:39Helen:And there's some interesting research and expert insights around sharing learning. Firstly, most organisations don't do it very well. So people keep a lot of what they're learning to themselves. And my hypothesis on this is you could argue well that's because it's people are like I don't want to share it's my competitive advantage but actually when I talk to people about this I think it is more there's just not the opportunity there's not the when well when when would I share what I know and kind of what I'm learning I think that's really interesting for teams in particular to think about we also know that when you share what you're learning you will you do spot the gaps you've got and there's this really interesting expert insight around rubber duck debugging.

2:21Helen:So this is people who work in code, so people who write code, will often explain that code out loud to a rubber duck that sits on their desk, I'm guessing. Obviously, we want it to be a lobster. I'm totally thinking about rubber duck lobsters now. Yes, yeah, yeah. We sort of want a lobster, so kind of talk to the lobster. And the reason that still works, even though you're talking to an object rather than a person, also you could talk to an AI, but that would also work, is again you're just having to explain you know it's like a sense making process and I often think when you do say something out loud you know it's always when you realize oh that sounds a bit rubbish I half understand that and I was thinking actually when you and I chat sometimes I will have read a book or I've read something and because you're always really curious you will ask me questions and sometimes there's a point where sort of I run out I'm like oh I can answer that question I can answer that I'm a bit stuck now because I've either forgotten that or I obviously didn't understand that properly which always feels a bit uncomfortable but it's actually really really useful so we definitely don't want to keep learning to ourselves I think almost like the more generous we are with our learning the better it is for us and also obviously the better it is for everybody's growth.

3:29I think the other thing that we know that gets in the way of people sharing is not that they don't want to do it but sometimes confidence gremlins get in the way because they think well in order to share it I need to be the expert and I think we don't want that fear of expertise to get in the way of people sharing what they know so the more fun ways that you can find so that people can share their learning the easier this is and we think we found a way and we've practiced quite a lot and it's fun it's really fun and we wanted to end the sprint with something that feels fun for everyone to do so the idea that we would like to talk about and we would would talk about it in the way that our team did it together to show you how it works and then Sarah and I thought we would live do one of our helpful how-tos do you want to talk about how we

4:18Helen:did it as a team because you led that um yeah so as a team we did a lobster lucky dip half day yeah and we picked out just loads of exercises from the book and to try them out and this was one of them so people had about five minutes to create a helpful how-to on anything so it didn't have to be a work thing it could be absolutely anything um and then you just have to present that to everybody else but when I say present no one's presenting with slides you're just talking people had maybe got a kind of few notes but I wrote down some of the things that people were doing helpful how to's on we got um how to make a pour over coffee from someone in our team who takes a coffee more seriously than I do you know when you think like I'm quite into this and you meet someone you're like no next level into it next level into it um so she talked about pour over coffee um we had someone talk about how to poach an egg yeah perfectly um which is a skill that you need to know yeah and I'm still not that good at actually uh we had Vivi and our team um how to learn a language uh I talked about like a really like worky one I was like here's how to get better at writing copy uh so like writing skills creating your first GPT so sort of everybody just did something I suppose that they felt comfortable sharing it was fun it was fast also you know everyone was laughing you know that's always a good sign when there's like high energy and it felt really buzzy and it also felt universally like someone everyone could just have a go at it was quite low pressure play actually it's one of the other things we talk about in how to lead your own learning like playing is a really good way to learn and I feel like it sort of combines a couple of those ideas and I think you can start with like you can do a help how to on anything that you want to and then once people have got over the fear of sharing and it's become fun you could then potentially like create some categories so you could do let's do a helpful how-to on processes that we're all working with or let's do a helpful how-to on some projects that you're working on so you can take that energy and turn it into something that might be more directly related to the day job but I would start with the fun and you could even we've not tried this yet but you know sometimes you've probably got skills and strengths that as a team other people see in you and you don't always realize how useful or valuable they are so also I've seen this with you the reason that kind of sprung to mind is people asking you because you built a gpt oh helen i'd i'd love a helen helpful how to on how to build a gpt and almost people are proactively asking you now and you're like oh okay well i hadn't realized that would be that useful but by you sharing it you'll get even better at it and then also it's really helpful for the team too so i think it's one of those things where once everyone starts practicing it you'll just get a bit more confident giving it a go yeah should we do one live okay yeah so we have picked the same situation and then we're going to do our versions of a helpful how-to from sort of two different perspectives.

6:58Helen:So the situation is how to go to an event if you feel nervous. So Helen's going to do the extroverts for you, the helpful how-to from an extrovert, and I'm going to do the helpful how-to from an introvert. Okay, so my helpful how-to. First of all, if you can look up who's going to be at the event beforehand, I think that's really, really helpful because it can help you to make some quick connections. I think you just feel a bit less nervous. Also, I really look forward to it. So I sort of reframe my mind. So look at people first. Second, enter the room with energy. So I think there's lots of people that are nervous when they're doing new events they've not been to.

7:33But if you can be the person that gives energy, I think you kind of becomes a bit of a magnet. I feel like energy attracts other people. And then my third is to take control. So if I'm in a new situation and I meet one person, then someone else comes into the room, I will kind of say, oh hi how you doing have you met the person that I've just met but I will start to be an introducer and a connector in the room and so I feel like I'm making other people feel more comfortable together and I just can't I just get a bit more confident it's like I've given myself a role that I feel comfortable in.

8:02Helen:So here's the introvert of you completely completely different to what you just said so my Sarah helpful how-to on going to an event when you feel nervous um number one and I don't know whether people will feel this is cheating but I think it is if you're nervous and introverted go with someone don't go by yourself number two meeting one new person is a win I think there's sometimes a lot of pressure to be like I go to an event and I need to make 10 connections and I don't know become best friends with everyone I would just think if my if I have made one meaningful connection then that that's actually really useful especially you know with someone I don't know with like a new a new person and then And my third one is to follow up thoughtfully.

8:42Helen:So I think that might actually be where I'm at my best. So not at the actual event. I'm okay at an event. And I do like meeting new people. I think often it's after the fact where I can send a thoughtful email. I'm good at reading things and thinking, oh, that would actually be useful for that person I've just met. And then in my ideal world, I get to know that person one-to-one. And then that's how I kind of build those relationships. but I still think as an introvert you have to watch out for not giving yourself an excuse to not go to those events. It's knocked off on my list of things that I really enjoy or really want to do but it is always worth it.

9:18So we wanted to end today in the same way that we have ended all the other days of the sprint so we're going to share a bit of inspiring advice that's included in our book in the fourth part of the book to help you keep growing and then we've also got a final action And it's a really fun action to help you to keep going.

9:35Helen:So very fittingly for the final day of our sprint, the advice today comes from Dr. Carly Daniels. And Carly is a scientist and are you ready for this? I'm ready. 25 year lobster expert. So I have met Carly and she's coming to our book launch to talk about lobsters. So she says, my advice would be to dive into everything you can at work, even those jobs you think will be hard or you're not sure if you know how to do it. Don't be afraid to ask questions and have confidence in yourself as learning often hides in the places we least expect. Like a lobster tossed into the big blue marine world, I discovered my strengths and passions not by knowing but by doing, volunteering and giving it all a go.

10:20Helen:Remember that everyone started somewhere and had to learn to get where they are in life. Oh, it's amazing, Wisdom. She's so wise. She's like a lobster learner who also loves actual lobsters. She's like the dream combination. It's such a nice way to end the sprint as well. So our final action for you to take off the sprint is we would like you to share your helpful how-to. And it can be on anything. It can be on something related to work, which you know about and enjoy. It can be something to do outside of work. But we would love you in whatever format you want to share it with the sprint community.

10:50So put it on LinkedIn. tag us in the post like squiggly sprint and at amazing if because if we get enough helpful how to's we will create a helpful how to handbook it may be the most random learning document we have ever created but i think it could be fun and it will be created basically by the squiggly career community so please share with us on linkedin tag us in the post and if we get enough we'll create

11:15Helen:that and share it out after the sprint finishes so everyone that is the end of the sprint well done for committing to your learning and growing with us don't forget to subscribe to squiggly careers wherever you listen and watch it means that you won't miss out on any of our upcoming episodes or the next sprints that we share