There are many ways help people to achieve their goals. Some people take the following approach. They aim to gather experience, make sense of experience and pass on knowledge from experience.
Such people study what works, simplify what works – in a profound way – and share what works. They aim to pass on this knowledge in a way that people can use in their own lives and work.
Different people follow this approach in different ways. Whatever approach they use, however, they often pursue the following themes.
They Gather Experience
Such people want to get a good grounding. They therefore throw themselves into gathering experiences in their chosen activity. They believe in learning by doing and getting the experience in their bones.
A psychotherapist may start by doing voluntary work with children, refugees and in a hospice. They may also explore many different therapies before settling on how they want to help people.
A footballer whose career is ended by injury may start coaching at grassroots level. They may coach children, drive the team bus and work through their coaching badges before getting a full-time coaching role.
A journalist may work in local radio, interview different kinds of people and learn to hit deadlines. They may also produce their own videos before getting a paid job and continuing to develop their broadcasting skills.
Let’s return to your own work. How did you aim to gather experiences before settling on your chosen route? You may have done this in the field of education, hospitality, technology or another area.
Sometimes we choose to gather experience in a particular field and this leads to taking a relatively predictable path. Sometimes we pursue one path and then serendipity means we take an unexpected route.
Great workers often begin by gathering experiences. They may then follow the path that gives them positive energy. This can lead to the next stage in their development.
They Make
Sense Of Experience
Great workers are often lifelong learners. They love to learn, develop and make sense of experiences. Some do this by following the path taken by many educators.
Good educators often aim to study success. They study what works, simplify what works – in a profound way – and share what works. They then love to pass on this knowledge to other people.
There are many ways to make sense of experiences. One of the key elements is pattern recognition. It is the ability to see both the successful and unsuccessful patterns in certain activities.
People like to learn about how to achieve their goals. Bearing this in mind, it is important study and recognise successful patterns. You can then help people to follow these patterns in their own ways.
Imagine that you want to follow this route in your own way. The approach starts by focusing on a specific topic you want to learn about. Depending on your interests, you may want to explore one of the following themes.
I want to learn about:
How to be a good counsellor … How to help troubled teenagers … How to help people to build on their strengths and do satisfying work … How to coach young footballers … How to transform a negative culture into a positive culture … How to lead successful teams.
Imagine you have chosen the topic you want to explore. Bearing this in mind, you can ask yourself the following questions.
How can I study success? When have people done superb work in this activity? What did they do right then? What were the principles they followed? How did they translate these into action?
How can people follow these successful patterns in their own way? What are the key strategies they can follow to increase the chances of achieving success? How can they translate these into action?
Imagine that you have focused on a specific activity you want to learn about. The next step may be to simplify what works but to do this in a profound way. How to make this happen?
As mentioned earlier, one approach is to look for patterns in a specific activity. Good educators often take the following steps to study and simplify knowledge in a particular field.
They focus on what people do right – the successful patterns they follow – to achieve their picture of success;
They translate these patterns into principles that people can follow to achieve their picture of success;
They aim to provide practical tools that people can use to follow these principles in their own ways to achieve their picture of success.
Different people choose different ways make sense of experience and study success. Some then move on to the next stage.
They Pass On Knowledge
From Experience
Imagine that you have clarified knowledge about works in a specific activity. You may want to apply this knowledge to reach your own goals. Alternatively, you may want to share what works to help other people to succeed.
Let’s assume that you want to follow the second route. One approach is to focus on the What, Who, Why, How and When. Let’s explore these themes.
The What
What is the knowledge you want to pass on? This may depend on the project or other activity you have been pursuing.
You may have learned lessons from gardening, counselling, building houses, managing crises, coding, leading teams, solving particular problems or whatever.
The Why
Why would you like to pass on this knowledge? What would be the benefits for people? What are the practical tools they could take away and use in their daily lives and work? How could these things help them to succeed?
The Who
Who would you like to reach with the knowledge? Would they be young people, those with learning difficulties, budding entrepreneurs, athletes, leaders, scientists, social entrepreneurs, therapists or other people?
What would be the characteristics of these people? Would they be motivated and wanting to learn? What other qualities would you like to see in your ideal students?
The How
How would you like to share your knowledge with people? Different people prefer different methods for sharing know how. They may prefer, for example:
To act a positive model and show what good looks like on a daily basis by, for example, running a business;
To act as a mentor, coach, trusted advisor or to run teaching sessions, seminars, workshops or other forms of education;
To write articles, create websites, write blogs, produce learning materials, make videos, make television programmes or whatever.
The When
When do you want to share the ideas with people? What would be your preferred setting? Would you like to run a seminar, produce a blog, run a coaching session or do another activity?
How can you bring the learning to life? How can you make sure it relates to people’s personal or professional goals? How can you do your best to make sure that it resonates with people?
There are many ways to help people to reach their goals. One approach is to gather experience, make sense of experience and pass on knowledge from experience.
Looking ahead, can you think of a situation where you may want to follow elements of this approach? How can you follow this in your own way? If you wish, try tackling the exercise on this theme. This invites you to complete the following sentences.
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