July 17, 2019

You can learn anything

It’s critically important, at every age, to learn new skills. A recent study from the University of Pittsburgh found that “new neural activity patterns emerge with long-term learning and established a causal link between these patterns and new behavioral abilities.” As the lead scientist said, learning “builds new synaptic connectivity that leads directly to the development of new patterns of activity that enable new abilities.” Learning physically improves your brain!

The attitude I most often encounter when trying to teach someone a new skill or technology is resistance and anger. Usually it’s because people are afraid. They think they don’t have the time to learn something new. They think it’s too hard, or they’re too old, or too inexperienced, or even too stupid to learn. But it’s not true and besides, the benefits are more than physical. By learning new skills you can make yourself more marketable and more happy.

The science behind learning

According to Central Connecticut State University, learning new skills improves your brain chemistry while potentially staving off dementia. But in addition, learning helps people relate to new information by building on existing knowledge. First, learning makes it even easier to learn and makes you a more interesting person. Well-rounded people have an easier time in relationships and have more in common with more people. Second, learning helps you fight boredom by providing something new to think about. And finally. learning helps you adapt better to change. Adapting to change is a a skill you can hone by learning new and different skills.

The learning and teaching loop

I was recently asked to take over responsibility for the struggling IT and software development teams. Even though my background is marketing, product management and customer success, I convinced senior management that I could make the group successful. It was a daunting new responsibility. I didn’t understand the technologies or the lingo. I was the only woman among all the engineers and developers. It was clear to me that the reason they were struggling was due to a lack of processes. They needed accountability, documentation, recognition and teamwork. They are all smart, capable people, but they can’t organize their way out of a paper bag.

As a result, we’ve spent the last year exchanging knowledge. As a result, I have learned about firewalls, load balancers, agile development, CI/CD pipelines, python and no-SQL databases. At the same time, they have learned about process workflows, setting priorities, taking responsibility for failures and reporting successes to management. Consequently, we have learned from each other.

The truth is that they, and you and me, can learn anything. Watch this video from Khan Academy – it’s inspiring. I tear up every time I watch it.