About building competence - LDS (Learn, Do, Share)

Learn, do, share

The second rule of building competencies is a familiar one: we build our competences through learning, doing and sharing.

There are three kinds of activities we do to get good/better/best in a certain domain. We learn it. We put it to practice. We teach others. Do not consider that a sequence. You do activities of all three areas all the time. The most common or average way would be to first do a lot of learning, then move into a phase where you mainly perform, to get to a stage where you guide and influence others. And that cycle should repeat if you want to stay good because of the time value of competences, and the small, fast, flat, spiky and blurry world around us. But it is NOT a sequence. The table below will remind of what we talked about in the chapter 'about competence'. Your level is defined by what you do most, and it goes up or down as times goes on.

Because it is my book, I've taken the liberty to define the color of learning. It is pink. The color of performing is blue. And teaching and other forms of sharing are green. We'll use these colors from now on.

Learn	Do	Share
If you mostly learn, you are an apprentice.	If you mostly do, you are a practitioner.	If you mostly share, you are a master.
You build your knowledge, skills and behaviors.	You build your experience.	You build your reputation.
Example: a university diploma	Example: 5 years of experience pleading for the court	Example: training new hires at your company

Key point: I said it before and I'll say it again: learn - do - share, that's what competent people do.