The Value Of ‘I Don’t Know’.
Edition #117
Introduction
Welcome to The ContraMind Code.
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Take a journey to www.contraminds.com. Listen and watch some great minds talking to us about their journey of discovery of what went into making them craftsmen of their profession to drive peak performance.
Are Corporate Training Campuses Increasingly Irrelevant In The Future Of Work?
During the last week of April 2024, GE sold its iconic Crontonville campus. This campus is steeped in history, where many leaders were groomed and carefully nurtured. Ironically, the same place that was the birthplace of training and leadership for the world is now being sold by GE!
Here are some highlights from articles written about this iconic centre, the impact it can have and the reasons for its demise:
WSJ wrote in an article - ‘GE opened Crotonville in 1956. GE’s decision to sell Crotonville represents the end of an era in corporate training. A number of corporate giants are now working to shed properties once used to train high-performing employees. In recent years, GE has also emphasised to employees that learning should happen closer to core operations or at production sites, such as on its factory floors.’
Indrajit Gupta, Co-Founder and Director of Founding Fuel, shared some interesting perspectives on this decision by GE - ‘The biggest among them is the short-termism that has gripped corporate America and its obsession with shareholder value creation. That virus has, in turn, percolated down to many markets around the world, including India. Crotonville inspired Four Acres at Unilever UK and Singapore, Gulita at HLL, Tata’s TMTC in Pune, Aditya Birla Group’s Gyanodaya, and many others like SBI, Infosys, L&T, Bharat Petroleum to set up their own versions of corporate universities.’
Knowledge @Wharton highlights how GE built its global leaders. Susan Peters talks about three skills they taught at GE Crontonville Centre - ‘We break it up into three buckets. The first is leadership. The second is skills, which are driven by function—finance skills, marketing skills, etc. The third bucket is business.’:
So, what does all this mean to keep yourself skilled, relevant, and ready for an ever-changing world when corporations shed such long-term investments? Spare some time and give this a thought.
Uncertainty is Science’s Super Power, Make it Yours, Too.
The Uncertain podcast by Scientific American is simply brilliant, and this episode on Uncertainty will definitely stimulate your mind.
We all deal with uncertainty in our daily lives. However, the scale of uncertainty scientists deal with, especially in decoding the science behind science, makes for a great story to listen to. It is fascinating to see that scientists or researchers enjoy the uncertainty associated with their work due to the inherent nature of exploration and discovery involved.
The story unfolds with an unexpected opening where the conversation starts with a poet about uncertainty, and the way the story is woven into how scientists and researchers thrive in uncertainty is brilliantly narrated.
It offers some interesting perspectives on how one must be comfortable with not knowing things as a precursor to learning, how uncertainty drives more curiosity and questions, and how it can help you discover something you may have never imagined or expected.
You can listen to this entire episode by clicking on the above link.
You can also listen to the podcast on
Skills-Based Organisations: Hype or Hope?
This conversation features Vidya Krishnan, Ericsson's Chief Learning Officer, and Nigel Paine, a change-focused media, learning, and development leader.
There are a lot of thought-provoking ideas and concepts about skill enablement that Vidya and Nigel speak about. Here are a few for you to think and reflect on:
Why it is important to look at people beyond their CVs or job roles done in the past but as a collection of ‘lived experiences’.
Going forward, every organisation’s structure needs to change, and people’s roles need to become looser, thereby making it easy for people to move between different roles.
People will need to acquire a portfolio of skills in which they are experts in some and apprentices in others.
It is essential for people to prepare themselves not just for the known but for the unknowns.
As a leader, being comfortable with vulnerability, not feeling ashamed in front of people, and accepting that they don’t always know everything is vital. Asking questions does not begin from a place of ignorance but out of curiosity.
Every single person’s talent and skill spills over their job description. Try to build your ‘portfolio of skills’ rather than be focused on the job that you are doing or want to do. Crafting our job with our skills is a transforming or game-changing feeling.
Reskilling is the new recruiting. Strive to build skills that aid a better personal future for yourself and thereby grow your organisation, too. The greatest challenge in times of turbulence is not the turbulence itself but acting with yesterday’s logic.
How your side gig can potentially become your next front door! - Vidya shares this fabulous thought.
Look at your life through the lens of fulfilment and not around the axis of success only. Performance is more tied to how deeply you feel fulfilled.
Skill-sensing is critical for how you skill up or an organisation skills its people up.
Click the above link and watch the video.
The Value Of ‘I Don’t Know’.
We live in a world where disruption and change is the only constant.
Looking back in history, human beings and our society have undergone many changes that we could have never imagined. Look at the discoveries and inventions that have happened over the last 100 years. They have created new industries, driving the need for new skills, knowledge or processes to manage them, and people have had to adapt themselves continuously to stay relevant. The story of GE is an excellent example of how even one of the greatest companies of our time, founded by Thomas Alva Edison in 1892, is going through one of the most challenging periods in its history. Rapid changes in technology can disrupt even iconic firms like GE. The only way for such firms to stay relevant and keep adapting all the time is to move from the ‘I know it all’ mindset to the ‘I don’t know’ mindset of all the leaders and people who work within these firms. Most often, success creates blindspots and arrogance in people, and it creates a negative impact on a company’s culture and its future.
This is really where the ‘skill-based’ thinking in organisations and in people becomes vital. When people get uncomfortable or find it hard to deal with uncertainty, they create a ‘fake face’, as Nigel Paine calls it, and act as if they know it all. Or, as Vidya Krishnan mentions, ‘They don’t want to be ashamed in front of others’. They refuse to see the dark clouds coming or opportunities emerging right under their nose. What’s more, if they are in a position of power as leaders, they do enormous damage not only to themselves but also to the people or teams who work with them and to the companies that have been built diligently over decades.
When you, as a leader or an individual, start becoming comfortable with the feeling that there is nothing wrong if ‘I don’t know’ the answer to the problem or accept the fact that you are perfectly at ease being vulnerable in front of your colleagues, that’s when accepting change and therefore learning begins to happen. Especially with changes happening around you, there is bound to be uncertainty. You need to start enjoying the uncertainty around you, as there might not be immediate answers to the problems when uncertainty hits you, like scientists and researchers who are dealing with science. When you start with the premise that ‘I don’t know’ and start asking questions, solutions will emerge.
Companies, too, need to build a culture of encouraging individuals and leaders to loosen up. They must encourage people working there to prepare themselves for a ‘portfolio of skills’ so that they are ready to adapt and face any uncertainty that can happen. Also, if people need to be re-skilled, it starts with them believing in the ‘I don’t know’ mindset, as it opens up the mind to see new perspectives and learn new things. No amount of company-led push can get people truly re-skilled if they don’t come to the table with this conviction.
True re-skilling, adapting to uncertainty, and learning happen when you begin with an ‘I don’t know’ mindset. If knowing created value in the past, knowing ‘I don’t know’ will help you sustain and create more value in the future.
Some lessons we learnt from this week’s missions:
Take personal responsibility and accountability to skill yourself.
Be ready to accept that you will be an expert in some skills and an apprentice in a few other skills.
Learning to work and live with uncertainty will be the norm. Find ways to enjoy and embrace uncertainty.