Copy Right -Understanding the art of learning from others -Part 12

The concept of Inverse Learning

Every relationship in life presents two opportunities; to teach or to learn. You may have noticed in a classroom; there is a teacher and students. The teacher teaches to give information so that the students can learn something new and progress. The knowledge helps to make decisions on what to do, which implies that there are some beneficial experiences and some which they are told not to do which are likely to have unpleasant consequences.

Students usually change their views based on many things, including the teacher, the information they receive, the level of persuasion. It could eventually shape the perspective and thoughts of such students to a point where they only believe the teacher and nobody else with contrary opinion or view.

The same is true for many today in life. We all have the opportunity to meet different people in life; some are like a teacher that gives us information which we accept them to be right. Some others provide us with lessons from their imperfections, errors, or failures. We can learn from those too. We not only benefit from those experiences by inverse learning, but they can also benefit from it to get a better result, and many more could avoid such pitfalls in future if they know better in advance.

A lot of people only want to listen to the great stories or people they consider wise, which is good so we can follow excellent examples. It is also possible to learn from the errors and failures of people too. The ‘perfect’ professional today was once an amateur that struggled through different challenges before becoming what you see today. You may find it difficult to see such traces of weakness because it has turned to strength with time, but you can easily relate to those facing such challenges and learn from them.

The consequences of the decisions of some people may help you make a better decision. Someone may have acted foolishly causing great harm or damage to himself and the community. It could help many others avoid such ways and decide not to follow suit. Inverse learning could help you get the lesson out of a bad situation or sieve the sense out of non-sense.

There are some times that we need to learn inversely by doing the exact opposite of what we have seen so that we do not follow the same mistakes. We can help many others also that are frustrated in a continuous loop of errors. It could be beneficial in providing solutions to the challenges that many people face, as they may not realise the reason for their failures. You can turn the situation around and learn from it by avoiding what led to the error and doing what will lead to a beneficial result.

There is always an opportunity to learn from people. It could be either something to follow or something to avoid. Sometimes we neglect some opportunities because we do not know what the outcome may be. Some people have already made those mistakes, and they have results to show for it, we can learn from those by avoiding the errors they have once made.

In the process of conducting a project, there is often a documentation of the knowledge gained, which is a combination of positive and negative experiences. It is often called Lesson Learnt. It is a vital document, especially after the project, as it provides a knowledge bank for better performance in the future. The negatives help to avoid the re-occurrence of any unpleasant occurrence while the positives give you an indication of what you can replicate.

Many people have surpassed the records in their profession. They achieved this feat, among other things, by learning from the errors of those that have gone ahead and avoiding them. Some have done worse because they repeated the mistakes or multiplied them.

There was once an entrepreneur that was reselling products of a big company. She gathered interests from her network and had a list of products they would like. She then borrowed money to order the products with the hope that those that have signified interest will buy the products. Unfortunately, they refused to commit to the purchase of the products, and she was left to bear the loss. It dashed her hope. Some people have had similar experiences in business, and many have learnt from this mistake. It is now common to see that many guarantee a commitment from the customer before they invest their time, energy and resources. Interest in a product is good, but it does mean they will commit to buy.

In one of the national election years, the party in power had the majority according to the opinion polls. As we counted down towards the election, the victory seemed inevitable. The party took advantage of this to make changes that affected some people and eventually made the people change their decision. The party did not win as expected and ended up in a coalition government without the majority required, which led to frustration and another election. The new leader learnt from this error and achieved victory with majority seats in the next election. Some leaders have lost their position similarly because of some mistakes they made during their term in office. Some have learnt, avoided those errors and have been able to achieve a better result; some have unfortunately followed suit and ended up in even worse situations.

I know of people that lend money or offer services without any formal agreement or documentation. It later led to arguments and eventually loss of the funds or income. Many have learnt from this, and implemented necessary agreement to avoid such disagreements and losses.

There have been disputes that led to chaos in some organisations because of the lack of documented policy. A policy, well written, understandable and accessible has saved such commotion when implemented in an organisation, community or nation. Some learnt from the mistakes and provided solutions to avoid a repeat. We can gain more from errors -when things go wrong, than from when they go well, because it can help achieve and maintain a better result.

You can always ask yourself the following questions when you come across such an opportunity; What can I learn from this mistake? What can I do to achieve a better result? How can this consequence be avoided?

You will be helping not just yourself, but those having such challenges and many that are likely to fall into the same trap in the future. Learn a lesson from the mistake of others and proffer an action that will improve the result. Be careful not to follow the errors but inversely learn from it.

To be continued next week, don’t miss it.

I hope you have found this post valuable, please leave a comment below and share with others. Send in your questions or contributions as well if you have any, I will be glad to hear from you.

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