Did you recently join a meeting or a training where you said one or both of these?
- I already know that
- Me too
In the academic sector, it often seems like everyone knows better than everyone else; the “Professor” knows better than all academics and researchers, the “PFHEA” is the ultimate knower of everything – yes everything – and the list of competing titles goes on. This is the Dunning–Kruger effect in action!
Have you ever been in a training space where everyone knows everything already and everyone has done everything you have achieved as well?
In this blog, I address two key attitudes to drop in order to become a humble student. Great students are open to learning all the time!
Drop your “I already know that” statement
When I run workshops for change management, the first thing I request participants to do is to be humble students and drop their notion of “I Already Know That”. If they can apply this one single attitude throughout the workshop, they will come out a winner.
Dropping this particular statement opens your mind to suggestions being made and you are more prone to learn how to implement those suggestions in your own team/department, increasing the likelihood of you successfully implementing improvements in your own work environment.
Of course, dropping this statement does not always happen like that, you need to be willing to do the work to change your own mindset. Check out this blog on “Changing mindsets to reduce discrimination at work“. This is directly transferrable to other areas where you need to have an open mind to suggestions.
Drop your “Me too” statement
You have probably heard of active listening and passive listening, that is what most people are familiar with and also what is often covered in most training within academia.
If you have ever said “Me too” in response to what someone has shared during a workshop or training, you were practising what is called “listening to respond” – you might be more familiar with the term “biased listening” depending of how many levels of listening you are aware of.
Now that most of the professional world has moved to hybrid work, you hear “Me too” more often. ”Me too” is slightly similar (nonetheless still better) to the scenario where a speaker or trainer is speaking while some participants are busy chatting in the discussion space or sharing “useful” resources. You may notice how often the “useful” materials shared are pushing the participant’s own agenda, something to put them in the centre of the conversation, bringing back the attention to them. “Me too” is also another example of bringing attention to you, although still better than the scenario of sharing “useful” materials.
Transcending these two limiting statements
Of course, dropping one’s “I already know that” and “Me too” statements is harder to put into practice.
The only way you can transcend that is by observing yourself when you attend developmental sessions – of course, the challenge being that you need to invest your time and effort to find those sessions, register for them and actually turn up to the entirety of those sessions. Sadly, in academia, such an opportunity is limited to only a few. One way I have curtailed this, was by identifying external, international training sessions that I could do in my own time.
Here is the recipe I followed in transcending my own “I already know that” and “Me too” statements:
👉I identify as many free online sessions available as possible
👉I happily pay for any session that is not free – I take charge how much and how fast I want change
👉I ensure I attend the session and take notes like I have never ever heard any of the concepts, theories, or tips before
👉I reflect on the notes and observe the feeling I had during the whole session
👉I repeat, and train myself to be aware of my feeling during (and not after) the session
Obviously, it is a recipe that can be adjusted, as long as you turn mash potato into hash brown and not the other way round.
Happy experimentation!
Impact Coaching & Mentoring (ICM) for Leaders 