When I was in high school our main focus was to figure out what to do with the rest of our lives. We needed to learn skills that would be useful to get a job and eventually a career. Most of us had no idea, so evaluating what courses to study in college was overwhelming. I remember taking an “aptitude” test my high school handed out which was followed up with a one-on-one with a guidance counselor who presumably analyzed my transcripts and gave advice on my career path. I don’t remember what he suggested at the time, but I’m sure it would make me laugh now. Back then there were no cell phones, no internet, and home PCs were very new. Luckily, I was exposed to some computer time in my mid-teens teaching myself how to program. This eventually came in handy 10 years later and for the rest of my life.
Today is different: I now consider the education and career path for my daughters — and all kids, for that matter. I was part of a cohort of graduates who were told that if we studied hard, learned a skill, and showed up to work every day that we would find success. I don’t believe that to be the case today. The advent of the Internet, the technology that brings the ubiquity of it into our hands, and artificial intelligence have bent the learning curve so much it would otherwise take a lifetime to climb. High school and college students today will learn a skill to get them into the door somewhere, and then quickly learn a new skill on newer technology which embarks them on a journey of lifelong learning. They have to specialize, learn something new and specialize some more or become stagnant.
Where does that leave us parents? We encourage, empower and most importantly we equip. We equip our children with the tools they will need to help them in their lifelong learning. We teach them how to learn, and this can be in various ways. To get a step further and a little like Inception, they need to learn how to teach themselves how to learn new things in different ways. We learn to drive with our hand-eye-feet coordination (of course my daughter may never learn to drive given autonomous cars), we learn to read in various ways, we learn sports, music, maths, all through their own vectors.
The future will belong to those who have the self-motivation to take advantage of all the free and cheap tools and flows coming out of the supernova.
— Tom Friedman, Thank You For Being Late
One of my millennial product managers recently took over a product and as he has begun he told me he was writing a methodology/strategy on how he would learn that product. He was able to break down the product into smaller chunks in order to learn them deliberately then re-assemble them to see the big picture. He learned how to learn and how to teach himself something new. I believe this is where we’re going, but it doesn’t have to be ominous. The ubiquity of the Internet and the free availability of information and tools provide an excellent framework for the next generation. They can leverage this framework to excel and flourish. These are the things that crawl into my mind when thinking about my children’s futures.
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