When I want to learn something new, I methodically disassemble the industry for understanding. As it turns out, I always use the same three steps for any industry regardless if my interest is professional or personal.
Step 1: I always start by figuring out who the leaders of the industry are. Admittedly this practice is a bit subjective since it relies on exposure and opinion, but I find it quite useful. When I studied music, this involved learning who the best musicians were. I don’t mean the Kenny G’s of the world that only succeeded because of fat marketing budgets and computer synthesizers, but the “down and dirty” people that make it work every day in the real world. In the testing world, I used blogs as an extremely effective way to get this information since it gave me instant access to their thoughts and beliefs. I used conferences in conjunction with my findings from the blogs to fine tune my understanding since face-to-face contact helps pull back the curtains in many cases.
Step 2: I continue by getting a grasp of the glossary used in the industry, an understanding of the vocabulary used so I can absorb what these people are talking about. I underestimated this task the first few times, but have since learned the intricacies involved. Everyone has an opinion or interpretation of what they think X means, and certainly everyone is entitled to this. The difficulty comes with extremely vocal professionals in the industry with differing opinions who sometimes push their definitions to purposely promote themselves or discredit others. Personally, I use the results of step 1 to help narrow this down to relevant and concise information.
Step 3: I finish with an evaluation of the information that was collected, followed by implementation and use; the literal “doing” what was learned and applying what can be applied when applicable. This is my favorite part because it is like putting in the last few pieces of the puzzle and finally seeing the picture. Equally exciting for me is the realization that this is only a small part of the full puzzle, that there is a whole set of untapped leaders and resources that weren’t even on my radar before. Who inspired the leaders? What resources do they use? Why can’t method X or technology Y be applied?
In my experience, these steps can and should be repeated. Why? The next time through the steps I narrow in on who inspires the leaders and their peers, which inevitably points to a new ring of resources and updates to the glossary. I typically go through the steps 2 or 3 times depending on the depth of the industry, how much I really need to know about the industry, and how much effort I put in the previous time(s). One observation that I find interesting is when reaching the top tier (and yes, there is such a thing despite the sometimes circular pattern of inspiration), many leaders are inspired by people outside of the industry. This could be a writer, an artist, someone in a related field, or sometimes it is just plain random. Why? My guess is people that apply their life experiences and external inspiration to their current industry make it something bigger and better than it was before.
Another variation is to select a segment of the industry to focus on when repeating the steps. For example, I spent 3 rounds learning software testing and feel I have a basic understanding of the industry’s key players and concepts. My next step is to narrow in on exploratory testing; who the key players are, what they do, who inspires them, how do they define things, etc.
One trap I keep falling into is not letting go of less-relevant information. This is a weakness of mine because I used to think all information is useful to some degree, even if it only teaches me what not to do or give perspective on how others exist. In retrospect, spending time on the wrong information does not add enough value to my self-learning experience. Learning something that may or may not provide value pulls me away from the time and opportunity to learn something I know to be relevant and useful. I also risk absorbing bad information which can lead me off my intended learning path. Am I saying to ignore this kind of information? No, I simply say it’s a risk that should have some thought behind it.
A true life example of this is the list of RSS feeds that I check every day. I was cleaning them out today and found I had about 15 feeds from sources I no longer consider accurate or relevant. These 15 feeds didn’t necessarily stop me from reading the other, more relevant RSS feeds, but it did stop me from spending more of my time absorbing, learning, and implementing relevant information.
I’ve used this approach successfully in several industries including: music performance, software development, dog training, software methodologies, software testing, and even cooking. Does it work for everyone? Does everyone do this already, perhaps unknowingly part of the human learning process? Not sure, honestly, but I know that while writing this I realized how much of my self-learning experience was summed up by these steps. I also found myself wanting to write more about this topic, my observations and experiences, and how so many of these concepts transcend every industry I have used it in, but in the end it is just about learning something new.
