I don\u2019t remember when or where I first heard about the learning model where being consciously incompetent is one of the four stages.\u00a0 In some ways it surprises me how many people have not heard of the four stages of competence and then after they\u2019ve learned about it \u2013 how excited they are by the ideas in it.\u00a0 Even a refresher on the ideas can be revitalizing \u2013 the model is a reminder that learning is a process.\u00a0\u00a0 Some of us can fall into making critical judgments about ourselves and that is dismissive of how our mistakes are critical to the process \u2013 it\u2019s a way to learn and become unconsciously competent – where we have mastered the skill and knowledge we wanted.<\/p>\n
The first stage is unconscious incompetence.\u00a0 When you don\u2019t know what you don\u2019t know you\u2019re in this stage.\u00a0 It could be that you recognize a skill in someone else, yet are dismissive of the usefulness of it.\u00a0 In order to move onto the next stage, you must recognize \u2013 become conscious \u2013 of both your own lack of skill and the value of learning it.<\/p>\n
From there, you move into conscious incompetence, the second stage.\u00a0 You\u2019re aware of the deficits and have little knowledge or skill yet.\u00a0 This is a time when you\u2019re likely to make lots of mistakes \u2013 and making those mistakes can be important to moving through this stage.\u00a0 Mistakes are an opportunity to learn \u2013 as trite as that might sound! Another way to consider this is how part of what you\u2019re doing in this stage is practicing.\u00a0 We\u2019ve all heard how \u201cpractice makes perfect\u201d (though please don\u2019t actually try to be perfect).\u00a0 What we\u2019re working on in this stage is becoming competent.<\/p>\n
The third stage is conscious competence.\u00a0 You have gained the knowledge and skill though you have to think about it and probably need to concentrate in order to execute it.\u00a0 You might need to have all the steps broken down or have more detailed processes at this point in your learning.\u00a0 You are still making mistakes in this stage, though they are on the decline.\u00a0 The effort to demonstrate the skills can be time and energy consuming \u2013 more than what\u2019ll be needed in the last stage.<\/p>\n
Unconscious competence is the last of the learning stages.\u00a0 This is where you have mastered the skill to the point that you no longer need to concentrate to make sure it’s done correctly.\u00a0 Mistakes are few and far between.\u00a0 When you’re at this stage, you have the skills and knowledge to teach others.<\/p>\n
As you can see, learning something new takes time as you move through these stages – and only when you’ve reached the final stage are mistakes negligible.\u00a0 How realistic is it to think that you can gain the skills without a learning curve? Heck, how perfect are you trying to be?\u00a0 The time it takes each of us to move from unconscious incompetence to unconscious competence is unique to us.<\/p>\n
Once you know about these stages you can consider where you are in the process.\u00a0 Despite the fact that many people seem to believe that organizing should<\/i> be simple and easy – doesn’t make it so for everyone.\u00a0 Let me clear, organizing is a skill like anything else – it is something anyone can learn.\u00a0 It’s also not knowledge we’re automatically born with – we learn it just like driving a car or anything else.\u00a0 Organizing is something that can have many variables – many opinions about the<\/i> way to do it (or the best<\/i> way).\u00a0 This means you have that much more to learn – more time in the middle stages before you reach the unconscious competence stage.<\/p>\n
Therefore consider whatever it is you’re trying to develop the skills and knowledge about – what is the complexity level?\u00a0 Where are you in the stages of learning?\u00a0 To some extent, our lives are a constant state of learning \u2013 at least it can be.\u00a0 Therefore, if we consider the stages of learning in combination with how we can continue to learn \u2013 we have a way to gain perspective.\u00a0 Each and every one of us goes through all four stages \u2013 no one is exempt.<\/p>\n
The Four Stages of Learning<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\n
- \n
Unconscious Incompetence<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/li>\n
- \n
Conscious Incompetence<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/li>\n
- \n
Conscious Competence<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/li>\n
- \n
Unconscious Competence<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
Setting goals for yourself and trying to create new habits could be considered you learning through these same stages \u2013 how to move from resistance, to planning, to action and practice, and each step that will take you to the final goal of it becoming a routine that requires little thought.\u00a0 What do you think \u2013 do you see a connection between the stages of learning and your desire to make changes in your life?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The four stages of learning lay out what we all go through as we try to learn something new \u2013 illustrating that we all have to follow the same process. The mistakes we make along the way to greater knowledge and skill are integral to whatever you want to learn \u2013 and provides us with a sort of road map. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[10,8,18,9,7,22,4],"class_list":["post-1718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personaldevelopment","tag-behavior","tag-discipline","tag-goals","tag-motivation","tag-procrastination","tag-productivity","tag-routines"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7p82c-rI","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1718"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1718\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1720,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1718\/revisions\/1720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.jenniferlinnig.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}