When I graduated from college I was ready to tame the world. I was brimming with knowledge, and ready to show people how intelligent I was. I quickly learned that the book knowledge I had gathered was a great foundation but “experiential knowledge” is what propelled me forward along the skill set path.
Most of what we learn through our careers comes from experience. An old saying goes, “Good judgement comes from experience; and experience comes from bad judgement”. It’s okay to make mistakes along the way, but the most important step is to learn from those mistakes. The best way to learn is to ask questions. Open communication is key; asking questions shows that you are open to learning.
Nobody is born with knowledge; it is amassed through several iterations of experience, some of which are good and a few of which are bad. When you encounter failure be sure that you take the time to learn what went wrong, and what you can do to improve the process for the future.
Steve Jobs was fired from Apple early on in his career; Walt Disney’s first animation studio went bankrupt; Mark Cuban failed at being a powdered milk salesman. All of these highly successful people persevered and kept asking questions until they got it right. Remember that the only bad question is the one that’s not asked!
Name: Dave
Title: Retired Relationship Manager
Industry: Applicable to all
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Photo by Lindsay Henwood on Unsplash
