Developing Expertise

Practicing with Courageous Curiosity.

I once was asked by a group of medical students what it takes to develop expertise in an area of medicine.  The answer is quite simple actually: a courageous curiosity. One must be courageous to admit to himself or herself that they do not know something and then must be curious enough to search out the answer.

Let’s look at an example.

Suppose you have set out to hypothetically be an expert in recognizing the shapes of objects. In all your efforts and learning to date, let’s say that you recognize three basic shapes - squares, triangles and circles. You have mastered the basics of shapes and certainly you are skilled to comment on shapes.  I would not say you are an expert in shapes but I would leave that to you.

An important lesson for all professionals who wish to advance their expertise is what they do when faced with situations that they have never encountered before. What does the person do when faced with new shapes - such as a rectangle, diamond  or oval (difficulty level 1) or heart, shamrock or star (difficulty level 2).

Should you choose to call a rectangle a special type of flattened square, it will probably make little difference and the same is true for calling an oval a special type of flattened circle. These are not so far off from reality. But what about the star shape and heart shape? What will you choose to call them if your knowledge of shapes is mainly that of circles, triangles and squares?

A Courageous Curiosity

It takes courage to say “I’ve never seen anything like this before!” and it takes courage to say “I just don’t know what this is!”. It takes more courage to say it to someone else than to say it quietly to oneself. It takes a bit of curiosity to figure out the answer to the unknown. Opening a book, searching the internet or seeking advice from others can sometimes lead one to the correct answer. 

Expertise builds overtime when one goes through their professional life with courageous curiosity.