A leader understands that there are levels of competency in his or her own life as well as the lives of those whom they lead.

There’s the level of Unconscious Incompetence. Some people don’t know what they don’t know.

There’s the level of Conscious Incompetence where the person says,  “Now I know what I don’t know.”

Then there’s the level of Conscious Competence in which I work very hard at being competent at what I do. Eventually, if I do the task long enough, I achieve Unconscious Competence.

It’s not unlike driving a stick shift car.  When I first started to learn to drive a stick, my whole attention was on the floor. I didn’t even think about the traffic around me.  I was pushing the clutch, and then shifting, and then letting out the clutch, then pushing the gas. Oh, I was so busy doing that, and even then I jerked the car to a stop, and the engine would die. I was trying to achieve conscious competence. Then finally, I hit unconscious competence and I could just drive and think about the cars that were on the road.  That was quite an accomplishment.

What a leader understands is that there are many levels that they will need to take their people through in terms of these levels of competence. However, they will often need to back up a level from unconscious competence (which hopefully the leader has achieved) to conscious competence.  Because unless they go back to conscious competence, they won’t be able to teach their people what they know, what they do, and how they think. They won’t be able to come back to being able to pass on the wisdom that they’ve achieved through life and work experiences.

Understanding these four levels of competence gives us a framework in which we can put not only our followers but also ourselves in any given area. Showing ourselves what areas we’re able to teach and what areas we have not yet broken down to that conscious competence level so that we can pass it on to another.

Categories: Learning

Tags: learning