Life is full of examples that teach us lessons. When we see or hear or experience something from which we can learn, it is that example and experience that often helps us remember the lesson. That’s why stories and illustrations make learning so much more effective. When a story can be used to illustrate or demonstrate a valuable lesson, the story makes it much more understandable, relatable, and memorable. And so I am sharing examples of circumstances and stories that I have experienced in my everyday life which illustrate leadership lessons that we can learn and apply. This is one of those stories, and it points out the reminder that you always have more to learn.
I was blessed to have my children attend the same school at which I worked. From the time that I first began teaching, through my experience as an administrator, principal, and superintendent, I was always able to take my children to school with me. Early in that experience, my daughter, who was our oldest child, was finishing first grade. She enjoyed school, and loved learning, but I remember something interesting she said on the last day of school of her first grade year as I was walking her out to the car at the end of that day. This was a K-12 school, so as we were leaving, she was noticing all the other older children who were leaving as well, including the high school students. As we walked past them, she looked up at me and with great enthusiasm said, “I’m so glad that I’ve learned everything that I’m supposed to learn, so that I don’t have to keep coming back to school like they do!”
Obviously, she had not learned everything that she was going to learn, but at that age, she did not realize what she did not know. And that makes me think of something that my dad would say: “The more you know, the more you know you don’t know.” He would say that to me to help keep me humble and teachable when I was pursuing a degree in higher education. He wanted to make sure I understood that I didn’t know everything, and that there was always more that I could learn. I have since learned that those two attributes – humility and teachability – are absolutely necessary to personal growth.
That’s true for you as well. You must be humble enough to admit that you don’t know everything, and teachable enough to see that there is more to learn (and then to pursue it). Those two things apply to your particular area of expertise or skill, but they also apply to your broader role of leadership, and to the way that you navigate your life. So, commit to being humble. Recognize that there is more to know than what you know, and that often there are others who know more than you from whom you can learn. Then, commit to being teachable. Knowing that there is more to learn, be willing to pursue it.
That’s the lesson on leadership from this little thing in life, from my daughter, at the end of first grade, believing that she had learned everything there was to know. The reality is that you don’t know everything. You often don’t even fully understand how much it is that you don’t know. However, humility and teachability will enable you to recognize this, and to pursue learning more of what you need to know. Because, the more you know, the more you know you don’t know. You always have more to learn.