Learning to Learn

Everyone says they want to grow, until it involves actual effort.

Imagine a software engineer encountering an exception and immediately asking a senior colleague for help, without even reading it or trying a quick Google search. This scenario isn’t hypothetical. I have actually had a manager ask me to teach people to copy-paste error messages into Google. It sounds absurd, yet it highlights a widespread issue: many people simply have not learned how to learn on their own.

Schooled to pass, not to learn

Part of the problem starts with how we are educated. Schools and universities prioritize exam performance, grades, and diplomas over genuine understanding. Educational philosopher Paulo Freire famously critiqued the banking model of education in which teachers deposit information into apathetic students. This approach turns students into containers to be filled by the teacher.

This system produces graduates adept at passing exams, but they often lack in critical skills such as critical inquiry and self-directed learning. As Isaac Asimov put it: “Self-education is […] the only kind of education there is. The only function of a school is to make self-education easier; failing that, it does nothing.” When schools fail to teach students how to educate themselves, those students enter adult life unprepared to learn independently.

One startling data point is that children’s natural curiosity is dramatically dampened by schooling. Young children ask roughly one question every two minutes at home. Once they start school the rate drops to less than one question every two hours. By sitting in class, kids go from exuberant curiosity to the silent recipients of information. As Albert Einstein once lamented: “It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education.” The decline in questioning suggests that many students learn an unfortunate lesson: do not ask too many questions, just listen and repeat. Over years of schooling, this can breed a form of learned helplessness in learning, which is a mindset in which people expect that answers come from authority, such as a teacher or a textbook, rather than from their own investigations.

Relentless curiosity and boundless imagination are what define early childhood. It is when children can learn and explore without negative repercussions: there are no penalties for failures, only scratches that heal with time. Yet by the age of 6, half of all children have lost their sense of wonder about the world. Hearing “Stop bothering me” or “I don’t know” from their parents whenever a child asks a seemingly crazy question about the world plays, as Carl Sagan noted, a significant role in reducing a child’s sense of wonder. Such a moment is nevertheless a perfect opportunity to teach your children that no one, not even adults, knows everything, but you can look up information together to learn more. You might even learn something new yourself!

Without role models for lifelong learning, children may end up defaulting to say: “Don’t make me think!” But instead of open-ended play, children engage more in instruction-based tasks as they grow older. Think of it as kids that follow the booklet that comes with each Lego box rather than smashing the newly built toy and using the bricks to build something new entirely, over and over again. Or colouring within the lines rather than drawing from scratch. Or scrolling endlessly on TikTok or the social media platform du jour.

By the time people graduate, they have internalized the idea that learning is a process of being taught and being tested, not something you initiate and pursue yourself. It is no surprise then that many adults stop actively learning new things once formal education is over.

The illiterate of the twenty-first century will not be those who cannot read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn. Alvin Toffler (1970)

Learned helplessness in adult learners

In the workplace this translates to employees who do not take the first step in learning without being prodded. These are the coworkers who encounter a problem and immediately look for someone to give them the solution to their specific problem, as if every workplace comes with a personal tutor on standby. Mentors and managers are not mothers: they are not there to hold you by the hand through every challenge or scold you into doing your homework. They can guide and support, but you own your growth. Or at least you ought to.

The modern workplace demands constant learning, yet many people do not feel equipped for it. The half-life of skills is now about five years, down from 10–15 years in the past few decades. So, half of what you know today could be outdated in a few years. No one can feasibly teach you everything you will need to know over an entire career. You have to learn how to learn new skills on your own. Unfortunately, too many workers have not yet received that memo. Half of employees only engage in training when they are told to. Almost three-quarters express an interest in upskilling, though only half actually do anything about it. Knowing how to learn is as crucial as any specified piece of knowledge, possibly even more crucial since specific job skills can quickly become obsolete.

Chasing credentials

Motivation is another barrier to learning, specifically the dominance of extrinsic motivation over intrinsic curiosity. Many people do not truly love learning for its own sake; they view it as a means to an end: a grade, a diploma, a promotion. If there is no immediate reward or certification, the incentive to learn evaporates. Organizations and schools have conditioned us to chase gold stars and credentials as proof of competence at the expense of actual competence. A certificate of completion merely states that your posterior is sufficiently pliable to sit you comfortably through a few seminars.

MOOCs promised free learning for all. Millions enrol in online courses from Coursera, edX, and so on, but completion rates are often in the single digits. The vast majority drop out once initial enthusiasm wears off, likely because real learning is hard work with no immediate pay-off. Interestingly, one of the most popular MOOCs ever is “Learning How to Learn” with over 2.7 million learners, which underscores both the need and the desire for this meta-skill.

In corporate settings, the focus on extrinsic rewards and compliance can actually undermine learning. Employees attend mandatory training sessions because they have to, but often they are checked out. It is common to see people click through required e-learning modules just to get the completion certificate to make HR stop nagging you. No wonder 43% of employees who do receive formal training still find it ineffective.

And indeed, the ROI on corporate training is abysmal. Companies worldwide spend $130 billion on employee development every year, yet only a quarter of that is estimated to be effective. That is nearly $100 billion down the drain!

That is hardly surprising. I once suffered through an hours-long monologue of a director with decades of experience at the executive level, after returning from a leadership seminar, totally enchanted by the virtues of a grossly simplified version of Myers–Briggs type indicators to understand the truth both universally acknowledged and self-evident: people can be different from the stereotypical extroverted, overconfident executive. Whether MBTI has been debunked or not is irrelevant. Relevant is the sad state of affairs in many organizations: experienced managers who never even learned anything about basic human psychology or organizational behaviour.

A pertinent question is whether people actually want to grow? Maybe they just want to be seen as if they have grown. After all, only one in three adults pursue learning for personal interest; the majority do so for career-related goals, often without clarity on what skills matter. Impression management and signalling theory explain how people pursue credentials not to increase ability but to display a semblance of competence.

Learning to learn

You either learn to learn or you stagnate. Accept that you, and no one else, are responsible for your development. Sure, your employer might pay for a course or your mentor might point you to a resource, but ultimately you have to drive the process. Embrace the idea that managers and mentors are there to support, not to act as surrogate parents nagging you to do your homework or force-feed you the right answers.

Once you take ownership, you can start cultivating the habits of self-directed learning:

• Ask questions relentlessly. Rekindle the toddler-like curiosity and stop being embarrassed by asking “Why?” or “How?” about things you do not understand or about things you believe you understand but never questioned too much. Every expert was once a beginner who asked basic questions.
• Leverage modern tools wisely. Humanity’s accumulated wisdom is only a few clicks away. 70% of what you learn comes from trial and error, not asking people or formal training. So try to figure stuff out yourself: Google the exception, converse with ChatGPT, read the documentation, or experiment with solutions.
• Make time to learn. “I don’t have the time to learn” is a blatant lie. People spend on average 21 hours on Netflix & Co. every week. That’s almost an entire day. You could reallocate a portion of that to read, take an online course, or practice a new skill. Many companies nowadays also encourage employees to take the time to learn or experiment during working hours. It is about willpower and priority.
• Set goals. Self-directed learners set their own curriculum. Unlike in school, you get to choose what is relevant or fascinating to you. Take advantage of that freedom to dive into topics that not only improve your career prospects but also genuinely intrigue you. It is much easier to stay motivated when you have an intrinsic interest rather than react to external pressure.

But more than anything, embrace the discomfort that comes with learning. Real learning often involves struggling, failing, and feeling dumb before you feel a little bit smarter. Over time you become more comfortable with not knowing, because you learn to trust your ability to figure things out.

Frustration is a signal you have hit a boundary. Do not avoid it, use it. Reflect on that frustration. It might signal that you have not yet understood a problem well enough to solve it efficiently. Maybe you do not yet have the knowledge to solve it, which is an opportunity to acquire it. Or it might indicate that you have uncovered a problem no one else has attempted to solve before. Each failure can be a step towards mastery, but only if you are deliberate and embrace failure and frustration as part of the learning process.

Lifelong learning

Learning to learn is essentially about reclaiming agency in your education and career. It is not about self-promotion; people who actually learn rarely broadcast their achievements for applause. Instead, it is about shifting from a passive mindset to an active one, which can be profoundly liberating. Instead of fearing the next new technology on the horizon or clinging to what you were taught years ago, you start to approach unfamiliar challenges with curiosity and humility.

There is a lovely story about Kanō Jigorō, the founder of the martial art judo. Instead of focussing on combat and strength, he studied anatomy and through trial and error came to the central insight of judo, which is how to use your opponents weight against them. On his deathbed he asked to be buried in a white belt, not the black belt of a master, because he wanted to be remembered as a learner. We are all eternal learners, never masters. Expertise comes with great humility. Loud people who proclaim to be experts or thought leaders rarely are.

The benefits of lifelong learning are not just personal. Organizations full of self-directed learners are more innovative and resilient. Studies show that in companies with strong learning cultures, engagement and retention rates are much higher than in those without. To all the managers who happen to have come across these words of mine and lest you think otherwise: you cannot decree a growth mindset. It has to come from within people; it is also a process, not a switch you can flick.

Ultimately, learning to learn might be the most critical skill of all in the twenty-first century. It is the skill that unlocks every other skill. It is not about jumping on trends or productivity hacks, but the artisan’s spirit of continuous refinement, or shokunin kishitsu (職人気質). It is about improvement without applause or an audience. It is mastery without end. You build mastery through small, daily efforts and honest reflection. No one can stop you from exploring. Except yourself.