Managing Leadership^®

When do you really know something? Is it when you can recite it on demand? Must you further be able to manipulate it to help you make decisions, chart courses of action? Or, must you actually understand it?

There are distinct differences between all three of these levels of knowledge possession. In particular, it is useful – important – to not mistake the second for the third.

But let’s start with the first. Have you ever consulted with someone who seemed to have an impressive grasp of the general nature of your business, but could never come to grips with your particular problem? This is the memorizer. This person has only a tenuous possession of the information, a superficially theoretical understanding that, while internally coherent, cannot be meaningfully applied to issues encountered in the real world, or used to comprehend them.

The saying that those who can’t do, teach, may have been intended for such people, but the truth is that they make inept teachers also. They can be said to recognize, but not to possess, knowledge.

The next group has attained a deeper appreciation of the material. In particular, they can follow the logic from research to theory. But they have difficulty continuing the trajectory from theory to practice. This is shown in their insistence on projecting general statistical findings onto every specific instance they confront. They will quote research studies to you until the cows come home, but insist on extruding your specific situation backwards into the pattern predicted by the general results of those studies.

This group’s members have taken their possession of the knowledge obtained to an important new level. They are able to use it to help assess situations and recommend action. The problem is that they inflexibly impose general patterns on discrete events, and eventually – inevitably – miss significant exceptions. This is not to say, however, that they have attained the ability to recognize patterns; the truth is that they are so bound up within them that they cannot recognize them for what they really are – including, importantly, their inherent characteristic of not comprehending every relevant thing that happens.

If research indicates that “A” results in “B” 80% of the time, these people will identify the result of “A” as “B” 100% of the time. Such people can be said to have borrowed knowledge, but still not to have attained full possession of information which still only resides in its originator.

But the final group has taken the information on board, challenged it theoretically, compared it with their own learning and experience, perhaps experimented with it, and come to a comprehensive understanding of its features, contours, what it contains, what it sheds light on, and what it leaves unenlightened. They are able to use it to recognize patterns, indicating what can be safely dealt with according to associated action protocols.

But they also use it to recognize the outliers to statistical generalizations – they are alert to the statistical certainty of the other 20%, and fully prepared to acknowledge that what they are dealing with at the moment may be in that segment. They will then be able to adapt their knowledge intelligently to the specifics of the actual situation, rather than applying standard procedures by rote to every event. Further, they use this understanding to recognize – even to create – something entirely new. This group knows their knowledge.

Unfortunately, many people who use knowledge really don’t know it. In fact, many who present knowledge to you for application in your work as a manager are themselves from one of the first two groups.

That’s fine. What’s more, the path to full mastery of information often passes through those stages. Just don’t loiter there with the others. Challenge everything you learn – not to deny or resist it, but to make it your own.

How do you know you have entered that last stage? When pressed to defend your position, do you present an organized case, or defer to the authority of your source? By the way, don’t be shy about citing your source – you should where appropriate. What you ought to be concerned about is finding yourself hiding behind it.

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Today’s tip: Speaking of sources of knowledge, please see this WSJ opinion piece about where some of the greatest ever can be found, and what our culture’s evolving approach to their codification may really indicate – or may even be.

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Note: Dan McCarthy, author of Great Leadership, has just published a new Leadership Development Carnival. I am certainly gratified to find that a recent post from these pages has been featured on it, but am especially pleased to have access to the really valuable resources and thinking that Dan has assembled. Please stop over to see – you will find yourself adding important new sites to your daily reading.

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