Is our “Real World – New Normal” becoming our “New Classroom” for Education?
Is our “Real World – New Normal” becoming our “New Classroom” for Education?
Since the formal declaration of the COVID19 pandemic, we have all been experiencing what few ever predicted; namely a lockdown on work, business and of course education…. or maybe not education?
Classroom Learning has always been different than Real World Learning:
The School of Hard Knocks (also referred to the University of Life) is an idiomatic phrase meaning the (often painful) education we get from life’s sometimes negative experiences as often contrasted with formal education. Given where the world is today and how life has necessarily had to change dramatically, one could argue that we have been unintentionally enrolled in a Doctoral Program at the School of Hard Knocks!
Terry Heick, Founder & Director of Teach Thought – We Grow Teachers, recently wrote that there are 12 ways that learning in school is different than learning in the real world:
1. In school, learning has a beginning and an end
2. Inquiry and curiosity drive learning outside of school
3. The feedback loops are different inside and outside of school
4. In school, the quality judge is rarely the ‘maker’ or ‘doer’
5. In school, the standards for quality are different
6. The learning is externally prompted outside of school
7. In school, learning is done inside the classroom (or is it now)?
8. The collaboration is different outside of school
9. In school, the learning often depends on the teacher’s ‘comfort level’ and expertise
10. In school, sociocultural ‘aspects’ are either non-critical or minimized /avoided
11. In school, it is based on content areas
12. In school, the work is graded
So how does this relate to how learning is happening today during our lock down and re-emergence of our professional lives and our business world? How has this impacted us as entrepreneurs, current or aspiring? And how have we been learning from The School of Hard Knocks and how is it preparing us to be better educated in our professional lives?
Applying our learning to Re-emergence:
Our learning has taught us to value cash in the bank like never before, especially for those businesses that have received Government funding through both the CARES Act as well as Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL). We have learned via real world recent experiences that LEAN principals are a MUST in many small businesses in the hospitality and retail space and not simply a Corporate Initiative for improving efficiency and profits. Certain franchises have learned to identify new opportunities created from the pandemic including:
• Restoration franchises like Puro Clean expanding their bioremediation services
• Commercial cleaning franchises like City Wide who are preparing office spaces for return to work
• Home services franchises like Monster Tree Service who are experiencing increased demand now that we are in our “stay at home” mode and wanting to make property improvements
How has this impacted us as aspiring entrepreneurs:
I have often used the phrase “confused people don’t act”. Buying or starting your franchise business should always be an educated and well-informed decision, yet new entrepreneurs still working in their corporate jobs have struggled with allocating the necessary time for a thorough investigation and proper due diligence and validation. Today, the one commodity that has been unintentionally created by COVID19 is more available time for many things (e.g. family time, home repairs/remodeling, etc.), but importantly, we may now have ample time to make a well-informed decision about business ownership.
Education and new learning for our professional lives:
Prior to COVID19, I would hazard to guess that many professionals never used Zoom for conducting meetings and discussions. Now we have necessarily received not just a superficial understanding of conducting virtual meetings, many of us are now “The Zoom Doctor”! Has this new learning made us more efficient or more impersonal in how we conduct our day to day businesses? That certainly could be debated, but most will agree that we have learned to forge ahead regardless of our like or dislike for this technology aid.
In summary:
Going somewhat personal, education has always been stressed in our household for our children and until recently, that has always meant formal education. Having 3 young adults (who have returned to the nest on and off since COVID19) will have this period of real-world learning indelibly etched into their lives. We can only hope as parents that education for our children has not only continued, but possibly has even been accelerated and redefined, and that it will serve these generations well as future business leaders.