Everyone is a Learner

Anna, our facilitator for class this week wrote about experience and wisdom and everyone a learner. Within this vein, I think about the post I wrote earlier on facilitation. 

Within our community, we have experienced operators and hands who have twenty or thirty years of knowledge about the refineries, plants, and worksites that they support. One thing we are missing is a course that can help these people become better trainers and help develop the next generation. 

For years trainers in my industry have been focused on the coming skills and technical training gap (Leonard et al., 2014 & Sammer, 2020) and the deficiencies that are coming to light in hiring for replacement using a labor pool with less technical and engineering know-how (Faw, 2012 & The Engineers Ring, 2019). 10 years ago this was something to expect, 5 years ago it was something we feared and we saw coming to light, and now we are living through it. 

Shade tree mechanics of the type that are now retiring are rare and a prized commodity for hiring organizations. What I believe we need is the ability to mentor and train using the workforce that is retiring, but so often these people don't have the skills necessary to properly train and mentor those that are replacing them. We promote what we can from our organization but there is a very real gap and part of filling that I believe is by tapping into the wisdom of the retiring workforce and empowering them to help train their replacements. 

One wonderful resource that is practicing this in real-time is Dad How Do I (see here (Links to an external site.)). A series developed by a concerned YouTuber who is interested in just helping people who have never been taught the basics of living, get a crash course in these subjects and using learning on demand, and video style of training. We are actually thinking of producing similar video snippets for our industry and utilizing the aqurired wisdom of our retreating older community.  

References

Faw, L. (2012, November 20). Does it matter if millennials don’t know how cars work? Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/larissafaw/2012/11/20/does-it-matter-if-millennials-dont-know-how-cars-work/?sh=7429fe044d58

Leonard, D., Swap, W., & Barton, G. (2014, December 2). What’s lost when experts retire. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2014/12/whats-lost-when-experts-retire

Sammer, J. (2020, February 19). Preparing for waves of retiring employees. SHRM. https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/benefits/pages/preparing-for-waves-of-retiring-employees.aspx

The Engineers Ring. (2019, April 17). Millennials lack key DIY skills. The Engineer’s Ring. https://www.theengineersring.com/young-people/millennials-lack-key-diy-skills/