There are many incompetent people in the world. Dr. David A. Dunning is haunted by the fear he might be one of them.
Dr. Dunning, a professor of psychology at Cornell, worries about this because, according to his research, most incompetent people do not know that they are incompetent.
On the contrary. People who do things badly, Dr. Dunning has found in studies conducted with a graduate student, Justin Kruger, are usually supremely confident of their abilities — more confident, in fact, than people who do things well.
Note the last paragraph there…. inept people are MORE confident in their ability than competant people! I am sure you know the type. They work hard. They create, learn and amaze all the people around them, and seem to be driven for perfection and high quality work. Then you talk to them. Compliment them and they crumble into little balls of mushy peas! I find it quite annoying that people like this don’t seem to be able to take a compliment. Then Erica Goode of the NYTimes, in writing a summary of this interesting study put it into perspective for me.
Unlike their unskilled counterparts, the most able subjects in the study, Dr. Kruger and Dr. Dunning found, were likely to underestimate their own competence. The researchers attributed this to the fact that, in the absence of information about how others were doing, highly competent subjects assumed that others were performing as well as they were — a phenomenon psychologists term the “false consensus effect.”
When high scoring subjects were asked to “grade” the grammar tests of their peers, however, they quickly revised their evaluations of their own performance. In contrast, the self-assessments of those who scored badly themselves were unaffected by the experience of grading others; some subjects even further inflated their estimates of their own abilities.
The problem I see in my line of work is that the competant, amazing people I work with are unable find the comparisons available to them. In the study, the good Dr. Dunning did note that reality eventually prevails though. He, in fact, hits me right between the eyes with this quote.
In some cases, Dr. Dunning pointed out, an awareness of one’s own inability is inevitable: “In a golf game, when your ball is heading into the woods, you know you’re incompetent,” he said.
Ouch. That one is a little to real for me. (smile)
What it comes down to though is honest feedback. Whether that be from a Titleist or a supervisor. There is no way of getting better unless someone points out where improvement is needed. In my business that needs to be done carefully and with diplomacy and consistency. If a person doesn’t hear it the first time, it is up to me to continue to try and try again.
The kids in the classrooms depend on it.
Mushy Peas photo from Flickrstorm http://www.flickr.com/photos/38263679@N00/766423918
Titleist photo from Flickrstorm http://static.flickr.com/150/363537202_64a18e1ace.jpg
I found Scott McCleod’s PDF handout on the 100 Principal Blog project almost 3 years ago when I took the initiative to start my school principal‘s blog. My tech integrator at the time, Jeff Utecht, was so proud. He had been gently encouraging me to think about taking it on as a way to communicate to our school community. One weekend, I sat on the couch, laptop at the ready and leapt into a wordpress blog provided by Scott.
One of the key reasons for principals to blog that Scott mentions in his handout is “Reason 10: Thought leadership”.
A blog can be a great place to put thoughts out there for the community to chew on. Is a school considering a new initiative or an important change? Does the school want feedback on a particular topic or issue? The principal could post some information and questions on the blog and solicit community participation. This is similar to setting up a meeting with an advisory board or interested group of stakeholders, except that the potential reach is much greater since everyone in the school community can see and participate in the conversation, not just the few individuals who might attend a face-to-face meeting.
Most notably, I write in the post about professional conferences about the need for follow through and deeper learning opportunities. I stated:
The key question that comes to my mind though is when will leaders be held responsible for the follow-up for their entire organization and when will we as learning professionals take on the sustained follow-up ourselves. Isn’t that what a PLN created to do for me? Can we not sustain our own learning?
Then I walked into the room yesterday and there on a piece of chart paper under the words “professional development” was “Andy Torris’ blog post”. The first words out of my mouth were, “Just another reason to be careful what you post online!”- which got a pretty good laugh from my colleagues! The follow up conversation was about what I had written- nothing to earth shattering if you ask me- but it did help the discussion as the ideas around the commitment of administrators in our organization have to deep, followed up professional devleopment. More importantly though, are the high quality comments to this post. Jon Nordmeyer, a colleague of mine, left some great links to the a site at Berkley. Another leadertalk contributor, Blair Peterson left a comment pointing to a post by Seth Godin.. And yet another blogging administrator Ed Shepard, who also is one of my twitter friends noted that my post made him realize that:
I am under the firm belief that I can get my staff to change or focus on doing one major thing really, really well during the school year. This could be anything from curriculum to classroom management. Either way it is a broad to specific focus designed to create a common practice and develop a common language within the school community. This focus is kept in the forefront and is ingrained in everything we do the entire school year. It requires a bit of research and development, but insures a long-term and long-lasting effect in the school. After the year ends, we start the whole process again with a new focus.
Well stated Ed! Can’t that same thought hold true for administrators and blogging educators as well. Many, many educational bloggers and web-designers are quickly realizing that over time, your personal professional learning network is enhanced and thus your “Thought Leadership” is sharpened by leveraging the use of the web 2.0 tools available to us on a daily basis. This learning is not work. It is engagement. It is engagement on the deepest level, as it meets the needs of a social learning WITH access to a rich research base AND expert advice!
I can’t close here unless I offer some common sense advice though.
1. Remember: What you write and create is essentially your professional persona that will follow you for years. Use the tool wisely. As I said in my last post on Sentiments on Common Sense, “You really do have to be careful what you write!”
2. BE CLEAR that your blog is YOUR BLOG or the SCHOOL’s Blog. I need to go back to my blog and make sure it is plainly stated. People seem to know who I am. People probably know where I work. I hope they see my writing as professional and also a bit personal. I also hope they see that I am not crazy about the content.
3. Embrace the comments and respond to them. I am more apt to read blogs that I get notes back from authors after I have left a comment. Let the commentators know you have read the note and maybe even responded to their notes. It expands the learning!
In the end, it really is about reflecting, learning and modeling that for our community. Don’t you think?
We see a lot more of this back channel stuff in our education conferences. 
Note the last paragraph there…. inept people are MORE confident in their ability than competant people! I am sure you know the type. They work hard. They create, learn and amaze all the people around them, and seem to be driven for perfection and high quality work. Then you talk to them. Compliment them and they crumble into little balls of 
What it comes down to though is honest feedback. Whether that be from a Titleist or a supervisor. There is no way of getting better unless someone points out where improvement is needed. In my business that needs to be done carefully and with diplomacy and consistency. If a person doesn’t hear it the first time, it is up to me to continue to try and try again.
