Journey from novice to experts

-A presentation on How to think

Pre-requisities

• How brain works• How can we use it for our good

Brain

• When you think, do you think in English, or any other speak able language?

• Can you describe a picture, or an emotion in terms of words?

Brain

• Brain has two modes that it works.– Rich Mode (R-mode for short)– Linear Mode (Linguistic mode, L-mode for short)

• These are the CPUs of your brain.• Unfortunately both mode cant work actively in

your brain at the same time• R-mode runs as a service on the background

Brain

• Brain in good in thinking. Machines are better in repeating things many times, exactly as they are programmed

• Let it be that way.• Use the above information

Brain

Mind

• Lateral vision• Success provides confidence, keeps the brain

healthy• Panic, R-mode starts shutting down resources

of the brain• These information could be used in the

coming topics

Five levels of people

• Novices• Advanced Beginners• Competent• Proficient• Experts

Novices

• NO/Little experience in this skill area.• Very concerned about their ability to succeed.• Don’t particularly want to learn, what to

accomplish an immediate goal.• Do not know how to respond to mistakes• Fairly vulnerable to confusion when things go

awry• Effective when they are given context free rules

to follow

Recipe

Novices

• Those are tedious but fixed rules that give novices some measure of capability.

• They don’t know which rules are most relevant in which situation

• Confusion when something unexpected comes up.

• Rules can get you started but they won’t carry you further.

Advanced Beginners

• After passing the stage of Novice, one starts to see the problems from the viewpoint of Advanced-Beginners.

• Start to break from the fixed rule set a little bit• Difficulty to troubleshoot• Want information fast• Don’t want to be bogged down by the lengthy

theory nor spoon-fed the basics.

Advanced Beginners

• Can start using advice in correct context.• Don’t want the Big Picture.

Competent

• Developed conceptual models of problem domain

• Can troubleshoot problems• Begin to figure out how to solve novel problems• Can seek out and apply advices from experts• Without more experience, still trouble to

determine which details to focus on while solving a problem

Competent

• Tend to be in leadership role in the team(formal or not)

• Can mentor novices and don’t annoy experts overly too much

Proficient

• Need the big picture• Very frustrated by oversimplified information• These people can self correct• Capacity to learn from the experience of others• They know what can possible break• They can know what a particular maxim means

in this context• Key to becoming an expert

Expert

• Prime sources of knowledge and information in any field

• Can continually look for better methods and ways of doing things

• Work from intuition, not from reason• Rules ruin experts• It looks like magical to others, how they arrive

at a conclusion

Which people to be treated how

• Horses should be allowed to run freely• Sheep should be herded.• If you try to herd Horses, or try to run a race

with sheep, you are not effective.• Use rules for novices and intuition for experts• Most people are advanced beginners

Learning

• Expert != Teacher• People always expect the learner to be one

step below them• Expert or proficient, trying to give novice the

large picture, will simply won’t work• Use Advanced beginners to interact with

novices and so on

Agile development

• Very effective tool, but wont work on a team composed solely of novices and advanced beginners

• Preventive rather then assertive• Decision based on current working software• “I was just following orders” doesn’t work• Don’t just do something to go through the process. • Know what you are going and why, before you do

it.