W27 - Three Insights on Educating People

1. Enduring hardship is a means; achieving results is the goal. I recently encountered the LEAD model, which offers useful methodological guidance. Relating it to recent architecture work: L, E, A, D stand for four things. Listen: clarify exactly what the boss wants, identify what is most important, and list all relevant critical information. Throughout history, many who deserved recognition have faltered at this step. Experience: connect your own experience and skills, and survey others’ best practices for similar problems. Analysis: evaluate all possible solutions, set strategy, find leverage points, and identify the approach best suited to your context. Do: action is required to implement—break big tasks into small steps, iterate as you go, and don’t sit on a grand plan in silence.

2. Keep ownership of responsibilities where they belong. Don’t let other people’s “monkeys” climb onto you until you’re overwhelmed while they fail to grow.

3. Become a coach, not a task doer. When delegating, it’s tempting for efficiency or short-term cost reasons to take over difficult problems and complete them personally. That robs others of the experience and skills needed to do the work well, erodes their confidence and judgment, fosters dependency, and reduces overall competence. This is a classic error of shifting the burden—when solving a problem at its root is hard, people resort to quick fixes that only help in the short term.