Learning to learn — a means to escape domain stickiness

The world is changing very quickly. A skill or profession that was highly paid and relevant 5 years ago might become completely redundant today. With the advancement of general AI, we can expect the rate of change to accelerate. However, majority of the population is not ready to adapt for this rate of change.

We live in the world where domain stickiness is rather prevalent. Going to medical school for 6 years, or studying computer science for 3 years results in the person being completely indulged in the domain which they studied. However, this domain stickiness is dangerous. We cannot remain comfortable with our expertise and our domain knowledge, because that competitive edge in the domain can very quickly evaporate with the rise of technology. What is important is the ability to quickly learn and adapt.

Today, it is possible to start learning programming and get hired for a software engineering job in 5 months. Would it then be possible for other fields to instantly train personnel for a specific job in a few months?

The most important skill today is being able to overcome the fear of something new, being ok with feeling stupid and the willingness to delve deeply into something we have never touched in our lives. There is the common misconception that we have to have some ‘official’ or ‘formal’ training to get started into a field, but the reality is so different. I have met people in my life that have self studied philosophy, psychology, neuroscience, programming and so on. With the courage to venture out of the comfort zone and the resourcefulness to perform a Google search, there is nothing stopping us from constantly entering new domains and adapting to new environments.

In conclusion, the rate of change is accelerating, and it is important for us to prime our attitude to be open to change and not overestimate the challenges of trying something new. Perhaps after entering the field, we would realise that it is not as hard as we thought. Indeed, the only constant is change, and we must learn to quickly adapt and thrive in that environment.