The Novice Mindset: A Hunger for Learning.
Drop your ego: embrace the discomfort of learning.
I recently found myself staring at a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) screen, a mess of waveforms and sliders that looked more like the flight deck of a Boeing 747 than a tool for storytelling. After twenty years of leadership and navigating complex regulation, I was reduced to a man who didn't know how to ‘normalise’ a vocal track without accidentally deleting it.
It was humbling, frustrating, and, if I’m honest, terrifying. The hype goes that as we climb the ladder, we should have the answers. But what happens when you intentionally step off the pedestal and choose to be the one asking the ‘silly’ questions again? This is the power of the novice mindset.
The View from the Bumpy Trail
Currently, my professional life feels less like a smooth motorway cruise and more like a technical off-road trail. I am deep in the pressure cooker of learning. I’m finishing my first book, undergoing a second rigorous round of professional Mentor training, and working towards practitioner certification in two complex personality assessment frameworks. On top of that, I’m the chief sound engineer, editor, and distributor of my own podcast.
There is a humbling sting of the learning curve that comes with this territory. In the boardroom, I know my bearings, but in these new areas, I am a novice. It reminds me of my early days on a motorbike; the sheer mental load of coordinating the clutch, the throttle, and the road ahead meant there was no room for ego - only for survival and growth. My upcoming book touches on this very transition: the shift from performing a role to actually learning the skills that underpin the leader you want to become.
The Ego as a Speed Limiter
In leadership, we often let our past successes act as a speed limiter, restricting how fast we can learn something new because we are afraid of looking incompetent. To truly learn, you have to give yourself permission to be bad at something. When I started the personality assessment certifications, I had to unlearn some of my own biases about human behaviour. It’s uncomfortable, but that discomfort is the only reliable indicator that your perspective is expanding.
“The expertise of yesterday is often the trap that catches you tomorrow.”
Tuning Your Leadership Frequency
More than making a podcast sound great, learning sound engineering has been about the discipline of mastering a new system. This hunger to learn creates a spillover effect. The patience I’ve cultivated while editing audio, meticulously removing my ‘umms and ahhs’ has unexpectedly sharpened my listening skills during 1:1 mentoring sessions. When you train your brain to improve in one area, the discipline naturally bleeds into your executive functions.
Dust Off Your L-Plate
You can build this same discipline in your own work. If you want to test your own appetite for learning, try these four practical steps:
The 15-Minute ‘Open Window’: Once a week, ask a junior team member or a specialist to explain a basic concept you ‘should’ already know. Forget your title and just listen.
Your L-Plate: If you haven't felt the sting of being a beginner in the last six months, you aren't growing; you’re just repeating. Pick one technical skill outside your comfort zone and commit to learning it.
Journal the Friction: When you struggle with a new tool or concept, write down exactly what is frustrating you. Often, the frustration isn't with the tool, but with your loss of control (especially when you’re expert/experienced in other areas).
Apply Novice Mindset to Old Problems: Approach your next strategy meeting as if you’ve never seen your organisation’s reports before. What questions would a hungry outsider ask?
The Intern in the Boardroom
We often treat novice as a derogatory term or phase, a stage to be hurried through so that we can reach the safety of expertise. Understand that your expertise of yesterday is often the trap that catches you tomorrow. If you do not learn, you become rigid in thinking, and fail to see alternative perspectives or solutions. By intentionally remaining a student, whether of human behaviour, or the intricacies of a podcast, I’ve found that my hunger for learning is what keeps my brain sharp. This is a reminder that leaders build resilience not by getting comfy in the corner office but the ones with a spanner in their hands, trying to figure out how the engine works.
Mirror Check
When was the last time you felt the genuine, sweaty-palmed anxiety of being the least competent person in the room - and did you lean into it, or did you hide/leave?
Thank you for reading this far. If any of this resonates, I’d love to welcome you as a reader and to stay connected. Please join the mailing list for future posts, share your thoughts in the comments, or find me on LinkedIn.
