Hill: One of the things I had to face and realize as a professor is that people do not learn how to lead at school. As an institution, our mission is to educate leaders to make a difference in the world, but you don’t learn to lead at school, but rather, on the job, when you’re faced with real problems with real consequences. That being said, by having students in sections that they stay with their entire first year, we do try to create some experiences from which they can be drawing leadership lessons, particularly how to lead when you don’t have formal authority in a peer environment.
So, what schools really should do for you is to give you the tools to learn better on the job and to learn from life experience. With that framework in my head at all times-which can be pretty humbling because you want to think you are teaching people what they need to know when they are right there in front of you-the main thing I try to get across is that throughout their career, people need to take charge of their own development. You need to really think through what type of experiences you are going to try to have professionally, because you can only learn what you get the chance to do. Be very strategic when you assess a new career opportunity and think about what you are going to be doing on a daily basis.
You need to be forward-looking as you assess this. What trends do you see? Are you developing the kinds of skills your organization will need a few years down the line?
The other part of this equation is what you get to do is definitely based on who you know. This can be very frustrating to people because sometimes you don’t get access to opportunities. But, unless they know you, you’re not going to get the chance to work on interesting things.
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