I was once invited to be a subject matter expert in an innovative documentary. Pretty neat. The only catch: I didn’t know much about a couple of the brands that the director wanted to cover. I had to get smart, fast.

Thankfully, an incredible community of practice had gathered momentum on discord, and in a flash of inspiration (or should that be, in a scramble for inspiration?), I put the question to the crew: Anybody know anything about these six brands?

I was blown away by the response! I was overwhelmed by resources, insights, and personal stories. All of a sudden, I had a different kind of research problem on my hands, a manageable one. It’s not that I didn’t have a bunch of work to do to become acquainted with the material — I certainly did cram like it was finals in college! — but I had a credible starting point, which is an enormous advantage when undertaking a learning journey!

To think that Charles Darwin — when corresponding with his network of collaborators — had to wait months for letters to travel the globe! What a privilege to be able to log onto a discord, or twitter, or other platform and immediately exchange knowledge.

I don’t want learning to be the exception; I want it to be the rule in my life. And having a network to draw upon — to both accelerate my own learning, as well as to help others along their own journeys — is an incredible gift.

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