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How many times have you heard somebody say, I don't know? Better yet, let me ask you this. How many times have you said it? And I promise you, I am not knocking you, because nobody knows everything. And there is a time for I don't know. But I don't know is supposed to be where you start, not where you stop. When it becomes your every single answer to every question is not an answer anymore. That is what I call an excuse. And it's only going to carry you so far, especially when you are looked at as a leader. And that's why I came up with this episode: some things are called and some things are taught. And I promise you, I'm going to break down what that looks like in real life. Because I sat in a training recently and it put this whole thing into perspective for me. Now, don't get me wrong, not everybody who says that they are a trainer is a good trainer. And most times you have to go above and beyond. You have to do your own due diligence and you have to do your own research to show yourself approved. So listen, I sat in this training and the instructor, I mean, she's she's a very good instructor, but she had a strong accent. Now that wasn't the problem because I knew most of the content that she was going over and I was able to piece pieces together. The problem was when she got stuck in the middle of her training and she couldn't figure out the issue. So she started moving around fast, she started getting lost. And when she was getting lost between her, the accent, I started losing focus. But in that moment, I had to gather myself because I couldn't get frustrated. I needed to get through that training. So I had to take notes on everything that I didn't understand so that I could look it up later. And after the training, I went back to the list that I've created. I looked up some things. I asked some people to do it every single day, but I did not let that training be the end of my learning. Did you hear what I said? I did not let the training be the end of my learning. And a lot of people, they don't do that. They say at the end of the day, oh well, I wasn't taught. My trainer sucked. Instead of them digging deeper, they lose interest, they lose focus, and they don't try to figure out what it is that they need to know. So what is some things are taught and some things are caught? Let me break that down for you. Taught is what somebody sits down and they show you, right? You're in class, you're you have the training, you have the manual, you got the walkthrough, you got this whole process. Somebody's explaining that to you. Caught is everything that is not in the training, right? It's noticing that the person who's great at their job, don't get me wrong, but they couldn't explain it to you, or they left it out because maybe that's just something that they wasn't thinking about. But those cult things are things that you learn on your own through experience or through just reading or talking to somebody or seeing somebody doing something. So here's the thing taught is what's going to get you started. But what's caught is what's going to make you good at what you do. And when you sit back and you wait for everything to be taught, you're never going to catch nothing. And when you don't close that gap, it's not going to stop with you. It's like a domino effect. You get tasked with the same thing that you sat through in training, and then you can't do it. So somebody else is going to have to do it. Somebody asks you how or why or when or what, and you say, I don't know. I wasn't trained. And then they don't know either. So then what happens? They ask somebody else, and that person shows them what they think is right. Now, three people are doing the wrong thing. Then you have somebody that makes a workaround, somebody else copies it, and then six months later, their leadership comes and asks you, why are y'all doing it like this? And then what do people say? Well, that's how I was shown how to do it. That's a domino effect. That one training gap turns into a performance problem. It can turn into a customer problem. It can even turn into a money problem. And as I was thinking about this topic, it reminded me of a mayor that we have in Stockbridge. Now, this mayor was one of the youngest mayors. I think he was around 22 or 23 to be in office. Really good, amazing thing. But the problem was he said that he didn't have any adequate training. Now, that could be true what he was talking about, but if you really wanted to learn, you would have created your own lessons. You would have found your own answers, and then you would have your own solution at the end. And if this is something that you're familiar with, some maybe this is something that you're doing, if you're in this leadership position, I don't know, it's totally different because people are watching how you handle things. Now, this mayor got into some trouble. And when he was faced with answering, why did you do this? Why did you spend that? Why did you not do X, Y, and Z? His answer was, I don't know. I wasn't trained. Now let me tell you this: there is a version of I don't know that works. I don't know. Let me find out and I'll get back to you. That's a leader. That's what works. But then you have the other version where people use this and they shrug their shoulders and they're like, uh, I don't know. I wasn't trained on that. Can't help you. And what does that do is that teaches everybody that's watching that it's okay to stop it. I don't know. Your team catches that faster than anything that you've ever taught them. And trainers, I have to tell you, I'm not letting y'all off the hook right now. Knowing how to do your job doesn't mean that you know how to teach it. If you watch the people that you're training, look at them and see, are they following you? And don't get so caught up in your feelings that you start making people feel like they're stupid for asking questions. Because that person is asking that fifth question might be the only one that's willing to admit that what you said didn't make no sense. And at the end of that, don't ask everybody, hey, do you everybody understand? Because you know what they're going to say. Yes, I understand. And half of the room is lost, but you can see it in their eyes. You the eyes tell everything. So, what do you do about this? First things first, you have to admit it when you don't understand something. You don't have to admit it to the whole room, but you need to admit it to yourself. If you're in a training, write down things. Write down the things that you couldn't explain to somebody else. Write down the things that you didn't understand. That's the first thing that you need to do. And those are the first things you need to go and learn after that training. The second thing is you can't expect that every person that says that they're a trainer is going to give you everything. They might explain something to you and it might click. And then they might explain something to you that might not click. And if it doesn't click, there's somebody else that can explain that same thing to you and make it make sense. So what that means is if it's not working with that one source, it's okay. Write down what you can and then go and get another source. Ask another person, read the documentation, watch somebody else do it. The third thing is you have to learn the why. You can't just learn the steps. You need to know the basics. If all you know is click here, then click there and do that, and this is what happens, you're gonna be stuck. So when you're in that situation or you're that type of person that doesn't like to ask questions, next time just write down your question and just ask, why are we doing it this way? What is the reason for this? What would make this be different from what we're already doing? And the fourth thing that I want you to do is watch out for that I wasn't trained. I don't know. Watch out for that excuse. Because sometimes, yes, it could be true, but think of that one thing that you keep saying that you weren't trained on, and then ask yourself if you actually tried to learn it, would you? Block 30 minutes out this week, go find the answer, and then come back with the answer. Don't let I don't know be your only solution. Because the reality is, I don't expect anybody to give me everything. I've never had that mentality. Show me the basics, point me in the right direction, and I'm going to start digging. I'm going to start asking. I'm going to start reading. I'm going to find more than what you told me. I don't want to be that person, like, oh, I was trained. I want to be that person that's like, I know what I'm doing. I'm the master at this. And remember that some things are taught and some things are caught. But at the end of the day, you have to be hungry enough to go and find out for yourself. Stop letting somebody else's inability to teach you become the ceiling on what you can learn.