Quick Knowledge: Embracing Just-In-Time Learning in a Fast-Paced World

Last year I took a promotion without knowing very much about the technology I would now be tasked with supporting. This fact was well-known to the task lead, so nobody was deceived or surprised at my skill deficiency. Since then, I’ve been in an almost-constant pursuit of what we call “Just-In-Time Learning.” I’m not the only one, there are a couple of other team members in the same boat. We do massive search sessions in the vendor’s documentation, the documentation left behind by the people who built the environment we’re supporting, and the Internet in general. We don’t need to know everything about the technology, we just need to know what we need to know right now. The general accumulation of knowledge will help us become proficient in supporting, amending, dismantling (if necessary), and, eventually, creating a duplicate of the environment. Nobody on our team was on the team when the environment was built, so we are all learning.

Things change fast today, don’t they? There are some things you can learn once and know forever, like how to tie your shoes. There have been some innovations in shoe fastening, but the basics of tying a bow for your shoes hasn’t changed for as long as I’ve been alive, and that information is still relevant. I won’t have to learn a new method of doing that. For so much of technology, though, Just-In-Time (JIT) learning is exactly what we need. The rise in Artificial Intelligence, and the tools built on it, have made it more important than ever to understand that there are some things you will need to learn Just In Time to use them. (See what I did there?) JIT learning is learning what you need to know when you need it, and not before. Traditional learning approaches indicate that we learn something before we need to know it, and I’ll talk about why we’re not tossing that into the landfill.

Understanding Just-In-Time Learning

Jit Learning is acquiring knowledge or skills right when they are needed. I use this when I’m trying a new recipe, putting a piece of furniture together, or troubleshooting a server issue. My husband used it when he was fixing my washing machine when it suddenly started leaking water all over the floor of the laundry room. My son used it when he had to learn how to replace the thermostat on his truck. None of us needed to have the knowledge in store, we only needed to know what we needed to know when we needed to know it, and we had the time to get the information. That’s one of the important distinctions of JIT Learning – you have the time to go get it. It may still be a rush, but there’s no reason for me to know how to refinish my floors today because that’s not something I plan on doing. If I ever make a plan to do that, I’ll learn how – when I need to know it.

There are three primary benefit of JIT learning: Efficiency, Relevance, and Retention. JIT learning is efficient, because it saves time and resources. You’re spending your effort on something that you absolutely know will provide a benefit to you relatively quickly. It’s relevant because you’re learning something that is immediately applicable. It’s concrete, rather than abstract, in that you can see right now how what you’re learning applies to what you want to know. JIT learning also helps you retain better what you learn, because learning something in context of its application helps improve memory retention.

As beneficial as JIT learning has been for me, it isn’t the right solution for every knowledge-acquisition endeavor There are some complex skills and deep knowledge that can’t effectively be acquired through JIT learning. The list of examples is longer than you might think, but you certainly want your surgeon or your airline pilot to have done a lot of foundational work rather than just learning how to remove a tumor or fly you to Los Angeles immediately before performing the task. There are things each of them will have to learn along their career path to keep up with advances, but their foundational skills are going to be gained through a more traditional learning course. Software development is another area where there are foundational skills that underlie everything else the developer does, photography, music, and language. Science and Engineering require math skills that need to be developed and built upon, in order that the seeds of the science disciplines and engineering fields can take proper root. It is true that each area of the deep, complex skills and knowledge will benefit from the JIT option, but trying to learn on-the-fly how to apply a novel approach to something like medicine or engineering without understanding the foundations of these professions would be disastrous, catastrophic, and possibly even fatal.

There are also some things that are worth knowing all the time, regardless of whether or not you ever use them. First Aid, CPR, how to drive a standard shift vehicle are skills that you won’t have time to learn in an emergency, or that could cost precious time learning in an emergency, when you’re already under stress. There are also tidbits of knowledge that are handy to know all the time, like where the water shutoff valve is, the main house breaker, the location of your insurance documents, and how to access the websites you may need after a disaster. (We’re going into hurricane season here on the Gulf Coast, so these things are on the top of my mind right now.)

The Balance Between JIT and Traditional Learning

The reality is that we need both traditional learning and JIT learning in today’s world. The key to learning success is to know what we need to know as a foundation, what we need to acquire to build on. I’m taking a course in photography composition, even though I kind of learned it on-the-fly. I’d like to learn it deeply, and I want to practice it extensively, so that it eventually becomes second nature to me and I walk around a subject looking for what I know, rather than trying to recall what I’ve read or heard. I’m also taking a business class that will help me market my photography and my copywriting work, and I’m putting the lessons into practice as I learn them. I’m taking a course in the technology I’ve been hired to support, so I can learn how the vendor believes things ought to be done, rather than how things get worked around by people who post things on websites. I’ll still always need to use JIT for troubleshooting, but vendor-recommended best practices are the best starting point.

I have set goals for learning in several areas of my life that are important to me: business, photography, blogging/writing, career skills, and general interest. The general interest category includes things like improving my math skills so I can better understand science, learning to fly my drone, the public affairs training from my church so I can work better in that calling, and sign language. While I can kick into those courses quickly if the need arises, I’ll still be putting down the foundation for each lesson. Honestly, I have so many courses queued up that, even if I never enroll in another one from now till I die, I still won’t finish them all. They’re all paid for or free, so maybe my kids and grandkids can use them.

We have the whole Internet at our disposal to facilitate JIT learning, with free and paid options, self-paced, instructor led, for credit, not-for-credit, all at our literal fingertips. To gain the best advantage from JIT learning, though, you’ll need a mindset that is open to constant learning and adaptation. You’ll need to manage your time and energy (I’ll be writing on that later) in order to balance your learning goals with your daily responsibilities, but the good news is that JIT learning tends to lend itself extremely well to that.

My whole book publishing endeavor has been a process of JIT learning, primarily because I didn’t know what I didn’t know. The first thing I had to do was find out the first thing I had to do. It was a frustrating circular effort. I’m finally at the publishing point, and – YAY – I think I can do it again. All of the things I learned Just In Time are still with me, so the process is going to be repeatable. It’s not the only way I want to learn things, and before I publish again, I’ll be reading material that will make the next book easier to get into print, but overall, I’m a huge fan of JIT learning

Your Turn

What have you had to learn on-the-fly? What did you learn foundationally through a traditional course? Drop a comment below and let’s compare notes.