# The Right Information ### Rough overview * *Reflection* is a necessary component of learning. * Most of the information we consume when we are told we are learning is really just other people's abstractions, rather than specific details and understanding. And other people's abstractions are unlikely to help us make better decisions. ### Rough Notes **We don't learn from experience, we learn from reflection** Some people incorrectly think that we learn from experience. That isn't true! Just because we have an experience doesn't mean we will learn from it. We *can* learn from experience, but it requires additional *work*. **The Learning Loop** We can think of learning as a loop, shown below:  What we see here is that *reflection*, not experience, is what leads us to doing something differently the next time. It is worth keeping front of mind that experience *without* reflection gives us the [The-Illusion-of-Knowledge](The-Illusion-of-Knowledge.md). **What should we learn?** We often treat all sources of information as equally valid, but they aren't. Most of what we consume is highlights, summaries, or distillations. We trust that these *[abstractions](Abstraction%20(Computer%20Science).md)* will save us time and improve our thinking, but they don't! The desire for these abstractions is natural. We feel overwhelmed by the amount of information available and unable to keep up with processing it all. However, if we rely on abstractions we aren't really learning. The further the information is from the first hand source the larger the abstraction is likely to be. History has shown that the greatest thinkers used personally collected details, and interacted with it directly. They looked for information that was raw and unfiltered by others. Too often we consume information that is multiple degrees removed from their source. Consuming these abstractions gives an illusion of knowledge: We gain confidence about *what* to do without understanding *why* that is what we need to. Consider the chef and a line cook. When all is going well, the line cook and the chef and indistinguishable. However, when things go wrong the chef knows *why*, while the line cook does not. The chef has years of experience and reflection. Recall the game of telephone. Slowly, as a message is passed from person to person a distortion occurs. The same thing happens in the real world. The further we are away from the original source-the closest source to *reality*-the more likely we are to encounter filtering and distortion. From an organizational perspective we can say this: > As information levels up in organizations it goes through understanding filters, political filters, biases and more. *Details get abstracted* and *signal is lost*. **How to get better information** 1. **Experiment**: go directly to the source, vacuum up the details, and ask better questions. For example, in the case of 2. **Go Directly to the Source**: Read the academic study instead of reading a newspaper article on the study. Or * Go the person closest to the problem. This does not mean that we let anyone *define* the problem for us, (/posts/see [The-Root-Problem](The-Root-Problem.md)), and it doesn't mean that we let them determine the solution (/posts/remember, we [own the frame](Owning-the-Frame.md)). But we put ourselves on the path to success by going to the person closest to the problem by asking questions designed to transfer their experience and reflections to you. This means asking *detailed questions*, seeking out rich information, and working to really understand the interconnections and things that matter. With that said, remember you must also consider the incentives and underlying motivations of those who give you information. **Question the lens through which someone is looking through.** 3. **Ask the right questions** * Ask someone *how* they think about a problem. If we ask for direct advice we are being told *what* to do, not how to go about doing it. We aren't just trying to gain information; we are ultimately trying to determine why and how they came to their conclusions. * Here are three great questions to ask: * What are the variables that you'd use to make this decision, if you were in my shoes? How do those variables relate to one another? * What do you know about the problem that I (or others) don't? What can you see based on your experience someone without your experience couldn't? * What would be your process for making a decision if you were in my shoes? How would you go about doing it?