The learning curve.
Why small daily steps beat sporadic deep dives.
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Happy Monday 🎅,
As per usual, everything that should have been done during fall is now happening the last couple of weeks before Christmas.
And speaking on before Christmas. Before you head out - why not take a break from everything and attend my free webinar on Thursday?
It will cover the biggest trends and how to prepare for them.
Join in on LinkedIn on the 19th of Dec - 3 PM CET / 2 PM GMT / 9 AM EST.
Of course free and no need to sell your kidney or anything to join this one - just join on LinkedIn.
Anyway, let’s get to it.
There are two questions I hear almost every time I talk about what I do. The first is: “Aren’t you afraid of sharing too much? What if someone takes your ideas and gets ahead of you?” The second is: “How do you even keep up with everything happening in AI & HR?”
They hit on two of the biggest challenges we face in HR (or in any field, really): how to balance sharing with protecting your edge and how to stay relevant without burning out.
Here’s my perspectives.
Sharing knowledge
The first question has a simple answer for me: knowledge is meant to be shared. Everything is already available in some form—it’s about aggregating, applying, and then sharing your insights.
Sharing what you learn is also a way to cement that knowledge for yourself. Explaining something to others forces you to reduce complexity and structure the information, leading to a deeper understanding. For me, it’s always been a win-win situation—I learn by teaching others.
Sure, people will copy. It’s inevitable, and honestly, it’s completely fine.
That’s how we grow our profession and drive it forward.
The key lies in how it’s done.
Copying something verbatim without reflection or adaptation isn’t as valuable as taking inspiration and applying it in your own context.
And I wholeheartedly encourage the latter.
In HR, we need to get better at “borrowing with finesse”—taking ideas, tailoring them to our unique context, and using them creatively — and then sharing this back to the community.
I’ve had the advantage of being an early adopter in several areas, such as exploring and sharing insights about ChatGPT. That is purely through interest and not about being smarter; it’s about learning through sharing and let others build on my knowledge.
An sure, that early adopter factor has been invaluable for me but I’m also so incredibly happy that more people are now sharing what they do in HR and AI.
How do you keep up? – A responsibility to stay current.
The second question I often get is than: “How do you manage to stay updated on everything?” My answer is rooted in a strong belief: I think it’s almost professional negligence not to stay informed about the world around us.
It’s not about blindly following every trend but about examining, evaluating, and understanding the changes happening.
It’s our responsibility to help ourselves and our organizations navigate a rapidly changing world.
To achieve this, you need principles and routines.
Personally, I use a mix of methods: podcasts, newsletters, seminars, webinars, and conferences. Conferences provide condensed knowledge, while podcasts are perfect for asynchronous learning—whether in the car, at the gym, or during a walk.
The key is finding a way to invest time in your own development.
Read a great newsletter (You are indeed already reading one so…but beyond that I recommend Andy Spence’s), listen to relevant podcasts , or attend events.
(See you at HR Tech in Amsterdam for example - it’s free!)
The thing is there are plenty of paths to take.The important thing is to choose one that works for you—and make it a habit and stick to it.
I’ve had this habit for almost 15 years. Summarising, vetting and analysing HR news that is. My first post was published 15th of January 2010 and yes, you can still read it.
And the great things with habits is that they are more or less automated routines. I almost don’t think about this - I just do it. I still remember it being a hurdle initially but somewhere it just became a habit.