Do You Know What You’re Doing?

May 11, 2023

For eight years I flew armed helicopters at night, low to the ground, through poor weather, into dangerous situations all around the world. I like to think there’s not much that can rattle me.

Then I started driving lessons with my teenager.

Strapped into a passenger seat with no controls, no steering wheel, no brakes—it’s the most uncomfortable I’ve felt in a long time. It’s also a situation that calls for trust.

Notice, however, the trust I grant my son from the passenger seat has less to do with the relational elements we’ve discussed over the past couple weeks and more to do with the rational elements. It doesn’t matter how authentic or benevolent I believe Luke is if he isn’t competent and dependable behind the wheel.

He’s not ready to get his driver’s license yet, but he’s close. He started out trying to stay in his lane in our neighborhood. Soon he was navigating traffic around town in good weather. Today he drove to school in the rain. This Sunday morning he’ll get on the interstate for the first time.

As his competency in successive domains and conditions increases, so does my trust in him as a driver—not to mention his trust in himself.

Competence in any area has three components:

Knowledge: The information or understanding of a subject
Skill: The ability to do something well
Judgment: The ability to make sensible decisions

Whether you are driving a car or managing a project or operating on a patient, these three competency factors inspire trust.

And in a fast-changing world, continuing to develop your knowledge, skills, and judgment through ongoing education, training, and reflection is critical to remaining trustworthy.

So Luke is getting better at driving; what are you getting better at?

For Reflection: What knowledge or skill are you working on to make it less risky for people to trust you?

Update: 36,744 words

I’ve written 36,744 manuscript words out of a goal of 60,000. That puts me about 61% complete with the first draft, which is 3% more than last week.

Continuing to make progress on the manuscript and excited about finding ways to make this material more practical and applicable for leaders.

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