Learning How to Learn: The Missing Skill in Leadership

Executives and managers often spend time learning how to coach—but rarely how to learn. Coaching feels aligned with their role: it’s about helping others grow. Learning, on the other hand, can feel risky. It exposes uncertainty, invites discomfort, and challenges the confidence that many leaders pride themselves on.

For high achievers accustomed to demonstrating competence, that’s not easy. Yet cultivating the ability to learn—curiosity, adaptability, and openness—is arguably the most powerful leadership skill of all. It strengthens self-awareness, improves judgment, and deepens empathy. It also happens to make people far better coaches.

Why Learning Feels Uncomfortable for Leaders

Many in management see their job as teaching, helping, or directing others. That mindset can unintentionally block their own growth. True learning requires the courage to experiment, make mistakes, and feel vulnerable.

This discomfort often shows up as perfectionism, self-doubt, or fear of not knowing enough. But these feelings aren’t flaws—they’re signals that growth is possible. Leaders who learn to manage these inner reactions, rather than suppress them, build the resilience needed to lead through uncertainty.

Reducing Interference to Learning

Tim Gallwey, author of The Inner Game of Work, described performance as a product of potential minus interference:

Performance = Potential – Interference

Interference isn’t just external noise—it’s the self-talk, judgment, and pressure to appear “expert” that limit our natural capacity to learn.

Reducing that interference allows leaders to engage with new skills more openly. Reframing setbacks, focusing on progress instead of perfection, and noticing what is working all help quiet that inner resistance. Over time, learning shifts from being a source of anxiety to a source of energy.

The Work Triangle: Balancing Performance, Learning, and Experience

Gallwey’s Work Triangle frames three interdependent elements essential to sustainable performance: Performance, Learning, and Experience.

Most organizations emphasize performance—metrics, results, output—while giving less attention to how people learn or feel in the process. When performance dominates, the result is predictable: burnout, disengagement, and diminishing creativity.

A balanced approach gives equal weight to all three:

• Performance — What we achieve.
• Learning — What we discover or improve through the work.
• Experience — How fulfilling or energizing the work feels.

When leaders set goals that include all three dimensions, work becomes not only productive but developmental and meaningful. The shift is subtle but powerful: from performing to prove to performing to grow.

From Directing and Helping to Modeling

Leaders who embrace learning as a personal practice, model what growth looks like. They normalize uncertainty, encourage curiosity, and create psychological safety for others to do the same.

This transforms coaching from an act of instruction into an act of shared discovery. By learning how to learn, managers build teams that are more adaptable, creative, and engaged.

Reframing the Role of the Leader

The next generation of leadership won’t be defined by who gives the best direction—but by who learns the fastest: about people, systems, and themselves.

When leaders embrace the full Work Triangle—balancing Performance, Learning, and Experience—they don’t just drive results. They create cultures where growth feels natural, purpose feels present, and work feels human again.