Rob Fitzpatrick is an author and entrepreneur, best known for his book The Mom Test. His latest offering is Write Useful Books.
In this episode, we discuss:
- Rob’s 4-part system for writing useful books based on product testing principles
- Common mistakes to avoid in getting feedback from readers
- Business lessons Rob has learned from a decade and a half of entrepreneurial projects
We also cover the publishing industry and Rob’s plans to disrupt it. This episode will give you a system for writing great non fiction that solves readers' problems and give you an insights into running an entrepreneurial career in a sustainable way.
Michelle Weise is the author of Long-Life Learning: Preparing for Jobs that Don’t Even Exist Yet.
She is an entrepreneur-in-residence and senior advisor at Imaginable Futures and her work over the last decade has concentrated on preparing working-age adults for the jobs of today and tomorrow.
In this episode we discuss:
- The current state of the landscape in workplace training and higher education
- The blend of skills we'll need to develop individually and as a society to thrive in the future
- What Michelle learned from working with legendary Professor Clayton Christensen
If you're interested in the intersection between the future of education and work this conversation is for you as well as giving you with plenty of original insight into how to direct your own career in a rapidly changing environment.
Alex Beard is an author, speaker and the Senior Director of the Global Learning Lab at Teach for All network of independent organizations working to help all children fulfill their potential.
After starting out as an English teacher in a London comprehensive, he completed an MA at the Institute of Education before joining Teach For All.
Alex has travelled around the world in search of the practices that will shape the future of learning and these experiences form the basis of his book Natural Born Learners which he describes as a user's guide to transforming learning in the twenty-first century,
Alex’s experiences formed the basis of our discussion in this episode we discuss three big issues, concretised in his experiences:
We also discuss the personal takeaways Alex got from his trip around the world that you can apply to your learning on an individual basis – so whether you’re a parent, teacher or learner this episode has you covered.
Charles Fadel is the founder and chairman of the Center for Curriculum Redesign, an institution focused on making education more relevant and answering the question: “What should we learn in the 21st century?”
Charles is also a respected thought leader and author in the global education space who works with several teams at the OECD and he’s also co-authored the highly regarded 4 Dimensional Education and 21st Century Skills.
Prior to starting the Center for Curriculum Redesign, Charles had a 25-year career in the technology space, which included 13 years as Global Education Lead at Cisco Systems – so it’s safe to say that he has witnessed first hand the disruptive effects of exponential change.
In this conversation we dive into a whole range of topics including:
- The race between technology and education and its implications for your career
- The knowledge, skills and character traits needed to thrive in the 21st century
- The challenge of measuring soft skills and metalearning CCR's efforts to do so
So if you're curious about the knowledge and skills you need to acquire to future proof yourself and attempts to update the curriculum for our generation, this episode has you covered.
Stephen Kosslyn is world-renowned cognitive scientist and the Founding Dean of Minerva, an innovative new university. In this conversation we discuss:
- How Minerva applies the science of learning to its curriculum and pedagogy
- The major misconceptions about the Minerva project and its key innovations
- The importance of community in any learning program
Whether you’re interested in the application of learning science or curious about the latest innovations in education this episode has you covered.
Jo Cruse is the CEO of The Unreasonables, which delivers leadership programmes to the UK”s top schools. In this conversation we discuss:
- The most important skills young people need to develop in the 21st century
- The lessons Jo learned about entrepreneurship on her travels
- The tradeoff between social impact and the bottom line in business
So whether you’re looking to arm yourself for the 21st century or build a business with a social impact, this episode will give you all that and more.
"What's the point of school?" is a question that’s been asked for hundreds of years but we still don’t seem to have a clear answer. In this episode, we discuss:
- The difference between learning and education and why it matters
- The harmful mindsets that education instils in us and how to combat them
- How the method of teaching has evolved in schools across history
So if you want to learn more about the philosophy behind education, this episode will give you all that and much more.
Simon Peyton Jones is a computer scientist who currently works as a researcher for Microsoft and has built his own programming language, Haskell. He is also chair of Computing at School, which was central to the 2014 reform of the English curriculum that made computer science a foundational subject.
As our lives become increasingly influenced by computers, it's surprising how few of us know anything about how these devices work. We don't all need to become programmers, but understanding the core principles that are behind our favourite websites and apps is important when we spend so much time on them.
Simon is uniquely positioned to offer insight into the field, given his many years of research and application and his experience teaching computer science as a Professor at University level.
In this conversation we discuss a range of topics including:
- The core computer science principles that everyone should understand
- The importance of focusing on ideas, not devices, in computer science education
- Simon’s view on whether there’s a tradeoff between technology and humanity
So whether you want to become a programmer, understand the basic principles behind computers or hear an industry insider's views on to how to manage the use of technology in schools, this episode will give you all that and much more.
Jeff Cobb is a thought leader in the field of lifelong learning and the author of the bestselling book, Leading The Learning Revolution. He also runs a popular blog and podcast, and is the founder of Tagoras, a learning consultancy.
As we move from a knowledge economy to a learning economy where we need to acquire new skills everyday just to stand still, the importance of lifelong learning is rapidly increasing and opportunities in the space are huge.
Jeff is someone who is uniquely placed to view the lifelong learning industry from a big picture perspective given his many years of experience and the range of different clients he has been involved with.
In this conversation we discuss a range of topics including:
- The main trends driving the increased demand for lifelong learning
- What makes good educational content and what should be avoided
- How the shift towards mobile is likely to affect the future of learning
So whether you're looking to start a business in the lifelong learning market or are just curious about the latest trends in the space, this episode will give you in depth insights from an industry insider.
Ed Fidoe is one of the founders of School 21, an innovative new school in Stratford, East London that's reinventing education by preparing its students, aged 4-18, for the 21st Century.
For so many people, school was characterised by drudgery, rote learning and the stress of exams. But school doesn't have to be that way and there are plenty of people trying to reinvent education for the 21st century.
Ed is one of these people, and along with cofounders Peter Hyman and Oli de Botton, he built a school from scratch that aimed to rebalance head (academic success), heart (character and well-being) and hand (generating ideas, problem solving and making a difference).
In this conversation we discuss a range of topics including:
- The core skills needed for the 21st century and how to develop them
- The process of reinventing education and the challenges ahead
- The effective and balanced use of technology in classrooms
So whether you're a parent thinking about how to manage your children's eduction or are just curious about innovation in education, this episode will give you a series of fascinating insights from an insider's perspective.
Barry Pousman is the founder of Variable Labs, a Virtual Reality company that creates immersive experiences to help people develop soft skills.
Virtual Reality is likely to be a game changing technology for a number of industries but its impact on education in schools and businesses will be huge.
As someone who's running a company at the cutting edge of the industry, as well as filming his own VR experiences, Barry is perfectly placed to offer insights into the potential of the technology.
In this conversation we discuss a range of topics including:
- How learning in VR accelerates the development of soft skills like negotiation
- The potential for VR to revolutionise education in schools and universities
- How VR differs to other storytelling mediums like film, audio and books
So whether you're curious about how VR can help you learn new skills or want to know more about it's impact on the educational system, this episode will give you insights from the cutting edge of this revolutionary new industry.
In modern society, learning has become synonymous with taking in information passively and retaining it. Students view teachers as people who are supposed to deliver information into their heads so that they can recall it when required.
But this is the one of the most damaging misconceptions we carry into our lives because the truth is that all learning is active. It isn’t a process of having something done to you – it’s a process of you doing something to yourself.
The best teachers all understand this – and know that their main role is not to build a whole fire for their students - it’s to ignite the spark of inspiration that will help them build and feed the fire themselves.
In this episode I discuss some of my main insights about teaching including:
- The teacher’s role in society and how it’s changed throughout history
- The qualities and characteristics that I think make great teachers
- The things we can learn from other educational systems who value teachers
Whether you're involved in the educational system or not, you'll gain insights that will help you reflect on the role of teachers in your life and help you become a great teacher to others, whether at school or in life as a parent or friend.
Mads Holmen is the CEO of Bibblio, a platform helping knowledge publishers deliver smarter content recommendation. Bibblio’s clients include the University of Cambridge and Oxford University Press as well as the BBC and YouTube.
It's been well documented that the educational system in the West has problems, but if you want to improve a system you need to look at the ways people think and interact with each other before changing the rules - and that's what educational philosophy is all about.
Mads is someone who has integrated ideas from educational philosophy into his business Bibblio and he’s often invited to speak about them on panels about learning and ed-tech. After seeing him at a talk in London, I reached out to him for a chat about some of the big issues in the field of learning and intelligence.
In this episode we discuss a wide range of topics including:
- How to think about learning and education
- Whether there’s an ideal curriculum for the 21st Century
- The nature of intelligence by drawing insights from the nature vs nurture debate
So whether you're looking to deepen your understanding of the ideas driving our educational system or find out how to navigate the endless stream of content online, this episode has you covered.
Tom Rogers is an entrepreneur and the Founder of Music Gurus, a platform that provides music courses & training from the world's top musicians. Tom is also a keen musician – he started his own band at school and went on to study at music college before getting an MBA at INSEAD.
Many of us wish we could learn a musical instrument but don't know how to start. Without music in our lives, we're not only missing out on one of life's great pleasures but we're also robbing ourselves of the broader understanding that music brings because music is a MetaSkill, which can be applied across domains.
In this episode we dive into a whole host of topics including:
- The best strategies you can use to learn instruments from scratch
- How to apply insights from music to other areas like languages and business
- The challenges of building an online education platform
So whether you're looking to pick up an instrument, understand the mechanics of online education or access and apply the principles of music across fields, this episode will give you all that and much more.