Let’s Bring on Agility and Enthusiasm

I am a career counsellor and I want to share a concern.

I meet young persons who are generally in the 10th, 11th and 12th standards. These young people just 15 to 17/18 years old should be bubbling with life and enthusiasm. However, this past year many of the students I have met (the sample is not big) have been poker faced with not a facial muscle moving — eyes still, voice flat, body language cold and distant. In a recent case, the only time I saw a glimmer of a smile in the boy’s eyes, was when I asked him to give me an example of his laziness — not my invention that was one of the words he had used to describe himself. His example — ‘It is hot; I know I should get up and put on the fan but I would rather put up with the sweat.’ I burst into laughter because I feel lazy like that too! And that was when I saw the light in the eyes. Well worth it!

My concern — what has happened to ENTHUSIASM?

Mind you, most of these young people and their parents are very focussed on their academic performance and marks. While this is important, the question is, will it be enough for the changing scenario of the world of learning and the world of work?

There has to be more, or else the statement most career counsellors make, of ‘fitting round pegs in square holes’, may well be a reality. What a terrible waste of human resources that would be, leading to a cascading effect on so much else, most important being the ‘happiness quotient’ of the student and the family.

I recently attended an online seminar for career counsellors hosted by Ashoka University. The keynote speaker — Dr. Pramath Raj Sinha among other ideas, spoke of the need for ‘agility’.

I loved the word as it conjured up so many images of different kinds of agility.

Here are a few that I could think of apart from the 3 mentioned by Dr. Sinha which were Cognitive, Emotional and Learning agility.

• Reading agility
• Communicative agility
• Memory agility
• Physical agility
• Leadership agility

There is of course an overlap and connection between the different kinds of agility — and I thought I would reflect on a few types.

Cognitive Agility requires certain core cognitive skills like the ability to think quickly and easily and shift between reasoning, analysing, questioning, reflecting. It would also involve paying attention, observing, remembering and so much more — all of which is stored in the brain as knowledge, ready to be used in everyday life if one had cognitive agility.

Does our learning and education system prepare our young people for this?

Reading Agility requires skills of recognition, understanding punctuation, contextual meaning, skimming, scanning, speed reading, reading silently, reading aloud and comprehension. My fight with teachers is that they ‘over explain’ the prescribed Literature texts, leaving very little for the student to do, thus affecting reading comprehension and reading agility.

Apparently our learning and education system does not prepare our young people for this.

Communicative Agility — This agility lies in understanding the target audience and encoding the message with knowledge, skills and the right attitude and values to enable effective decoding of the message by the audience. Agility would be required in synchronizing voice modulation and body language. Hence at the very core of communication are the skills of listening, speaking, reading and writing. And why? To collaborate, reach out, connect, contribute, convince and persuade.

Does our learning and education system prepare our young people for this?

Emotional Agility — This is not at all about suppressing emotions but the ability to express our emotions in appropriate ways. And for this there should be awareness of one’s own emotional state and that of others in order to manage a relationship with oneself and others. If one is to stay relevant in a fast changing and unpredictable world of work — then the need of Emotional Agility or Emotional Quotient become paramount.

We have heard of a ‘square peg in a round hole’. It is an idiomatic expression that describes the individualist who cannot fit into the family, community, society or work place. All of us have come across highly intelligent people who are failures at work and in life, one of the reasons among others, being a low emotional intelligence. Low emotional intelligence or emotional agility impairs cognitive agility, creativity and innovation. It can also lead to a confused emotional state and behaviour, thus having a bearing on relationships, productivity and other outcomes.

Learning Agility will require one to invent learning strategies to suit situations as they keep changing. Important changes to the approach to learning will have to take place to move from surface learning to deep learning, from isolating tasks to integrative tasks, from memory tasks to conceptual tasks, from dependence to independence. Learning agility will thus need a cyclical approach of learn — unlearn — relearn.

I need to pause and go back to my question — What has happened to enthusiasm?

The answer is right in my face. Young people are staring at screens for online classes — with or without the video.

• No need to think!
• No need to interact!
• No need to read and comprehend if I don’t want to
• No need of any kind of Agility

That’s where Enthusiasm got lost. It got lost in the lack of Agility.

Henna Inam — Author of ‘Wired for Disruption’ gives us hope when she says that human beings are wired to be agile. Shifts in agility are within our control and also good for our wellbeing.

So let’s bring on Agility and with it Enthusiasm.

For after all,

• Enthusiasm is infectious, it binds us together.
• Enthusiasm is creative, and deserves our best efforts.
• Enthusiasm is fun
• Enthusiasm reaffirms to us that everything is possible with our total commitment.
• Enthusiasm is Life itself.