We historically think of apprenticeships like the image here. But we can quickly lose the narrative for the nostalgia and novelty if we don’t take it apart and put in today’s context.
Look closer.
It’s simply expertise, sharing, observing, conversing, correcting, critiquing, praising, motivating. It’s also learning in the work, it’s seeing the immediacy of application and feedback from product and mentor in realtime. It’s simply the most human and best way to learn.
We have digital tools now that can put mentees with hundreds of mentors. We can share our processes and outputs frequently over time and space. We can instantly ask for critique and feedback and work with others as co-creators, or as novices in teams learning from those even just slightly more advanced than us.
In all likelihood, your organization has provided you access to social technologies, video meeting capabilities as well as more traditional communication technologies like the phone and email to connect with.
What are you doing with them?
Are you waiting for some directive on their use or some OK from above? And are you awaiting the efforts by L&D and HR to get their traditional approaches online?
Learning is on you. What you need to get better, faster, with and through others is at your fingertips ready when you are.