I suspect I got Learning the Importance of Knowledge Sharing from one of the Software Craftsmanship folks, but I’m not quite sure which. Doesn’t matter really. What matters is the third paragraph in it:

What I’m slowly learning is that I have to be willing to expose myself in order to grow. Be willing to ask one too questions and to treat each setback not as a downfall but as a learning experience. I should be able to put my work out there for all to see and comment. Knowing me though, it will be a process. But even now, I’ve started to ask more questions allowing me to start minimizing personal frustration and stewing. Though I do still greatly struggle with wanting bottle up my work. But I have to be able to put it out there so that I’m not limited to my own experience and ideas, but have to access an industry’s experience and ideas.

It frustrates me to no end when I can see people having difficulty with an idea and they don’t ask for help / clarification because they are afraid of looking ‘dumb’. Guess what? ‘Dumb’ is part of the learning process. I would guess that I have learned more from my failures than I have my successes.

Michael once quipped that he doesn’t make mistakes, but he makes all sorts of learning opportunities. Exactly.