Dealing with 9-to-5ers
We live in an age where a higher percentage of people in technology careers are engaged with their wider community than ever before. It seems that you can't go into a cafe or bar without some branch of technology holding a meetup or gathering of some description. There are online tech communities all over the place, holding discussions and webinars, sharing whitepapers and blog posts, and generally getting the word out about what they're up to while encouraging feedback and debate about the path they're taking.
That's great! It means ideas are being floated, knowledge is being shared, and the industry as a whole improves as a result. It also means that those involved are fully engaged in their work, and are clearly very serious about what they do for a living.
Of course, not everyone works this way. There will be members of your team who simply can't pursue extra-curricular activities, and that's perfectly okay. I'm certainly not saying that anyone who can't engage with the wider community is making less of a contribution, or somehow bunking off by not spending their free time pursuing wider knowledge. People have lives, families, and a whole world beyond work, so if they're still taking opportunities to engage internally, attend and contribute to meetings, and generally showing a desire to improve, that's fine and dandy.
But what can you do with the people who have their head down the whole time and won't engage? The folks who do what they have to do to make sure they're in at nine and out at five every day? The ones who just slug away at the coal face, and are content to Eat, Sleep, Grind, Repeat with no apparent thoughts of interacting or expanding?
Nothing.
Well, okay, not nothing. These team members should still be encouraged, praised and rewarded for their hard work and consistency. Without them, you'd never make your targets, and you'd never get things done.
But if you're lucky enough to be in a position where you can send delegates to conferences and workshops, conventional wisdom says that these development opportunities should go to those who are getting themselves out there and showing an active interest in self improvement, and not the 9-to-5ers.
However, it's worth remembering that information gathering doesn't necessarily relate to personal growth and development, and knowledge is only of any use when it's applied and / or shared. Your apparent self-improvers might read every article they can, attend local meetups and talks, listen to every podcast, watch every webinar and demo they can find... and then do absolutely nothing with what they learn. They don't implement anything new at their workplace, they don't change their working practices, and they don't even share what they've learned with their peers - all of which makes any knowledge they obtain worthless.
Everyone knows that if you get to go on a field trip, there must be a reckoning in the form of a report to the class when you get back. Without that, the value of the sponsored place to the company is diminished. It doesn't have to be a full on slideshow and whiteboard affair, but the delegate should at least give a summary of what they've picked up during their excursion as part of the next team meeting, along with an invitation for anyone who wants to know more to reach out to them.
And bear in mind that such an opportunity might just be the thing that opens the eyes of a 9-to-5er, gets them to engage with both internal and external communities, helps them to build some confidence in presenting when they deliver their report, and potentially kicks off the desire to learn and grow in a hundred different ways.
So if you know an event is coming up, and you're going to be in a position to send delegates, have a conversation about knowledge acquisition and sharing, and drop a mention of the event into your next round of 1-to-1s, and watch carefully for signs of interest. Where they come from might just surprise you.