Knowledge Is Power — Or Is It?

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“Knowledge is power” - we were told.

Is it? 

Since I was a kid, I’ve always been taught to challenge authority. 

Whenever I shared something I learned at the dinner table, I would always be asked: “who told you that?” “Why?” 

I grew up asking questions. The facts, teacher, status quo — question everything. 

Is knowledge power?

That brought me to do a degree in Philosophy. I got to study how great minds ask questions, How much confidence should we have in what we know? What is the process that we go through to believing in things? Can we justify those beliefs? 

As I dived into Foucault’s “knowledge is power,” I learned that — and I might lose you here — knowledge is only considered knowledge if it has relevance to a dominant discourse in a given social structure. 

(This sentence is a perfect example of how even though I have the knowledge, I have no power because this sentence is way too complex for a Linkedin post.)

If knowledge was power, why am I broke and living with my parents with no idea what I want to do with my life? 

So I learned that knowledge is power only when it is relevant to the group. You have to speak the language the group speaks. If you want to be part of the cool kids in high school, your knowledge of “who’s dating who” gives you power. You also have to adhere to certain codes and conventions of how the school kids should act. 

I felt that the knowledge of philosophy wasn’t the language our society spoke. 

Nobody cares about Foucault’s notion of power. 

If I want to be part of the cool kids in society, I need knowledge of something that people cared about.

So I did a 180-degree change and went to pursue a Master’s degree in Finance, and got a job in the field. 

I wanted to do something that is relevant to society and that drives real-world impact. 

Guess what? I hated it. 

I was told I would be solving real-world problems with complex math solutions. 

Instead, I was doing repetitive tasks, with money as the means and ends to my everyday existence. 

As I was staring at the numbers blinking on one of my four monitors, a cartesian doubt started to grow in my mind. 

I decided it wasn't the impact I was looking for. 

So I made another 180-change, and quit my comfortable, corporate job, in search of another path to turn knowledge into power.

“Knowledge is made for cutting”

After some thorough cartesian skepticism and two 180-degree changes, I was back to square one. 

My belief system was put into question. How can I turn knowledge into power and what should I do with my life? 

I turned back to Foucault for insights. 

“Knowledge is not made for understanding; it is made for cutting.” 

In using knowledge to do something different we cannot avoid cutting it up, for we must cut and splice into our own thoughts to create new meaning. I needed to create my own meaning of knowledge and power, and how I can achieve it.

My childhood friend, Guillaume was also working in Finance, asking himself the same questions. I was more of a creative, and he a numbers guy. He’s the left brain and I’m the right. 

We decided to put our heads together to figure out how to turn knowledge to power.

Bouncing ideas off Guillaume helped me move forward 10x quicker. We started testing different ideas, most of them failed, but each one led us closer to where we wanted to be. 

Reinventing knowledge sharing

Still convinced of the power of knowledge, we started out to help teachers teach better. That was back when #EdTech wasn’t even a hashtag yet. 

We’ve been met with a lot of resistance, as the business need was missing. Then we realized, teachers don’t have the urgency to change. 

For companies, however, the cost of inefficient knowledge sharing is much higher. 

We realized that companies thrive or die based on whether their employees have the knowledge they need to succeed. We’re in a knowledge economy, every company needs to train employees on new technologies, new skills, but existing learning tools are terrible; not at all adapted to the way humans learn. When you don’t have the right tools to share knowledge, you lose talent, efficiency, and revenue. 

After two of my 180-degree changes, I was reminded once again of the importance of questioning everything. 

And that’s how we started 360Learning. 

I realized that learning and applying knowledge is not linear; it takes a lot of trial and error and learning from mistakes. 

I also realized that knowledge is only as powerful as the methodology and framework you put in place around it. 

Most of all, learning happens faster when we combine expertise, put our heads together and learn together. 

So how the hell do we turn knowledge into power? 

That is the question I asked myself when we created 360Learning, and a question every 360Learner continues to ask every day. 

A new way of learning: Collaborative Learning

I wouldn’t say we’ve cracked the code yet, but after 5 years of a lot of constant reiterations, our formula for learning is: 

• Find people who want to learn and share knowledge: we’re on track to cross 200 360Learners by the end of the year; 
• Make sharing knowledge quick and easy: we’ve crossed 1 million users completing 1 million courses every month; 
• Give real-time feedback and constantly improve: we’ve created a unique convexity culture that is bottom-up and people-driven;
• Tie learning to business needs and outcomes: we’re generating 15€ million in ARR on our Collaborative Learning vision. 

Garyvee recently shared a post about how culture is like the operating system of a company, I can’t agree more. 

The only thing I would challenge is the fact that he says culture “comes from the top.” 

For me, like learning, culture should be built bottom-up. We started with our vision, but every 360Learner makes that vision a reality and helps us iterate on it as we grow. 

Knowledge isn’t power, learning is

If you ask me today whether knowledge is power, I’d say, knowledge is power only when you have the right framework and tools to acquire, share, and apply it efficiently. 

The business impact is real: companies that practice a continuous learning and growth mind-set and openly discuss mistakes to promote learning are 3x more profitable and have up to four times better retention than those that do not. 

There’s clearly a huge appetite for a better way to learn and share knowledge, our recent fundraising and 1,200+ clients across industries are both a testament to that. 

What’s your story? How has knowledge given you power?