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Discuss this Chapter!
Context: You have been an apprentice for a little while. You know a few things and people are starting to look towards you as a source of knowledge.
Problem: Up until now you have focused exclusively on your own improvement as a craftsman. To become a journeyman you will need the ability to communicate effectively and bring other people up to speed quickly.
Solution: Early in your apprenticeship develop the habit of reguarly sharing the lessons you have learned.
Offer those around you the opportunity to take advantage of the lessons you have learned. This may take the form of maintaining a blog or it may involve running a "brown bag" session amongst your Kindred Spirits. Other ways in which you can aid those around you involve putting on presentations at conferences or even writing tutorials for the various technologies and techniques that you have begun to learn.
At first this will be difficult. After all, you are not a master or even a journeyman: surely you should wait for someone more experienced to put themselves forward? However, you will find that your fellow apprentices will appreciate one of their own trying to demystify complex topics. You may know only a tiny amount about category theory or prototype-based programming languages but the little knowledge you have is more than most. Since you have only a little knowledge your explanations will be simple and straight to the point without assuming prior knowledge. This will make them better explanations. You may find it helps to write the tutorial you wish you had found when you were first learning a particular topic or technology.
Being part of a community of individuals where both learning on your own and humbly sharing that newly acquired knowledge are valued is one of the most powerful facets of apprenticeship. It makes so many otherwise esoteric fields of knowledge suddenly accessible and provides apprentices with a guide who speaks their language.
Related: This is most clearly connected to Chapter 27, Record What You Learn. If you have recorded the things you have learned it is easier to share them with others. On the other hand this pattern has the additional danger that people won't always appreciate the things you share. Some lessons should not be shared. Other lessons cannot be shared without damaging your relationship with other members of your current team or your employer. The gains made through the application of Sweep The Floor can easily be undone if others, rightly or wrongly, feel that you are insufficiently humble in the manner in which you share or that you are sharing your lessons for some ulterior motive.
Chapter 17, Be The Worst leads you toward better learning opportunities at the risk of neglecting your responsibilities to the craft. You could fall into a perpetual mode of selfishingly sponging knowledge by constantly looking for opportunities to accellerate your learning without ever considering the people who would benefit were you to Share What You Learn.
Dave Smith's pattern Prepare The Way has strong connections to Share What You Learn:
Prepare The Way raises the bar, teaching that as groundbreakers, we have the additional responsibility of leaving a well-marked, safe trail in our wake as we trundle off into the wilderness.
