The Importance of Flight Time

The new class format is starting tomorrow so I wanted to take this opportunity to say a few things. Many of you have heard me discuss this in our classes but I want to re-emphasize with you the importance of doing vs. listening to lecture.

As human beings we learn best through doing. Here is an important distinction that you all need to make and the sooner the better...ALL LEARNING IS SUBCONSCIOUS! If you think about it we do very complex things subconsciously. Our hearts beat, our eyes blink, and we take breaths in and out all day long...obviously these are very important functions.

Could you imagine if you had to think every time in order to breath, or blink, or beat your heart. Okay...breath in, hold it .03 seconds, breath out...oh yeah, blink...oh and now my heart, that's important.

It's not that we can't learn consciously, it's just the hardest, longest route! All learning goes through 4 phases

1) Unconscious Incompetence - In essence, you don't know that you don't know. This is where you aren't aware that you don't know how to do something.

2) Conscious Incompetence - This is when you become consciously aware that you don't know something or how to do something. Most of you have experienced this when you first learned to ride a bike. You got on and wobbled around learning about balance. You were aware that you didn't have(know) balance with a bike.

3) Conscious Competence - This is when you become aware that you can ride the bike with competence but you still need to pay attention or you might fall. It's not comfortable yet.

4) Unconscious Competence - Now you can ride the bike without thinking about it. That's when you can really concentrate on having fun because you don't have to think about what you're doing. You can now focus all of your conscious awareness on other things.

You see your body is your link to your subconscious mind. By incorporating drills and exercises (such as inputting drills, MLS Drills, Comping Drills, etc) you'll learn 1,000 times faster. When you physically fill out the grids in the reports, not only are you learning how to do adjustments but you are learning at the subconscious level...after many repetitions, it becomes natural. This is known as 'flight time.' It's the secret to accelerated learning.

I've broken down many of the sub-skills that I use on a daily basis as an appraiser. They are the attributes of appraising. They are really the differences that make the difference in appraising. It's not something you can get through listening to a lecture or taking a USPAP class. Listening really only gets you to become aware that you don't know something. You have to attempt it on your own to get it through the last 2 steps of learning.

Ultimatlely, you can only learn through experience...your experience. The attributes are things that you would develop on your own if you were doing appraisals all day long, but since most of you aren't, I've created drills that will develop them without having to be a working appraiser...yet. Once you start getting work, you won't have to do the drills anymore...and you'll be ready to take on a lot more work then a normal trainee would be able to.

The more time you can put into the drills and exercises, the faster you will learn appraising. It's that simple. You'll be surprised at the results...that's a fact!

So until next time,


Ed