Atul Gawande: The Difference Between Coaching and Teaching

by HarvardEducation

On Wednesday, October 24, HMS and HSPH Professor Atul Gawande applied his observations from the fields of sports, music, schools, and medicine, to a discussion of how different professions produce top-level performers.

Published on Nov 2, 2012 by HarvardEducation

'What I found over time, trying to follow and emulate people that were focused on achieving something more than competence, is that they weren’t smarter than anybody else, they weren’t geniuses,' Gawande told an audience at the Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Askwith Forum on Wednesday." - Harvard Magazine

"Atul Gawande’s Askwith Forum talk covered observations from sports and music, as well as anecdotes from his career — including his experience working with a surgical coach.

In addition to suggesting some technical changes (like changing the position of his elbow), the coach also 'pointed out the ways I’d missed opportunities to help the team perform better,' Gawande said.

After making changes and re-focusing on small details, 'I saw my complication rates go down.'” - Harvard Gazette

Category:

Education

License: Standard YouTube License

Source: http://www.youtube.com/user/HarvardEducation

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=VabtGPVVihA#!

Positive Psychology given credence by Academia:

Positive psychology is the scientific study of the strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to thrive.

Commentators on the subject Martin Seligman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, note that:

"The field of positive psychology at the subjective level is about valued subjective experiences: well-being, contentment, and satisfaction (in the past); hope and optimism (for the future); and flow and happiness (in the present).

At the individual level, it is about positive individual traits: the capacity for love and vocation, courage, interpersonal skill, aesthetic sensibility, perseverance, forgiveness, originality, future mindedness, spirituality, high talent, and wisdom.

At the group level, it is about the civic virtues and the institutions that move individuals toward better citizenship: responsibility, nurturance, altruism, civility, moderation,tolerance, and work ethic."