If you could win every game, would you? The answer seems obvious but the more you think about it the more problematic the answer becomes.
In my younger days I would most probably have answered yes. I trained hard for the 400 metres for years and the lesson that effort and determination didn’t necessarily equal victory was hard to learn. As it says in Max Ehrmann’s Desiderata, “If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.” After all, winning feels good! However, if winning’s so great, does that make losing a terrible experience? Not necessarily. You can still win if you lose (and you can still lose when you win). Losing certainly provides lessons that winning cannot. For sure, if winning is so great where did the phrase “winning isn’t everything” come from? It doesn’t take a genius to appreciate that, if you win all the time, those special feelings you get from winning begin to fade, eventually you lose the drive to improve yourself.
Earlier this week I enjoyed taking part in an Oxford style debate at an event in central London organised by NetworkPharma Ltd. The motion I was opposing was: ‘web-based learning is an effective educational tool for medical writers.’ This is an easy position for me to counter as I believe that we lull ourselves into a false sense of security around the effectiveness of our blended training packages, used to teach young medical writers what they need to know to be good at their job. In my opinion, no one ever got great at something by watching a movie – practice makes perfect. Supporting the motion was Steven Walker from StGilesMedical.
Polling the audience before our presentations showed them to be unsure - perhaps split 50:50. After our presentations the room of over 50 attendees were almost unanimous in their support of web-based learning. Not even my own Head of Medical Writing, Dr Justin Cook, supported my position. I did have one lone supporter (thank you whoever you were).
So was winning important - NO! Why not? Simply put: I had the opportunity to talk to medical writers about one of my passions – the art of becoming a writer and medical writing.
My ultimate goal was to share my energy and enthusiasm for the subject in hand. We had the opportunity to discuss issues that the day-to-day 'slog' has us forgetting – for example, the importance of rhythm, flow and style in creating great writing. I was eager to underline what I believe to be the importance of actually practicing your craft, and that does not just mean what you do from 9 to 5. Growth as a writer involves feeding your inner muse with continual reading and seeking originality through experimentation outside the formal framework. We should also appreciate the value of mentors when you are developing your skills as a young writer. Equally, serving as a mentor is a crucial step on your road to mastering your craft. I have included a summary of my presentation below.
During the debate, both parties spoke directly to the audience. In a sense this was slightly ironic that may have been missed by the audience, that we don't have to rely on PowerPoint slides every time we stand up and present. It is my hope that, following a period of reflection, Tuesday’s audience will come to appreciate the key points of our discussion. Our aim in conducting the debate was both to entertain the audience and to start them thinking about where web-based learning packages fail.
Does winning feel better than losing? Of course it does! Is losing the end of the world? Far from it. Winning isn’t everything, and losing doesn’t have to be, either. In this case, taking part was reward enough. I would like to thank Peter Llewellyn (NetworkPharma Ltd) for offering the opportunity to take part. Slides and video highlights from the meeting are expected soon on the Network Pharma website.
Introductions by Peter Llewellyn: Dr Tim Hardman is Managing Director of Niche Science & Technology Ltd., a bespoke services CRO based in the UK. He is also Chairman of the Association of Human Pharmacology in the Pharmaceutical Industry and an occasional commentator on science, business and the process of drug development. Web-based learning is NOT an effective educational tool for medical writers Medical writing is difficult. It combines both scientific understanding and clear communicative writing. No one is born understanding grammar or punctuation, much less mechanics and style.
Dr Tim Hardman: They say it take 10,000 hours to become an expert. We have become adept at creating mechanisms to down-load information into our brains. Video, power-point, manuals, blogs, podcasts and criterion-referenced instruction materials all carefully constructed into blended learning packages. Powerful resources designed to rapidly shoehorn information into the brains of young scientists. Knowledge, not know-how. But putting that into context, no one would expect Peter to play the violin like Myleene Klass after even 20,000 hours of downloads however good he looks in a bikini.
Sadly, you cannot clone medical writers. When I was younger, I trained as an athlete. Success involved years of training on the track, understanding the strategy and psychology and repeated competition to develop my ‘edge’. All under the supervision of my coach – in fact several coaches over the years as my needs changed.
It’s not just what you know. If you want to be any good at writing you need to practice, practice, practice. The brain, your writing muscle, needs to be exercised like any other. Guidance is also essential. Writers need feedback on their style, consistency and communication vision. Feedback needs to be timely and may sting – all the better for learning some lessons.
Originality of thought is also important, particularly in this world of unforgiving plagiarism checkers. Reading is how you feed the muse. Every time you read something of value, your brain absorbs the rhythms, the flow, the style. You’re teaching yourself how to write. You can’t just download that into your brain.
Training as a writer is an apprenticeship. You practice the simplest of tasks under the close supervision and guidance of your mentor. As you develop your mentor should use their pedagogical and conceptual knowledge OF YOU (the person) to stretch you (the writer). You may, at some point outgrow your mentor, find a better one or become a journeyman, practicing your skills ‘on-the-job’, ever aiming to improve these skills with every iteration and challenge.
For me, the final step in mastery of your craft is taking on a trainee of your own. Guiding them with care through the vicissitudes of those first client-writer relationships. Can your training programme do this? Self-determined path, pace and purpose in the absence of feedback, focusing or practice? Writing is hard and crafting a good writer harder. Where is the self-proclaimed genius that can say they have squeezed all this into one tin available for £4.99 from Woolworths?
Thank you.
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