Experts, Novices, and Tweeners

It's important to understand the Dreyfus Model of Skill Acquisition. Why? Go ahead and treat an expert like a novice and find out. People are different so they need to be treated differently:

1. Novice (wants to be given a manual, told what to do, with no decisions possible)

• "rigid adherence to taught rules or plans"
• no exercise of "discretionary judgment"

2. Advanced beginner (needs a bit of freedom, but is unable to quickly describe a hierarchy of which parts are more important than others)

• limited "situational perception"
• all aspects of work treated separately with equal importance

3. Competent (wants the ability to make plans, create routines and choose among activities)

• "coping with crowdedness" (multiple activities, accumulation of information)
• some perception of actions in relation to goals
• deliberate planning
• formulates routines

4. Proficient (the more freedom you offer, the more you expect, the more you'll get)

• holistic view of situation
• prioritizes importance of aspects
• "perceives deviations from the normal pattern"
• employs maxims for guidance, with meanings that adapt to the situation at hand

5. Expert (writes the manual, doesn't follow it)

• transcends reliance on rules, guidelines, and maxims
• "intuitive grasp of situations based on deep, tacit understanding"
• has "vision of what is possible"
• uses "analytical approaches" in new situations or in case of problems