You’ve got something you’d like to learn. There are a dozen ways to learn it, but perhaps none simpler than imitation. Babies are master imitators. Animals, too, are quick to learn from imitation. So why do we resist it?
Scolding “copycat!” voices from our childhood may still be in our head. There’s the aspiration to think different. Who doesn’t recognize a certain cool cachet in someone deemed original. Just saying someone is original is perceived to be a compliment.
I’m all for the new bright idea. But if our task is to learn, then let’s start with the obvious: imitate. Too many bad home page designs result from a designer wanting to be original. (Tim Ash bemoans “graphic designers run amok” in our lesson on home page redesign.)
Parents fear imitation at times, concerned their kids will pick up “bad influences” if they don’t have the right friends. So yes, let’s pick carefully who’s worth emulating. But there’s nothing better than a good example, if you ask me. And sometimes there’s nothing more instructive than a bad example.
There are some training programs that ask you to plod through lots of theory and certifications. Not here. A working tagline for Frankly eCommerce expresses this difference, I hope: “An expert-led course teaching you with frank stories & examples.” Let’s copycat what works.
PS. Hat tip to Dan Millman, when he wrote: “If you feel you’ve not yet attained a high level of expertise, it may be that you’ve not made the best use of your powers of imitation.”