Learn-Do-Teach Loop is three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously. It sits in the Systems dimension (SYS) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™ as element HBT-SYS-0017, within the Learning family. The core principle: three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously. In incentive terms, it matters because it changes the payoff people perceive before they choose — which means it can be designed for, or exploited.
Scientific Definition
Three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously.
Plain-English Definition
Three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously.
Feynman Explanation
Skip the teach step and you'll relearn the same lesson next year.
Core Principle
Three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously.
Mechanisms
Pending editorial review.
Three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Embed in onboarding: every new hire learns, applies, then teaches the next cohort.
Inputs (Triggers)
Pending editorial review.
Outputs (Behaviors)
Pending editorial review.
Behavioral Signature
Skip the teach step and you'll relearn the same lesson next year.
Examples
- Eben Pagan's documented decade of compounding through Learn-Do-Teach.
- Embed in onboarding: every new hire learns, applies, then teaches the next cohort.
Pending editorial review.
Original analysis from The Incentives Lab — how this element behaves inside real payoff structures.
Why this element matters to incentive design
Most organizations meet this element as a personnel problem. It is not one. The mechanism underneath it is straightforward: three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously. You can recognize it in the field by its signature: skip the teach step and you'll relearn the same lesson next year. Every element in the Systems dimension changes the perceived payoff of an action before the action happens, which is exactly where incentive design has leverage.
How it gets exploited
Left undesigned, embed in onboarding: every new hire learns, applies, then teaches the next cohort. It is amplified whenever embed in onboarding: every new hire learns, applies, then teaches the next cohort. Inside organizations that shows up as embed in onboarding: every new hire learns, applies, then teaches the next cohort. The pattern is the same one Goodhart's Law describes: the measurable proxy attracts the effort, and the purpose behind it quietly loses funding.
How the Lab designs around it
The redesign move is to audit your weekly time: are all three present? If not, restructure. Design against it the way you would design against a known failure mode — assume it will appear, and price the exploit before someone finds it.
Famous Experiments
Pending editorial review.
Design Principles
- Audit your weekly time: are all three present? If not, restructure.
Measurement Approaches
Pending editorial review.
Evidence
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
The Perverse Incentive Lens™
How this behavior is exploited — and how to redesign around it.
- Audit your weekly time: are all three present? If not, restructure.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Interactive Mini Network
Click any neighbor to re-center the graph and follow the threads of connection.
Knowledge Graph Neighbors
Auto-linked to the rest of the Human Behavior Taxonomy by family, domain, dimension, and shared keywords.
Single-loop fixes errors; double-loop questions the assumptions producing them.
Single-loop fixes the action. Double-loop questions the goal or model that produced it.
Single-loop: fix the action. Double-loop: question the governing assumption behind it. Chris Argyris.
Map reinforcing (R) and balancing (B) feedback loops between variables to see system behavior.
Observe, Orient, Decide, Act — faster than your competitor.
Systems that gain from disorder.
Approach motivation — pursuit of rewards and goals.
Avoidance motivation — sensitivity to punishment, uncertainty, and threat.
A system with many interacting parts that learn and adapt.
Many interacting parts producing emergent behavior nobody designed.
System 1 is fast, automatic, intuitive; System 2 is slow, effortful, deliberate.
Interdependent network of actors evolving together.
Where Learn-Do-Teach Loop is cited in the corpus
Essays, field guides, and diagnostics from The Incentives Lab that apply this element.
- EssayPolicy Is Incentive Design
System-level payoff structures.
- Field guidePublic sector incentives
Budget rules, election cycles, blame avoidance.
- EssayAI Agents Inherit Your Incentives
How this element propagates into automated systems.
- ReferenceThe incentive glossary
Definitions for every mental model, bias, and fallacy in the corpus.
- CourseIncentives 101
The free ten-part primer on reading a payoff structure.
- ReferenceThe Periodic Table of Human Behavior
The full 1,267-element map this page belongs to.
Questions about Learn-Do-Teach Loop
- What is Learn-Do-Teach Loop?
- Learn-Do-Teach Loop is three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously. It sits in the Systems dimension (SYS) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™ as element HBT-SYS-0017, within the Learning family. The core principle: three-stage cycle: learn by seeing, learn by doing, learn by teaching — looped continuously. In incentive terms, it matters because it changes the payoff people perceive before they choose — which means it can be designed for, or exploited.
- What is an example of Learn-Do-Teach Loop?
- Embed in onboarding: every new hire learns, applies, then teaches the next cohort. The Incentives Lab catalogs everyday, organizational, and historical instances of this element on its Human Behavior Taxonomy™ page (HBT-SYS-0017).
- How is Learn-Do-Teach Loop exploited?
- Embed in onboarding: every new hire learns, applies, then teaches the next cohort.
- How do you design around Learn-Do-Teach Loop?
- Audit your weekly time: are all three present? If not, restructure.
- Which behavioral dimension does Learn-Do-Teach Loop belong to?
- Learn-Do-Teach Loop is classified in the Systems dimension (SYS) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™, family "Learning", class "Mental Model". Its permanent identifier is HBT-SYS-0017 and its evidence grade is B.