I mentor and train my employer's college hires in front-end development. At the end of the 12-week program, the college hires present what they've learned to their managers and their leads.

I have one question I like to ask them, to help them prep for their demos:

"What surprised you?"

I get lots of responses to this. Maybe they were surprised by collaboration tooling, or they learned how to ask questions, or they struggled with Git. All surprises, big or small, are valid here.

I think this a great question to ask for self-reflection, for two reasons:

1. A surprise is a thing learned. Why did something surprise you? You had expectations that things were one way. A surprise disrupts your expectations and forces you to learn something new.

2. Surprises require reaction. Learning something is only half of the puzzle. You can learn many things and never act on them. What's the point of that? Surprises require you to adjust your status quo and adapt.

How do you use your surprises to grow and be better?