ABSTRACT
This chapter makes health professionals think back to the time when they first learnt to consult in primary care. It would have involved watching others consult, by sitting in on their surgeries; trying out consultations for yourself and talking about them with a trainer, mentor or senior colleague; and having a colleague or teacher sit in with health professionals to watch their surgeries and give feedback. The chapter discusses unconscious incompetence, conscious incompetence, conscious competence, and unconscious competence. It highlights that health professionals have been consulting for years, their consultation skills would be unconsciously competent. In other words they do not have to think too hard about what they are doing most of the time. In order to add new skills, they will need to temporarily go back to the stage of conscious competence. New skills may feel awkward for a while, but will soon get incorporated into their 'unconsciously competent' toolkit.
