Learning to learn<\/strong><\/h2>\nWatching my wife learn to become a teacher (her 4th trained career before 40), then learn how to teach in our very challenging – yet absolutely vital – public school system, then teach herself how to be a specialist teacher in a whole new subject in a matter of weeks, taught me something: learning is the skill that keeps you in the game.<\/p>\n
Reading a few LinkedIn posts or HBR articles while you're gathering up the focus to do your actual work, sadly, doesn't count as learning. I'm talking about directed, structured, measured education.<\/p>\n
Like most skills, regular practice and constant challenges are the key to improvement. While training is becoming increasingly easy to access,\u00a0it can take a bit of discipline to get all the way through a course. Note: it takes a shedload if you want to attempt \u2018self-directed learning', but before the discipline, it takes a bit of provocation to get started. You need to make a commitment.<\/p>\n
Behavioural economists believe we are twice as motivated to avoid a loss as we are to generate a profit. Use this quirk of neuro-witchcraft \u2013 book a course, spend the money and then let your loss-averse brain badger you into getting started. Which we all know is the hardest part.<\/p>\n
It was partly curiosity, partly fear (a big overseas trip to celebrate a bunch of significant life milestones will do that to you), that drove me to put a learning plan of my own together for the year ahead.<\/p>\n
As far as industry-related training, I'm investing in a couple of conferences and also attending training courses put on by some of our delivery partners.<\/p>\n
\nThere's simply no faster way to get chapter and verse on your collaborators' skills and methods than by paying to have them train you in them.<\/h5>\n<\/blockquote>\n On the home front, I've stopped blasting about mindlessly on my dirt bike (all I was achieving was finding new and creative ways to dismount) and, with the help of YouTube, started doing proper low-speed training drills to work on balance and technique. I'm already crashing \u201cheaps less, ay.\u201d<\/p>\n
In terms of professional skills, I've taken a sideways step and am doing some voice coaching. I'm also taking some basic theatre and stage technique classes to help improve my confidence and performance in front of an audience, whether that's pitching, facilitating or presenting.<\/p>\n
And in terms of product learning, we're developing a training course for some of our Brand Strategy processes, delivered online as a series of interactive modules, in partnership with a specific industry association.<\/p>\n
As new teachers, we're having to take a step back and look at how our products work when we're not in the room to guide them, paying careful attention to the language and pacing while making the most of the medium. As the maxim suggested, we've discovered one of the most effective ways to learn is to teach.<\/p>\n
\nActually, it was the \u2018desktop publishing' software companies offering the training as two competing platforms fought for the \u2018hearts and minds' of art directors and studios in a ground battle for industry supremacy. Congrats Adobe, you won.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The need to keep upskilling isn't going away anytime soon. It's never to early or late to establish a CV in the skill of learning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[835],"capabilities":[],"class_list":["post-15705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-job-seeker"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t