Free learning

Are you making the most of free learning?

I ran into a dear friend today at the market. She had, somewhat reluctantly, taken a new job a few weeks back. Her first stories about it were a bit worrying. It sounded ghastly.

But not today. Today she was full of the stories of a wonderful and skilled colleague she had met and is now working closely with. Her eyes were sparkling with life and she could hardly stop singing his praises.

“I’m learning such a lot.” She said.

I was put in mind of an old colleague of mine. I was so impressed with her communication skills that I got onto a project with her, just so I could observe what she was doing and find out how it worked.

That was the start of a long road that I am still travelling. My question to you is: are you making the most of the free opportunities for learning that surround you?

So many people waste these free opportunities, but they are everywhere, if you know what to look for.

Lessons to look for

Focus on spotting people who do something well. They don’t have to do everything well, just one thing. Then try copying what they do and see if it works for you. I guarantee, the more you look, the more you will find.

The other side of the learning coin

And remember that there are also things you don’t want to copy. That’s useful to learn too. It’s a bit like the old saying I once saw on a doormat:

All our visitors make us happy; some when they arrive, others when they leave.

Go here for more about how to keep yourself learning – and how to look after your brain.
Go here to check out the questions you could be using to help yourself.

What’s the difference between good and great training?

How do you measure your training? Here’s a question I came across recently.

What’s the difference between good and great training?

We all know the difference between good and bad training, but it’s harder to tell the difference between ‘good’ and ‘great’ training.

Perhaps it’s not as hard as all that.

The results matter

Ultimately, the real test is: did it work? What are people doing differently as a result of the training?

Even if a trainer is using all the best techniques and tools, the training is only any good if it works. It’s the same with anything.

A clear objective

That’s why it’s so useful to have a really clear objective for your training. So often I’ve been asked for ‘a presentation skills course’. When I’ve asked the client what they want people to be able to do differently by the end of the training they have often had no clear idea.

Here’s how to structure a training objective:

All delegates are able to present the safety information so that the members of their team know how to use the new equipment safely by the end of the day.

If, after your delegates have been out and presented to their teams, everyone is using the equipment safely, then your training has been successful.

For more help with training, see our workshop on Training Skills

An easy way to stop learning

Did you know that there is no learning without feedback? I heard Prof. Marian Diamond speak on this topic many years ago.  She’s an expert in the brain and is still working at 85.

She is one of the world’s leading neuroscientists. I was lucky enough to meet her. Till I heard her talking about feedback, I had no idea how important it was. I thought it was dry and boring. Just something you had to do in a performance review or appraisal and perhaps once or twice a year.

Now I know better. The important thing to realise is that by not giving or getting enough feedback, you are not learning as much as you could be. You are making your life more difficult than it has to be. You are not moving forward and improving.

No learning

Have you seen people (or companies) who make the same mistake again and again? We all have.

One of the key reasons for this is just not checking information you already have about the results of your actions. You often don’t need to get feedback from others; you can get the information yourself. And that’s all feedback is: information.

It’s information that helps you to make a decision on what to do next time.

A small example of feedback working

I worked with Anne, a finance manager. She had a team member who was unreliable. He often did not complete tasks when they were required. Many of her requests were sent by email.

We printed them all out and she put them into two piles. The ones he had complete on time and the ones that had not been completed on time.

There was a clear different in the way she had asked him to complete the task. When she had given a specific time or date, the tasks were done promptly. Where she had said they were ‘urgent’ or ‘really important’ (with not date) they had not been completed on time.

So her feedback was clear – to get tasks completed on time, Anne needed to give a specific date.


Find out how to get feedback and make sure others get it.

Why books are bad for you

So often people fight against change and have all kinds of reasons for it. Apparently the ancient Greeks (Aristotle, Plato and friends) thought books were bad.

They thought that having books would stop people bothering to learn things off by heart.
Judging by the people who come along on my workshop “Improve your memory now and for the rest of your life” I would agree.

What surprised me the most recently was that on one of the workshops not a single person knew anything off by heart. Absolutely nothing. They professed to be amazed that I could recite an entire poem. So the Greeks were right.

Memory

The trouble is that not using your memory does mean that you get out of the habit of remembering things. Having a good memory is all about using tools and techniques to remember things.

If you use the right tools and practice them you can improve your memory quite drastically in a very short space of time. 

On the workshop there is a little memory test where you do your best to remember a series of 20 words. Most people who come on the workshop manage to improve their score substantially over the three hours. Some even double it.

It’s not magic, it’s just trying out a few techniques.

So are books really bad?
Of course books in themselves are not bad. What is bad is letting your faculties go, becoming lazy and allowing yourself to go into decline.

If they didn’t like books, what would the Greeks have said about TV? Personally I love watching something good on TV. But I wouldn’t want to sit all day every day watching TV, though it would be easy to do.

It would be easy to stop using my memory. I have a phone that does my shopping lists and reminds me to do just about everything. So it’s very tempting to get lazy. Then you find that, when you need it, your memory doesn’t work.

The trouble is that, if you are not careful, these useful tools become crutches.

Once you become totally reliant on them you are lost when they fail or are taken away.

I used to work with a chap who had had polio. He walked with two sticks. He told me once that he had been offered a wheelchair several times by well-meaning medical staff. But he never accepted. He said; “Once you get in a chair, you never get out.”

Improve your memory now. Get the recording of my teleseminar "How to Improve Your Memory"