by Caroline Leach | Apr 1, 2016 | Careers, Corporate Communications, Learning, Marketing & Analytics
Who doesn’t love binge watching a favorite show?
Whether it’s Game of Thrones or Billions, watching multiple episodes in a single sitting makes the experience more intense, rewarding and fun.
That’s a fun part of working for at the company that provides DIRECTV. Whether it’s the DIRECTV app or a programmer app with the subscription, it’s easy to stream great content on a mobile device.
It got me thinking about how binge watching might apply to online learning. Could it make learning more effective? More efficient? How about more fun?
And why was I pondering this question?
A Fortune 10 CEO was recently quoted in the New York Times on reskilling people for the future. “There is a need to retool yourself,” he said, “and you should not expect to stop. People who do not spend 5 to 10 hours a week in online learning will obsolete themselves with the technology.”
(Full disclosure: I work for this great company. Opinions in this blog are my own.)
While it’s true that small steps add up to big changes, it’s possible to accelerate learning by binge viewing great online courses.
As an example, for professional certifications that require ongoing education, binge viewing online courses is highly effective.
Why?
- It eliminates the inefficiencies of starting and stopping courses.
- It amplifies learning by increasing the ability to see patterns and make connections between seemingly disparate concepts and information.
- And a significant amount of learning can be completed in a relatively short time, fueling more motivation to seek out further coursework.
As I rectify my accreditations in public relations and human resources every 3 years, this strategy has made ongoing learning more efficient and more fun.
And it’s worked well for a series of marketing essentials courses I co-created with colleagues in my new career role. And for several weeks my action-item list has included “complete this series of online courses.” But somehow it didn’t happen. Until today. And here’s why.
Schedule time. The 5 online courses I need to complete are 90 minutes each, totaling 7.5 hours. Have you ever found a full day without meetings that you could commit to online learning?
Earlier this week I looked at my schedule and saw I had a few open late afternoon hours on a Friday. So I booked it for 2 online courses. Which then became 3, as I was pulled into the reward of completing course after course.
It was much easier to click into that next course as long as I was already online, in a comfortable place, and with a few hours of time I’d blocked out.
Make yourself comfortable. Maybe there’s a comfortable chair in your workspace. Or a standing desk. Or even a treadmill desk. What would make the environment even better? Your favorite coffee beverage? A healthy snack?
Focus on the course. Find a quiet place. Close your door if you have one. Turn off email and text notifications and other sounds on mobile devices.
Enjoy the experience of focusing intently on only one thing. Research shows that humans can’t multitask anyway, as much as we delude ourselves into thinking that we can.
Write notes on key points. Listen for 3 key takeaways. There’s magic in the number 3. It focuses your thought processes and forces you to prioritize what you heard and saw.
Taking notes on those key points helps to solidify the learning, especially if you hand write them. And you have something you can quickly refer to when you want to refresh your learning.
Take one immediate action. Of those 3 key points, what’s one thing you can put into action right away?
As part of my PR recertification, I listened to an IABC webinar on the art of social media by Guy Kawasaki. That’s how I discovered Canva. It makes anyone, including me, into a graphic designer. Many of the images in this blog are from Canva.
Given the need for all of us to prepare for our next career, why not binge watch your way to a new skill?
by Caroline Leach | Feb 22, 2016 | Corporate Communications, Work/Life
What makes a great speech?
Humor. Brevity. Meaning. Emotion. Love. Those were the hallmarks of some touching remarks I heard over the weekend.
And no, it wasn’t a TED talk or a corporate retreat. It was a high-school soccer banquet. Seen through the eyes of a freshman parent.
The most impressive part was the level of preparation. Each graduating senior had a freshman talk about what they learned from that player.
And whether they pulled a piece of paper or an iPhone out of their pocket, they had all clearly put thought into what they were going to say.
After the freshmen had their say, some of the seniors shone the spotlight on their coaches.
A few memorable mantras from the many vignettes –
- No matter what happens, you have to make the best of it
- Some of the biggest learnings happen off the field
- Someday I hope I can make people feel as special as my coach made me feel.
Whether they were talking about soccer, or life or both, a lot of great lessons had been role modeled, learned and shared.
What struck me the most was the level of poise these young athletes demonstrated. That’s what comes from having many opportunities to speak in group settings.
They showed how much inspiration – not to mention humor – you can bring to a very short speech.
There’s no need to hem or haw or spend a long time leading up to the punchline.
They simply shared what was in their hearts.
by Caroline Leach | Feb 6, 2016 | Corporate Communications, Leadership, Learning
Reading is all the rage among many business leaders.
As a lifelong bookworm, this is welcome news. Something I’ve always loved to do has (finally) become on trend.
The lesson? If you do things you like long enough, they might become popular at some point. Then you can say you were ahead of the curve.
The benefits of reading are vast – there’s focusing your mind and calming your soul. There’s learning new information relevant to your career. There’s exposing yourself to a diversity of viewpoints to understand how different groups of people think and act.
In the year since I posted News Rituals of a Communicator, my own reading habits have evolved and changed.
New on the scene are 3 daily digests pushed to my email.
- theSkimm. This filters news through the eyes of Millennials. It’s a fun read with a fresh take on the world, with quotes of the day, a main story and things to know.
Thanks to colleague Lauren Brown for the recommendation, during a meeting of our company’s employee resource group for women.
It starts with today’s agenda, moves into the world in brief and wraps up with market activity.
- L.A. Business Journal. This is the local look at what’s going on in the Los Angeles business world. It aggregates sources with news that impacts Southern California.
And since I work for a Dallas-based company, I’ve become an avid follower of The Dallas Morning News.
Isn’t this a lot to read? Not really. Similar to other news sources, I scan the headlines in each digest and choose at least one story to read in full.
That’s why I focus so much on the importance of headlines in any corporate communication. Often it’s all people will read. The main point has to be captured in it. If someone read nothing else, would they get the key point? Is it something that could be easily found later in a search?
Beyond news, there are blogs for a variety of viewpoints. And what about books? There’s less of a method to my madness here in creating a reading list.
I keep an eye out in Harvard Business Review posts for upcoming books. Sometimes I’ll discover books through TED talks. Other times it’ll be on best business books lists.
Usually I discover books before their publishing date. So I pre-order on my Kindle app. It’s a fun surprise the day they download. This week’s gift is Adam Grant‘s Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World.
Because I’m such a book lover, I haunt my local library‘s new releases section. It’s like browsing the latest titles and taking all the best ones home for free. Even better, they get returned after 2 weeks and don’t clutter my home or office. There’s also an option to borrow electronic books.
How is there time for all these books? They’re always available on my smartphone or tablet. That way I can read on the go whenever I have a few minutes. It makes time fly when you’re standing in line or waiting for an appointment to begin.
When time is tight, I’ll read the first chapter, last chapter and any other chapters in the table of contents that catch my eye. There are plenty of book summaries out there. And you can listen to books in the car.
And I’m endlessly inspired by Claire Diaz-Ortiz and her reading habit. Her post on How I Read 200 Books a Year gives great tips for how to fit more reading into your life.
What are you reading and how do you make time for it?
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