by Caroline Leach | Feb 27, 2016 | Change, Learning, Marketing & Analytics
Does what we say to ourselves influence how much, how fast and how well we can learn new things?
Absolutely, says Erika Andersen, the author of the forthcoming book Be Bad First.
She outlines 4 key mental tools in her Harvard Business Review article, Learning to Learn. They are aspiration, self-awareness, curiosity and vulnerability.
Aspiration. Andersen says “great learners can raise their aspiration level.” How? By focusing on the benefits of what you’ll learn, rather than on the challenges in the learning process. A good question to ask is “What would my future look like if I learned this?”
Self-awareness. This is about seeking feedback and taking action on it. Good questions to ask yourself about feedback are “Is this accurate?” “What facts do I have to support it?” and “How do I compare with my peers?”
Curiosity. Andersen writes that “curiosity is what makes us try something until we can do it it, or think about something until we understand it.”
If you’re not interested in a new subject, Anderson advocates changing your self-talk to ask why others find the subject so interesting.
As a person interested in words, ideas and influence, my curiosity is helping me find where those interests intersect with analytics and big data.
In starting to read Tom Davenport‘s Big Data @ Work, I became more curious about how organizations of the future will better focus on the collaboration and communications activities of their people.
This led me to a footnote that took me to another book called Social Physics. This is defined as “analyzing patterns of human experience and idea exchange within the digital bread crumbs we all leave behind us as we move through the world.”
Now I’m truly fascinated and thinking about the connections with another book I read last year, The Reputation Economy. This is about how individuals can shape their digital footprint at a time when your reputation can dictate the kind of life you’ll live and what opportunities may be available to you.
Vulnerability. This is about the scary prospect of “being bad at something for weeks or months; feeling awkward and slow; having to ask ‘dumb’ questions; and needing step-by-step guidance again and again.”
The cure? Changing what you say to yourself. Andersen suggests that instead of saying “I’m terrible at this,” replace it with, “I’m making beginner mistakes, but I’ll get better.”
As I’m pursuing my own learning project and getting up to speed in a new role, I reminded myself of trying out for a sports team in high school.
When I showed up for the first practice before tryouts, I almost didn’t come back the next day. I felt uncoordinated, self-conscious and silly. But I made myself come back the next day. And the next.
And happily, I made the team. But what if I’d given up that first day? What if I’d allowed myself to believe that I was terrible and had no hope of getting better?
There are very few things we can’t learn if we tell ourselves we can. And if we encourage ourselves with positive thoughts. And remind ourselves that others don’t notice our mistakes as much as we might think.
I have to tell myself that frequently as I walk into yet another figurative wall by mistake. Oops. That hurt. Did anyone notice my mistake?
But the important thing is the dust yourself off. To keep moving forward. And to avoid making the same mistake twice.
What’s a good way to do that? By being kind to yourself. Encourage yourself. Have faith that with grit and perseverance, you can do what you set out to do.
One day this month I came home and a friend from a community group had left a thank-you card and a book on my doorstep. The book is “The Power of Kindness.” It’s about “the unexpected benefits of leading a compassionate life.”
And while the main focus of the book is on being kind to others, there is power in being just as kind to ourselves.
That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t set aspirational goals and have high standards for ourselves. But it does mean encouraging ourselves and asking how we could do better next time.
In addition to my learning journey in data and analytics, I’ve written in this blog about learning stand-up paddle boarding and learning yoga. My goal this summer is to combine the two.
Today I went paddle boarding and tomorrow I’ll take a yoga class. The benefit to both is a kind of zen that helps me be kinder to myself and to others.
It pulls me out of the moment-to-moment frenzy of everyday life and puts me in a meditative state. A reflective state. A refreshed state.
All the better to keep learning.
by Caroline Leach | Feb 21, 2016 | Learning, Marketing & Analytics
Headlines are critical in corporate communications.
If someone reads nothing else but the headline, will they get the key message? And will the headline compel them to read the story?
A tweet can serve the same function. Can you get your key message across in under 140 characters? Will it engage your followers to click on the related link?
It turns out, there’s another powerful use for headlines and tweets. Alexandra Samuel outlines this in her HBR post How Content Marketers Can Tell Better Stories with Data.
“Start with your dream headline,” Samuel advises. She likes to start by “imagining my dream headlines or tweets: the discoveries that I would love my data to yield.”
Samuel gives the example of looking at child-related security risks. “I hoped to discover the security practices that led to the biggest reduction in online misdeeds,” she wrote, “something like ‘good passwords cut hacks perpetrated by kids by 50%’.”
This informs how she tackles the research. What’s less important is whether the discovery she wants to find is actually supported by the research. Because the method provides focus to the research.
This gives a better ability to discover “data that would yield the best-case outcome.” The headline and the story then evolve based on the most interesting and relevant insights from the data.
My first introduction to Alexandra Samuel was through her series of e-books, which ultimately become Work Smarter with Social Media. These helped me to work better with LinkedIn, Twitter and more.
That’s why I was drawn to Samuel’s articles during my Sunday morning reading of HBR posts on marketing, market research and data. It’s all part of my ongoing, online learning project.
And it speaks to the 5-plus hours of learning that everyone at my employer is encouraged to do to mobilize the future.
We’re all lifelong learners. It’s a gift to be part of a company that creates a learning culture to do just that.
What are you learning today?
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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