Learning Skills Blog Posts

These days, there's change everywhere you look, from new technology in the office to new ways of communicating with friends. It's great when this change is easy to keep up with. But sometimes new systems and approaches can cause anxiety. Will other people "get with the program" more quickly than we do? What does that […]

All Posts, Career Skills, Leadership, Learning Skills, Team Management, Uncategorized

If you want to explore different ways to develop your people's skills and improve their performance at work, you may consider coaching them. Whereas coaching is seen by some as a corrective tool for when things are "going wrong," with careful planning, it can be a positive technique that will help your coachees to focus […]

All Posts, Career Skills, Communication, Learning Skills, Team Management

I recently completed a self-assessment questionnaire, to discover what kind of learning best suited me. The assessment was based on a model created by Alan Mumford and Peter Honey, and it divides learners into one of four categories: activists, reflectors, theorists, and pragmatists. A good many of my Mind Tools colleagues took the same test, and the […]

All Posts, Creativity, Decision Making, Learning Skills, Problem Solving

I know quite a few people who seem to be having mid-career crises at the moment. They're all in their mid-30s and worked their socks off in their 20s by regularly doing late nights, not taking time off, and spending numerous weekends in the office. Usually, they have an end-goal in mind: to gain a […]

All Posts, Career Skills, Learning Skills, Stress

Imagine the scene. I arrived at college full of excitement and a new-found sense of freedom. I was studying the subject of my dreams and socializing in a vibrant and cultured city. The first year was a breeze: the shock came in year two. Suddenly I was nowhere near the top of the class, in […]

All Posts, Career Skills, Change Management, Learning Skills, Stress, Team Management

When I was a student, I had to learn and remember a lot of information to pass my end-of-year exams, and I did so in various ways. I'd start off by reviewing the notes and handouts from my lectures, and I'd rewrite them by hand. This helped refresh my memory, and clarify the information in […]

All Posts, Career Skills, Learning Skills

How do you learn more quickly and thoroughly? Some say they learn best through hearing and speaking about new concepts. Others prefer visual presentations. Kinesthetic learning is a preferred style for some. That is, they like to touch and get their whole body involved. Is your best learning sequentially (step-by-step) or holistically (examining the big […]

All Posts, Learning Skills, Team Management

What’s the difference between managers and leaders? It’s one of those questions you might expect to answer if you’re sitting an end-of-year business-studies exam in high school. I’m sure I had to do an assignment at college on this very subject. I probably wrote about how a manager is an organizer, who makes day-to-day decisions […]

All Posts, Leadership, Learning Skills, Team Management

There are several areas in my life where I’m constantly striving to improve myself. And, for each one, I motivate myself using different methods. For example, one way that I try to better myself is through keeping fit, and this year I trained for a half marathon. To keep motivated, I printed off my training […]

All Posts, Career Skills, Communication, Learning Skills, Stress

I often challenge myself to go without something I enjoy for a period of time. At the moment, I’ve given up chocolate, and my goal is to go six weeks without eating any. In my opinion, six weeks is long enough to test my will power, but not too long for it to feel insurmountable! […]

All Posts, Career Skills, Learning Skills, Problem Solving, Time Management