Are you feeling stressed trying to keep up-to-date with the latest technology landscape? You feeling maybe a little behind, not sure where to start? Don’t worry – it happens. Let me to give you some advice on how best to handle this and give you some license to not be so hard on yourself.

The technology landscape changes all the time, with seismic shifts happening roughly every 5 years. We’re expected to to keep learning, to ensure we don’t go out of date. We don’t need to be at the bleeding edge, not even the leading the edge, but we do need to keep updated. Our world is predicated on the self-learn model. Whether that is reading articles/books, watching videos, listening to podcasts, we have a world of information at our fingertips in a wide variety of formats to suit each persons taste. It can feel overwhelming at times – especially if you have a hectic workload as it is. What can you do?

Sometimes we put too much pressure on ourselves. It is natural. You want to be able to understand something on the first read/view and be fully versed in the given new technology/design-pattern/technique you are researching. However, that is not how learning works. It takes repetition, usually around 7 times, before a new piece of knowledge sinks in.

You can’t shortcut learning – your brain isn’t a USB-stick to be inserted into a master computer for download (though can you imagine you how much easier things would be if you could instantly be an expert in something?). Reading alone isn’t normally enough – interaction is required. Remember how you learned as a child – you picked things up, you put things in your mouth, you tried different ways, each time your brain was registering a new piece of information.

And here is the biggest thing – it doesn’t require a huge amount of time. Often the excuse is given “but I don’t have the time”. Nonsense! You always have the time – you just don’t know how to properly utilize/prioritize the time you do have.

One thing is for sure – if you do nothing, then nothing will happen.

Start Small

If, however, you do as little as 15 minutes learning each day, by the time the week is over, you will have increased your learning by at least 1hr 15mins. After a month, you will be 5hrs more intelligent, and within the year, 70hrs further forward. That is nearly 2 full working weeks dedicated to just learning. Out of no where!

You telling me you can’t find 15 minutes? Of course you can. Most people’s commutes are longer than that – imagine throwing on a podcast, and listening to that while you are driving/traveling. How much better off could you be after only a few days?

You find time to read emails – how about if one of those emails was an article, emailed to your inbox each day? How much better off would you be after a week?

The same is said of exercise – it doesn’t take a lot and doing something is better than doing nothing. I try to ride on my bike at least 30 minutes a day – get my heart pumping and build up a sweat.  I do it, because I owe it to my body – I need this host to keep my brain alive to let me experience all the wonderful things around us.  I will be the first to hold my hand up and admit to abusing my body for too long.

My Doctor gave me a wonderful piece of advice a couple of years ago, stolen from Clint Eastwood, who advocates “Keeping the old man away”, by doing something each and every day.  It doesn’t need to be a lot, just needs to be something.  I get a big kick when I look at my bikes statistics after a month to see I have typically ridden over 250 miles.  That is 250 more miles that I would have done by doing nothing.  Your brain is the same.

Treat yourself to the gift of learning and start off in bite sized chunks. You will be surprised how quickly it builds up and how more confident you will be after only a short time. Reading a book, doesn’t need to be at once, or even a chapter a once, just a few pages every so often, will put you further ahead than if you did nothing. Tag/bookmark an article as and when you come across it, but read it later. Once you start seeing the same concepts come at you, from different sources, it will quickly start sinking in.

There is no exam. No deadline. This is not school or university. You are learning to increase your own knowledge, to be a better human, a better contributor.

Share

Once you start, then start sharing – one piece of advice I was always given, to know if you understand a given topic, try writing an article (or wiki page) on it, so you can teach it to others.

Through that mechanism you can quickly figure your own gaps and be confident in the areas you fully understand.

Little and often. Try it this week – see what you can achieve by the end of the week. You may surprise yourself