OK, you’ve been to school, then onto college or maybe university and now
you’re either ready to enter the workplace, or you’ve been making waves
in it for some time. Of course, work in itself is a learning experience; new
skills, new people-managing techniques and even learning how to make
the perfect chipotle round at your Mexican colleague’s home. You never
stop learning, in fact.
This is all great, but being able to defuse arguments and wield a mean
chili pepper isn’t going to make your resume any heftier, are they?
These are softer skills – invaluable, but harder to promote and work into
an interview. This is where further education and career development
comes in to move you up the ladder.
Online courses can offer a real career boost
The internet has revolutionized just about everything in our lives, even
the way we gain new qualifications. Name any subject you can think of
and there’ll be a course to help you understand it more and sometimes to
come away with a recognized qualification. From food safety to
astrophysics, if you want to learn it, it’s out there, especially if you go
somewhere like The Knowledge Academy.
One of the advantages of online courses is that you can fit them around
your existing commitments – work (obviously), family and hobbies, and
take as long as you need to complete the training.
Sounds great, but will it really help my career
Online courses also take time, of course, they do, but you don’t have to
schlep to the college and back; if you have just 15 minutes to spare after
the kids are in bed, then that’s 15 minutes nearer to your goal. It’s
another commitment, but a hugely more flexible one.
You should, however, go into it with the aim of getting demonstrable
results. That astrophysics course? It’s very interesting but not much use if
you’re an accountant; an Innovation for Accountants course might be,
though. Talk about your key takeaways with your boss and see how you
can implement your new ideas and skills day-to- day.
Visualize the benefits
You could create some dummy work using the things you’ve learned. Use
some previous projects as the base and do a re-run, maybe, or bring in
something totally new.
Stay ahead of the competition
If you’re in a field where there are lots of advancement opportunities, but
where the competition is fierce, then doing an extra course on your own
time will earn you some Brownie points. If you’re in IT or a similar
industry, things move incredibly fast and so you need to be able to at
least keep up with the curve.
There’s even room for that astrophysics course once you’re done with the
accounting and stats courses – a good grounding in Science, Technology,
Engineering and Maths (STEM) is useful whatever you do. You might also
want to think about languages – every little bit helps!
In short
Taking an online course can help your career along, but you’ll need to
prove to your employer, or prospective employer, that the things you’ve
learned will noticeably benefit the company.
OK, you’ve been to school, then onto college or maybe university and now
you’re either ready to enter the workplace, or you’ve been making waves
in it for some time. Of course, work in itself is a learning experience; new
skills, new people-managing techniques and even learning how to make
the perfect chipotle round at your Mexican colleague’s home. You never
stop learning, in fact.
This is all great, but being able to defuse arguments and wield a mean
chili pepper isn’t going to make your resume any heftier, are they?
These are softer skills – invaluable, but harder to promote and work into
an interview. This is where further education and career development
comes in to move you up the ladder.
Online courses can offer a real career boost
The internet has revolutionized just about everything in our lives, even
the way we gain new qualifications. Name any subject you can think of
and there’ll be a course to help you understand it more and sometimes to
come away with a recognized qualification. From food safety to
astrophysics, if you want to learn it, it’s out there, especially if you go
somewhere like The Knowledge Academy.
One of the advantages of online courses is that you can fit them around
your existing commitments – work (obviously), family and hobbies, and
take as long as you need to complete the training.
Sounds great, but will it really help my career
Online courses also take time, of course, they do, but you don’t have to
schlep to the college and back; if you have just 15 minutes to spare after
the kids are in bed, then that’s 15 minutes nearer to your goal. It’s
another commitment, but a hugely more flexible one.
You should, however, go into it with the aim of getting demonstrable
results. That astrophysics course? It’s very interesting but not much use if
you’re an accountant; an Innovation for Accountants course might be,
though. Talk about your key takeaways with your boss and see how you
can implement your new ideas and skills day-to- day.
Visualize the benefits
You could create some dummy work using the things you’ve learned. Use
some previous projects as the base and do a re-run, maybe, or bring in
something totally new.
Stay ahead of the competition
If you’re in a field where there are lots of advancement opportunities, but
where the competition is fierce, then doing an extra course on your own
time will earn you some Brownie points. If you’re in IT or a similar
industry, things move incredibly fast and so you need to be able to at
least keep up with the curve.
There’s even room for that astrophysics course once you’re done with the
accounting and stats courses – a good grounding in Science, Technology,
Engineering and Maths (STEM) is useful whatever you do. You might also
want to think about languages – every little helps!
In short
Taking an online course can help your career along, but you’ll need to
prove to your employer, or prospective employer, that the things you’ve
learned will noticeably benefit the company.
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