Continuing professional development … but what?
Following the web conference yesterday, I’m all fired up for working on my continuing professional development. But there’s so much that I could cover, what should I concentrate on? Should I concentrate on the business side of things and do some reading up on how to improve the business, or should I focus on my web design skills? My problem is that I want to do everything all at once. How do I get the right balance between the two main areas of what I do?
Here are a couple of options:
- I could make a list of everything I want to learn and prioritise it, concentrating on one thing at a time
- I could alternate between the two – read a book on web design, followed by a book on business, followed by web design etc.
One thing that I know is that I find it very difficult to stay focused on one thing for very long – not because of a lack of interest, but because there are always other things fighting for my attention. I might try the second approach and see if I can keep some kind of log of what I learn so that I don’t lose track because of too much chopping and changing. Do you think I can manage an hour of reading a day? I can but try. Hopefully I’ll start having a few things to review on here again.
Another full-on day
I survived another full-on day on the management course. 9-5 with very little let-up. Yesterday’s session was on problem solving and decision making. We went through some decision making models, which was interesting because I’d done some of that on another business course I did last year but most of the models we covered were different – actually seemed a lot more simplistic even though this course is supposed to be a higher level…
We’ve got an assignment to do for this module, which will count towards one of the qualifications. We have to take a problem we’re facing in our business, analyse it, work it through, choose the best solution and write an action plan for implementing it. I’m quite looking forward to tackling this one – hopefully it will be something that I can practically apply so will directly benefit the business.
So, with the course over and done with I can start bashing through some work again. Am heading into Penzance in a moment to do the banking and stock up on some office supplies then I’ll be chaining myself to my desk for the rest of the day.
Definitely not in my comfort zone
Well that was quite a week. I’m pleased to say that the presentation went smoothly and we’ve already had a number of enquiries as a result of it so it’s really looking like it was worthwhile. It did rather dominate the week though. I spent the first part of the week frantically preparing for it and then the second part recovering from it. Well that’s what it felt like anyway. Friday was actually busy in its own right – one meeting, a hands-on session helping a do-it-yourselfer out with their website, and trying to catch up on the stuff that had been let slip because of the talk.
Now I’m not sure what I need most …. some time off to recharge my batteries or just some solid days of working so I can feel a bit more on top of things. Maybe a few days of solid work followed by some time off will do the trick. Not that I’m going to get either! Meetings, courses and a massive workload is what we’ve got waiting for us. Tuesday I’ve got the second session of my management course so today I really must get the great pile of homework polished off for that. Could really do without it! When I booked up the course a few months ago I had no idea we’d be so busy now. I really must concentrate on the benefits of it and stay positive.
Round-up of last week
Eek, I hadn’t realised it was so long since I last posted. My excuse is that it was an incredibly busy week last week. The management course on Tuesday turned out to be worth going to, despite being a bit too full-on. Turns out we’ll be working towards two qualifications and there’s a lot of paperwork involved in the process. I was a bit daunted by it but have been reassured that it won’t be as bad as it seems. The weird thing is that it feels just like going back to school – the course tutor’s style is very much that of teaching a class and there seems to be little acknowledgement of the fact that we’re all grown-ups running our own businesses and therefore very much have minds of our own. Still, what we’re learning is definitely going to be useful so I’ll concentrate on that and try not to revolt too much from the strict atmosphere.
On Thursday morning I went to an interesting workshop run by Helena of TrainingCornwall.com. It was a taster session to give an idea of what she does. I went along not really knowing what to expect but it was a brilliant couple of hours. Great fun and I learnt a lot. It turns out that I’m mostly blue but with a largish dose of red. Blue being cautious, precise, deliberate, questioning, formal and analytical, and red being competitive, demanding, determined, strong-willed, purposeful and a driver. Think it sums me up pretty well. The idea is that if you are more aware of your own traits and can recognise other people’s you can learn to communicate much better. Sounds good to me, will definitely be investigating this further.
Aside from courses and workshops the week was busy with client work, preparing quotes and meetings. I can’t believe how many maintenance jobs came in on Friday so am launching in to another busy week!
Off to another course
After a start to the week that was no less frantic than the end of last, I’m not sure whether I’m pleased to be out at a course all day today or wishing that I was able to stay in the office and keep on top of things. Last night I was seriously considering giving the course a miss but with my sister-in-law relying on me for a lift I would have felt a bit mean. So, I’m up bright and early this morning and getting myself ready for the drive over to Carnon Downs. I think a couple of the ladies from last week’s course are going to be there, so it will be good to catch up with them again.
Today’s course is ‘Management’ and it’s a mighty eight-day course. Luckily not eight days in a row but a more casual one day kind of every other week, apart from over Christmas when there’s a longer gap. Think it will be going until March, so it had better be good!
What I’m hoping to get out of it is to feel more confident in the day-to-day management of our business (and the high-level business development kind of management too for that matter). Something to boost my confidence in dealing with our clients and the freelancers we subcontract on some projects. And of course a few tips on project management wouldn’t go astray either!
Finger’s crossed it’s worth the day out of the office…
Not a great start to the week
I had the second instalment of the Managing Your Finances course today. I’m trying hard to think of something positive to say about it but unfortunately I think it may have been a wasted day. I can’t say that I learnt very much at all. That’s not to say that the course was badly taught – for what it was I think the tutor did a pretty good job and I got the feeling that some of the people on the course were picking up some good tips. However, it was at completely the wrong level for me. Perhaps I should have checked out more thoroughly what it was about before signing up for it – will definitely do that next time.
The problem was that it was all stuff I knew and carrying on the ‘basic numeracy’ theme from last week I didn’t have much problem doing the sums. I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t need to be taught how to fill out a cashflow forecast, I can figure that out for myself, what I would have found more useful was an overview of the tools/records that are useful when managing business finances so that I can feel more confident that I’ve got it all covered. Basic bookkeeping I’m fine at, but something about reports I could be generating to help me assess our finances would have been really useful.
I have to admit that I’m also feeling pretty grumpy about the day because we had no heating for half of it and lunch was a fiasco (one veggie sandwich between three vegetarians). Next course I go on I’m taking my own lunch, whether they reckon they’re providing it or not!
Not quite what I was expecting
I was on a course all day on Monday. It was ‘Managing Your Finances’ and what I (and the other course members) were expecting were some practical tips on managing finance in a business context – budgeting, forecasting, records you need to keep etc. I knew it wasn’t going to be a bookkeeping course but was expecting an overview of what’s involved with managing business finances.
But no, what the tutor had been briefed to give us was a course on basic numeracy. Hmm. The theory was that you needed the building blocks of basic numeracy to be able to manage your finances, which does make sense. However, I’ve always been pretty strong on maths so it seemed a bit too ‘basic’ for me. We started the day with a 50-question quiz starting with “8 + _ = 0″ (with a choice of answers!) and getting very slightly harder as it went along. Let’s just say that I established that I can add, subtract etc.
So, not quite what I was expecting, however the tutor soon picked up on the fact that we were after something a bit more businessy and is going to cover what we want to know next week. Maybe the course organisers need to be more careful about making sure the course description and the tutor’s brief actually agree.
Apart from not feeling like I was learning an awful lot it was a really fun day. The other people on the course were all lovely and there was a really good atmosphere. So, definitely not a wasted day. I’m quite looking forward to the next one.
Bureaucracy gone bonkers
I went to a seminar last night. It was on intellectual property and ecommerce law. Very useful stuff, if a bit dry and powerpointy. The most memorable thing about the evening though (apart from the crunchy chocolatey thing in the buffet) was the form filling.
It was a 2 hour seminar but preceded by 30 minutes of form filling. What’s that all about? Not the fault of the organisation that was running the seminar. It’s because they had got funding for the training so had all sorts of things to comply with. There were four forms and had to be explained step by step because you needed to know the right code to put in each box! It was painful to say the least.
Now who on earth dreamt that up? Is it somebody’s job to devise this kind of thing? I guess it must be. Do you think they’re amusing themselves by seeing how many different forms they can force innocent people to fill in?
