It’s as Easy as 1,2,3…
In this article, I would like to share with you ‘3 Accelerated Learning Tools that will help you learn more, faster, and retain more’. In our busy schedules, you don’t have the time to waste spending one day on a training course without getting the very most from that day.
There are many Accelerated Learning Techniques. I will share those learning techniques that worked for me and the many people that I have trained and coached. Some tools are a ‘quick grab’, others will need further work on your part. Some you could probably choose to park until you have locked away one or two.
Learning Tool #1
What Day-to-Day Problems do you Want to Solve?
You might say that this is obvious and I would agree, yet so many people have not put any thought into what they want to get from the time they are investing in being trained. Be specific. For example, if you taking part in Time Management Training, your thinking needs to have progressed beyond the objective of ‘improve my time management’. Because to have saved 1 minute in the next 12 months would have achieved your objective, yet you have spent 8 hours being trained. Therefore the equation is in deficit and at the very minimum if you are spending 8 hours being trained then you want that amount of time back in the next 3 months.
Take 20 minutes to write down the top 3 day-to-day problems that you have with your time management. For examples; ‘My inbox is out of control with over 250 emails per day I spend forever in my inbox’, or ‘At least once per week I’d like to go home on time’, or ‘Our meetings always run over, have no agenda, and no real purpose’. These are your real day-to-day problems. They are your reasons to invest your time being trained so that you get the solutions that you need.
Learning Tool #2
“The Best Way to Ride a Horse is the Way That it is Going!”
You may have heard about ‘Learning Styles’ and such terms as ‘Reflector, Activist, Pragmatist and Theorist’. These are labels given to the way that people prefer to learn. Knowing your individual learning style will take a little effort. Then you will find that by understanding your learning style you’ll better understand why it is that when you are learning you prefer to ‘get up and have a go’, or ‘sit back and have a think’, and so on.
Let’s start by understanding your learning style. My preferred company for doing this is Honey and Mumford because I regard these guys as the most accurate. We use their 80 question questionnaire in our training which costs c£25 from Honey and Mumford. The 40 question questionnaire is sufficient to begin with and is available as a pdf to download. Write your answers on to know which is your preferred learning style.
Once you have identified your learning style you’ll feel more comfortable in learning situations. For example saying, ‘I’m a Reflector, therefore I don’t want to get up and have a go’. Or equally, ‘As an Activist, I really need to be engaged with this actively, otherwise, I get bored very quickly’.
Learning Tool #3
Throw the Deck Away Because You’ll Never Look at it Again
How many people have attended a great training day, received a deck of slides. Then left the day with renewed enthusiasm to be a better manager, salesperson, team player, etc. Only to have found the slides a year later in an office ‘tidy-up’, to then throw them out? Most people, including myself, have committed this crime. A crime because I invested 1 day from my busy schedule into training, only to find that I had put on hold most of my learning for ‘When I get to those slides and review them, I’ll be awesome’ – Only for it to never happen.
There is a better way, ‘Keepers’. Keepers is all about taking away the golden nuggets that resonated with you because your golden nuggets will be a different group of golden nuggets to the guy next to you. His golden nuggets different to the guy next to him. As you begin your training take a page in your book, or a new piece of paper, and write ‘Keepers’ at the top, plus the training, e.g.’ Time Management’, and the date. Then make 3 columns and split the page into 10 rows covering the entire page. As you progress through your training capture any significant piece of learning that resonates with you, for example ‘Learning styles’.
How to Use Keepers
In the first column headed ‘Nugget’ write ‘Learning Styles’ and a few bullet points that you wish to remember. Draw a piece about learning styles, in the second column headed ‘Image’, that helps you remember what learning styles are about. In the third column headed ‘Action’ write what you are going to do next with that golden nugget of ‘Learning styles’, e.g. Identify my learning style.
When you leave your training you will have one or two pages of golden nuggets or ‘Keepers’. These have resonated with you, were captured by you. So they have meaning and you can easily refer back to one or two pages very quickly to recollect the training, rather than a deck of slides.
