What was the last webinar you participated in? What was the last podcast you listened to? What was the last book or in-depth article you read to learn something new? The bigger question is do you have a continuous learning plan?
One of the things I love about working in healthcare and technology is the pace of change and that there is always something new to learn. But that is also one of the challenges. So how do we keep up?
Don’t doubt that having a continuous learning plan is important for your career. The most recent This Week in Health IT podcast was interviews with six CIOs. Bill Russell asked them each the same five questions. The last question was what did they wish they knew or had done before they started their current role. A theme in the answers was around staff development – needing their staff to develop new skills and developing their leadership teams.
There are many different options and formats for ongoing training and learning to consider. You may prefer reading or webinars or podcasts or classroom training. Most likely you need a combination of all.
A few observations and tips from my own experience:
Reading: What used to be a stack of publications piled up in my office to read has now become a lot of bookmarked articles to read online. I read a lot of articles each week and add more to my list, even though I may not get to them. Having a few good “go to” resources and knowing your key areas of interest help manage and filter out the noise.
Webinars: You could spend several hours a week just doing webinars. Focus on a few “go to” resources and register for the ones that are most relevant to what you need to know. Or register for something new that you want to learn about. Once you put it on your calendar, consider it like any meeting. Continue reading