How to Use the Unexpected Downtime to Benefit Your Career

Yes, And

There are lots of articles published on how to use the unexpected downtime to benefit your career. And that’s great. But many of them are missing the mark. This article is the second in a series. The first one dealt with your emotional and mental well-being. This one delves into taking courses to put you in a position of strength after the isolation.

The next one will deal with how to analyze and synthesize the new information you are learning. I'm including links to articles I've written to get you started. Please read them to get the most of of this article.

How are you really doing during this time you’re forced to work at home? Your mental health is very important. There are a few ways you can use the unexpected downtime to benefit your career. I started writing this article before, but quickly realized that I had to address how social isolation is impacting you.

If you missed it, please read, “Hygge: Danish Practice Embodying Contentment, Coziness, and Well-Being to Help You during Isolation.” 

Now that I’ve talked about hygge and how to preserve your mental and emotional well-being, it’s time for me to talk about how to use the unexpected time to benefit your career and business. Since you don’t have to commute to work, you have some extra time on your hands. If you have young children at home, you could use part of the time to learn something together.

In the past couple of months, I’ve talked to several people about their career situation. Many of them are in jobs they don’t like and looking for a way out. A few think that they don't have any marketable skills. And some are simply stressed. If you’re in one of those groups, there are a few things that you can do while in isolation.

Have you read?

Hygge: Danish Practice Embodying Contentment, Coziness, and Well-Being to Help You during Isolation

Remote Work: How to Stand Out When You’re Forced to Work from Home

What I Know about Developing a Learning and Development Habit

In case you’re wondering what I know about using unexpected downtime to benefit your career. I’m ready to deal with that right now. I haven’t used downtime, but I’ve made time and invested it in my learning and development. I’ve made some mistakes, which you can learn from. My advice may be difficult for reluctant readers, or people who hate reading. However, I’ll try to make my recommendations as painless as possible.

Reading the World: Use the Unexpected Downtime to Benefit Your Career

I’m an avid reader. And I’ve made reading diverse books a part of my daily practice. When my mother died unexpectedly from a heart attack, my heart was shattered into tiny pieces. I needed to do something I loved. So I read books. I created a reading challenge for myself to read the world.

I read 80 books in four months written by authors born in 29 countries. One of the big things I learned is that you need to vary the level of difficulty of the books you read. And mix things up. That simply means reading diversely. But for the most part, it was an excellent experience. And it changed my worldview, giving me a broader perspective.

Why should you read the world? How will it help your career? Reading the world helps you to develop intercultural awareness. This is a skill that will serve you well now and in the future. Reading fiction written by authors from other cultures is one way to use the unexpected downtime to benefit your career.

Taking Courses to Learn and Understand: Use the Unexpected Downtime to Benefit Your Career

Years ago, I kept on reading that people with a liberal arts education were more creative. I decided to test the statement for myself. So I decided to invest the time to get a non degree liberal arts education. 

For close to a year, I was at my desk from 6:00 am to 8:30 am taking courses. I was taking courses that interested me. For instance, below are some of the courses that I took. Unfortunately, some of them are no longer available.

• Introduction to Visual Thinking, Berkeley
• Great Big Ideas, Open Culture
• History of Architecture
• SmARThistory 
• Creative Reading
• Creative Writing

Since 2013 when I first started taking courses, I’ve taken courses on problem solving, creativity, negotiation, emotional intelligence, service orientation, and communication. 

Reading to Learn and Understand: How to Use the Unexpected Downtime to Benefit Your Career

The World Economic Forum conducts research on the future of jobs. Based on the results of the study, the think tank recommends the skills you’ll need to thrive. The studies and the skills overlap. 

Based on the skills you need to thrive in 2020 and 2022, here’s the list I came up with.

1. Complex Problem Solving
2. Critical Thinking and Analysis
3. Creativity, Innovation, Ideation, Originality, and Initiative
4. People Management
5. Coordinating with Others
6. Emotional Intelligence
7. Judgment, Reasoning, Analytical Thinking, and Decision Making
8. Service Orientation
9. Negotiation
10. Cognitive Flexibility
11. Active Learning and Learning Strategies
12. Technology Design and Programming
13. Leadership and Social Influence
14. Systems Analysis and Evaluation

I’ve read several books to learn the skills. Here are some of the books that I’ve read so far. But I’d like to say that you will not learn the skills by simply reading books. Analyzing and synthesizing the information from the books you read is a big part of the process. In another blog post, I’ll write about an effective way for you to do that.

List of Books I Read to Develop Career Skills: Use the Unexpected Downtime to Benefit Your Career

1. Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure
2. How to Get Ideas
3. The MacGyver Secret: Connect to Your Inner MacGyver & Solve Anything
4. How to Get to Great Ideas: A system for smart, extraordinary thinking
5. A Technique for Producing Ideas
6. Problem Solving 101: A Simple Book for Smart People
7. Problem Solving: Solve Any Problem Like a Trained Consultant
8. The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking Concepts and Tools
9. Emotional Intelligence 2.0
10. Go Suck a Lemon: Strategies for Improving Your Emotional Intelligence
11. How to Sweet-Talk a Shark: Strategies and Stories from a Master Negotiator
12. Be Our Guest: Perfecting the Art of Customer Service
13. The Imagineering Process: Using the Disney Theme Park Design Process to Bring Your Creative Ideas to Life
14. The Wisdom of Walt: Leadership Lessons from the Happiest Place on Earth
15. To Pixar and Beyond: My Unlikely Journey with Steve Jobs to Make Entertainment History
16. Impulse Interrupted: Four Simple Steps to Improve Cognitive Flexibility
17. Decision Diagnosis: Seven Antidotes to Decision Procrastination
18. Learning How to Learn: How to Succeed in School Without Spending All Your Time Studying; A Guide for Kids and Teens
19. Teach Yourself How to Learn: Strategies You Can Use to Ace Any Course at Any Level
20. Teach Students How to Learn: Strategies You Can Incorporate Into Any Course to Improve Student Metacognition, Study Skills, and Motivation
21. Lifetime Learner’s Guide to Reading and Learning
22. The Thinker's Guide for Students on How to Study & Learn a Discipline
23. Learn Like Einstein: Memorize More, Read Faster, Focus Better, and Master Anything With Ease
24. Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career
25. Yes, And: How Improvisation Reverses “No, But” Thinking and Improves Creativity and Collaboration–Lessons from The Second City

So you can spend some of the unexpected downtime to benefit your career. Remote Work: How to Stand Out When You’re Forced to Work from Home will explain to you how to choose your courses. This is important.

If you'd like a process  to learn the key skills that's already been created, Join the Performance Accelerator Plan Today, click the link to buy now! Start learning the skills the World Economic Forum says you need to thrive in 2020 to 2022. Use this unexpected downtime to benefit your career.

Steps to Making Learning a Lifelong Activity

You may be forced to work from home and have some downtime on your hands. But it’s the perfect time to make learning a lifelong activity. If you make and plan and implement it, you can prepare yourself to be at the front of the curve. Things will never be the same again. You have information on where to find courses to take. And I've listed some of the books I've read to learn the skills you need to succeed.

Based on my experiences taking courses and reading books to learn key career building skills, I learned several lessons. You can learn from my mistakes so that you don't make them.

1. Set learning goals: Initially, this step was not as well thought out as it should have been, so I had to drop courses and choose others. Some of the courses weren’t very good. Therefore, I didn’t want to waste my time completing them.
2. Anticipate the challenges you will face. Devise a way to resolve or get around them. I wanted to take an anthropology course, so I chose one taught by a top professor in India. The problem was the course would have been twice as long because it was taught in both English and Urdu. So the lecturer spoke in Urdu, then repeated what he said in English. This technique would have been amazing if I wanted to learn Urdu. I dropped the course after the first lecture.

3. Decide how much time you can realistically commit to learning. Micro-learning is big these days. I decided that I would dedicate between 6:00 am to 8:30 am or 9:00 am, Monday to Friday to pursue my liberal arts education. Although I was committed, I had a difficult time focusing on any video that was more than an hour-long. I slogged through the two-hour video courses, but it was mentally taxing.

4. Schedule the time to make it a habit. I could devote the first two-and-a-half to three hours each day to learn, but not everyone can do that. Do what works for you. Thirty minutes a day committed to learning is better than no time.
5. Determine your learning style. Are you visual (seeing and reading), auditory (listening and speaking), or kinesthetic (touching and doing)? I am visual, but I do not like watching long videos. After an hour of viewing I get very antsy. On the other hand, videos have to be at least 15 minutes for me to sink my teeth in.
6. Choose your courses based on learning goals. My learning goals were not very strong, so I had to change some of my courses and the direction I was going.
7. Identify a buddy to take courses with. For three courses, I had a buddy. And it was fantastic to have someone to discuss the content. Between the two of us, we generated many new ideas.
8. Teach what you learn. I use my blog to teach what I learn.

Make Completing Your Courses Easier: Use the Unexpected Downtime to Benefit Your Career

For me, I decided which courses I would study each week. I thought back to when I was in college and university and used part of that structure. Several of the courses I did were semester length. But I completed them sooner because I was at my computer every morning studying. Do what works for you. Don’t follow others. I'm only giving you suggestions.

Please read, “Remote Work: How to Stand Out When You’re Forced to Work from Home”. You’ll learn about Symbaloo, a personal knowledge management tool.

Once you've created your personal learning environment on Symbaloo, what next? You have done the easy part, now you have to commit to completing your courses and reading the books to develop career building skills. Use time management tools such as Workflowy to map the tasks you have to perform to achieve your learning goals. 

After you have mapped out your tasks using the time management tools, schedule them into your calendar to ensure that you complete them. To take a class, click on the link from your Symbaloo dashboard.

For me, I’m going to start more structured learning again. This week I’ll map out courses to take. I’ve primarily been learning by reading books. And I’ve watched some lectures.

Summary: How to Use the Unexpected Downtime to Benefit Your Career

1. Take care of your mental and emotional wellbeing so you have the space to learn new skills. Read Hygge: Danish Practice Embodying Contentment, Coziness, and Well-Being to Help You during Isolation.
2. Read Remote Work: How to Stand Out When You’re Forced to Work from Home to learn where to find courses to take and how to set a personal learning environment.
3. Choose the courses to take. Make sure some of them will teach you career building skills. Some courses should be fun to lift your spirit.
4. Schedule your learning time. A suggestion is to use the same time you'd be commuting.
5. Start taking the courses.
6. Choose some books to start learning the skills. You could select some from the list of books to build skills above.
7. It's important to read diverse books. Books from different fields. This will prove helpful when you learn how to analyze and synthesize the information that you're learning.

How Avil Can Help You!

I invite you to Join the Performance Accelerator Plan that walks you through the process and more. You’ll be reading books to build skills and develop intercultural awareness.  Get more reading and learning tips here. And I also invite you to join Read a Book, Solve a Problem Facebook Group. I’m building a tribe of people who want to use the knowledge gained from books to tackle some of the world’s biggest problems.

In December 2020, I published two books on Amazon. I would greatly appreciate your support if you bought my two short e-books Read 30 Books in 30 Days Like Francis Bacon and Performance Accelerator Plan: Guide to Learning and Mastering Key Skills for the Future.

Read 30 Books in 30 Days Like Francis Bacon is not about speed reading. It’s about approaching every book differently and reading only the sections that align with your purpose.

The Performance Accelerator Plan book is a stripped-down version of the paid reading challenge of the same name. Obviously, you won’t get all the resources that come with the program that I sell on my website. But if you are a self-directed learner, it will help you tremendously.

If you click on one of the links below and buy any of the books, Amazon will pay me a small commission.