Improve Your Skills
Improve your skills. Along the same lines: choose a skill that
needs sharpening, and challenge yourself to get better at it. Whether that’s
computer programming, writing, working with Adobe in Design, or whatever.
Perfect your skills — you can use it to further your career, get a new job, or
become self-employed. Or just have the satisfaction of knowing you’re the best
you can be at that skill. So the key is to make sure you use a
method that follows the R.E.P.S. gauge:
R: Reaching and
Repeating
E: Engagement
P: Purposefulness
S: Strong, Speedy Feedback
Let's take a
brief look at each.
Reaching and Repeating: Practice should require you to operate at the edge of your
abilities. In short, you have to consistently reach and constantly repeat. Say
you're leading a training session. Should you:
1.
Call on one person, ask a question, and have him or her answer it, or
2. Pose the question first,
and then randomly choose someone to answer (and maybe even turn the exercise
into a game)?
The second is the best
approach, because everyone has to reach, every time--even if he or she isn't
called on. Call on John from accounting, and I know I don't have to answer the
question; I can sit back, check my email, and wait until you eventually call on
me. I don't have to reach but--maybe--once.
Always put yourself--or the
people you're training--in a position to reach, over and over again.
Engagement: Practice must command your attention and
make you feel emotionally invested in striving for a goal.Say you're trying to
perfect your slide transitions for a presentation. Should you:
1.
Run through the whole presentation 10 times, or
2. Try to hit each transition
perfectly, without mistakes, three presentations in a row?
Running through your
presentation 10 times in a row will feel like death; trying to be perfect three
times in a row turns the exercise into a game you care about.
Make sure the outcome of
every practice session is something you will care about: You'll try harder and
be more engaged, and you'll improve more rapidly.
Purposefulness: Practice must directly connect to
the skill you want to build. (Sounds obvious, but often what we practice has
little to do with what we need to accomplish.)Say you feel nervous and
intimidated when you have to speak to a group. Should you:
1.
Rehearse at home, alone, until you know your material inside out, or
2. Practice speaking to small
groups of people in less formal settings, like in a meeting?
Although solo rehearsing
certainly helps, the only way to perform well under the pressure of an audience
is to actually practice speaking to people. No amount of solo practice will
prepare you for the nerves you'll feel when every eye in the room is on you.
Strong, Speedy Feedback: Practice must provide an immediate
and consistent flow of accurate information about performance.Say you're
studying for a certification exam. You purchased a sample test guide. Should
you:
1.
Take a complete test and wait until the next day to see how you did, or
2. Complete a section and
immediately grade your answers to see where you went wrong (and right)?
Take the test in chunks.
Check your results right away. Immediate feedback is the best feedback; you'll
better connect the dots because you're in the flow. Waiting even a day for
feedback creates a mental distance and a lack of engagement that are really
hard to overcome--which means much of the time you spent trying to learn was
wasted.
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