I was listening to a podcast recently that presented some fascinating insights about how best to learn. The research that was presented is applicable to students, to workers tackling new tasks, to parents supporting kids and to coaches/trainers. In a world with a vast amount of information at our fingertips, (or at the sound of our voice – “Alexa who won the Stanley Cup in 1967?), what you know no longer distinguishes you from the crowd. What makes you invaluable to your employer (or your client) is if you know how to find information and if you can learn from and integrate new information.

Here are the top 5 tips about learning that resonated with me:

1. The bigger the error you make in the initial stage of learning the more you learn and the better it will stay with you.
2. You have to engage in active learning – including writing out and reviewing flashcards, repeating new information back in your own words or teach the information to someone else. Highlighting passages, underlining concepts and re-reading the same material does not help you learn.
3. Learning needs to be spread out over time. Cramming for an exam or taking an intensive training will provide learning but if that learning is spread over a longer period it is integrated, understood and retained much more. This supports the research that you need to engage with a new idea 3 times before it is optimized as learning.
4. You have to balance social support with social pressure in learning. This is the balance of people who are cheering you on as you take on a new learning curve and the people who are watching to see if you are going to be successful and who you want to prove yourself to.
5. Social diversity in your world, including friendships, interests and media/information exposure counters our biases and challenges our ideas in a way that optimizes and solidifies our learning.

The interview with Ulrich Boser was on a People and Projects podcast. Ulrich Boser is the author of Learn Better: Mastering the Skills for Success in Life, Business, and School, or, How to Become an Expert in Just About Anything.

There are 168 hours in a week. If you assume you sleep 8 hours a day and you work 8 hours a day then you have8 hours each day – 56 hours each week to fit in the rest of your life. Fifty-six hours to not only complete the maintenance of daily life – cooking, cleaning, laundry, and dishes but also to take care of your body, mind, and spirit as well as nurture import relationships and pursue your passions.

Are you spending this most valuable gift consciously? Wisely? Sustainably?

I think most people (myself included) are unaware of how much of the 56 hours slip away without a thought and without a significant payback. Like the $30/week you spend at the coffee shop – a couple of bucks at a time your 56 hours get whittled away in small imperceptible increments.

The only way to truly know how you spend your time is to do a study for a week – by logging how your time is spent. I already know that my time equivalent of the coffee shop budget breaker is my phone and my habit of surfing news and social media sites. Perhaps by being more conscious of the 56 hours available to me will help me shift my activities away from the time wasters that are not adding value to my world.

I have been asked at least a dozen times in my career what I wanted to do next or what role I had my sights on. I must confess I HATE that question! In my 30 year career, there has never been a title or a box on an organization chart that I said: “yeah that’s what I want to be!” Never!

Several years ago I invested a great deal of time, energy and angst to develop a personal mission statement. Part of doing that work helped me develop an evaluation tool for myself when I am contemplating a new opportunity. I use three lenses as I look at any new role.

1. Will I be able to do good work that makes a difference?
2. Will I have an opportunity to learn?
3. Will I be working with great people?

I have been blessed over the years to have had some great opportunities in my career and as long as I have been using these questions they have never steered me wrong.

I am very pleased to announce my new PMP designation!

The Toad and I have a favourite pizza place right in our own neighbourhood. For those who are not aware Toad is an absolute pizza monster! He loves pizza, could eat it every day and can consume almost his body weight in pizza when he does have it.

Whenever we call for delivery they always provide a timeframe to expect the pizza in – usually 35-45 minutes but they consistently meet or exceed their promise and the pizza always arrives piping hot. In the 8 years, we have lived here I think there may have been 2 occasions that they missed their projected window.  If you think about it this accomplishment has occurred in an industry where the staff is young and inexperienced and in which there is extremely high turnover.

The owner of the pizza place is clearly operating from a culture in which quality food and quality service are the rule and not the exception. What a great learning opportunity for the young people who are taught this so early in their career as it is a value set that will set them apart from others and serve them well for the rest of their lives.

I am in the final weeks of studying for an upcoming certification exam. I have followed the study tips that have been shared by those who have gone before …. Read the prep books, take courses, make/use flashcards and do lots of practice questions.

This week I could feel the energy for studying leave me. All the material felt repetitive and stale.  So I did what is now second nature to many of us – I googled it! I found a treasure trove of new study resources – videos explaining specific topics in great depth, new formats for practice questions and even a skill testing app for my phone! 

As I get down to the wire I am using every moment I can to review content. My books go to Toad’s batting practice, the app is used while waiting in line at the coffee shop and the flashcards are perfect while I make dinner or help with homework.

Today, the availability of ways to learn and study – whether for personal interest or professional development is limitless. When I was Toad’s age my grandparents bought my sister and me two sets of Encyclopedia Britannica – one youth set and one adult set. Toad’s generation knows nothing but real- time information at the touch of a button. The challenge of his generation will be to media literate enough to critically evaluate the sources of the data they are using.

“Notice the small things. The rewards are inversely proportional.” Liz Vassey

Do you think someone can be under-stimulated and over-stimulated at the same time? This was the question I pondered this morning as I paddled alone on the lake just before dawn.

When I paddle I often have music playing – not loud enough to disturb anyone on shore but loud enough to keep me company. Today I was so eager to get out on the water before the sun came up that I forgot to put my music on. As I started to paddle I thought I would miss the music and it would be “too quiet” without it. What I learned is that dawn on the lake is not quiet at all!

I paid closer attention to my environment as I paddled and I could hear the song of several different types of birds. I could hear the wooden docks creak against their cradles and I could discern that my paddle made different kerplunk noises in the water depending on my speed or the angle my blade hit the water. There were sounds of farmers working in the nearby orchard and a motorcycle going down the road. There was a ting of the ropes hitting the mast of a sailboat as it bobbed in the small waves and the sploosh of the fish that jumped just a few feet ahead of me.

Once I realized there were so many sounds in my environment that I had not fully appreciated before I broadened my frame and realized there were a million visual inputs I have also not paid close enough attention to – the ripple patterns of the water that constantly change, the different colours of the sky as the sun starts to emerge from behind the mountain, and the shape and movement of a tree branch floating in the water.

The realization made me wonder what small or special details I have been overlooking in my work and my home environment……. Time to get out of my head a little more! I feel some experiments coming on!

If I could work on any project which would I choose??????

I was thinking about projects I would love to be part of – sort of a project bucket list if you will. (Yes I am a nerd). My thoughts went to projects with big impacts or in exciting locations. They also went to projects as legacies or that impact a lot of people.

I decided there were too many to just make a list so I decided to categorize the bucket list. (Yes I am a nerd). Below are the “winners” in each of my chosen categories.

Large Transportation Project: Airport Expansion

Large Infrastructure Project: Subway System

Information Technology: Launch of artificial intelligence technology in a care setting like a hospital or seniors care facility

Special Event: NHL season

Exciting Location: Galapagos Islands (but not sure there is a need for any projects there)

Historical: Building the Canadian National Railway

Humanitarian: building a school or hospital in Aleppo (or another place that has been devastated by conflict)

The great benefit of being a project manager – particularly as a generalist – is that the possibilities are endless. I really enjoy the learning involved in all projects as well as the satisfaction of delivering something that your customer is happy with.

Below are 10 random facts - both personal and professional - about Tree Toad.

Professional

When I started my career I wanted to be the Cruise Director on the Love Boat (or similar cruise ship). My first post-secondary focus was Recreation Therapy.

I have worked in health-related fields my entire career – not for profit, for profit and the public sector.

I earned my MBA at Queen’s University. On a not so professional note, I had a Q shaved in my head as part of a dare.

I am a certified Myers Briggs Type practitioner. For those familiar with the MBTI methodology I am an ISTJ.

Being a generalist in my career is one of the few conscious career planning choices I have ever made.

Personal

Tree Toad is named after my son whose nickname is Toadie.

I am a hunt-and-peck typist and there are several words that I cannot type correctly the first time – change, initiative, efficient.

I laugh uncontrollably every single time Toad wiggles his ears.

I love lists and schedules – my personal life includes lists of groceries and weekend chores and schedules and project plans for work around the house.

Toadie has two stuffies I had when I was a kid – Cheesie (a big pink mouse) and Bartholomew (an oversized teddy bear).

I know I have shared before that I have a low-risk tolerance generally. This was brought home to me the other day while out on my paddleboard. It was a sunny and fairly warm spring afternoon - about 16 degrees. The water temperature, however, is barely 7 degrees. I was out on the lake in my neoprene wetsuit, boots, and gloves when another paddler crossed my path. She was wearing water shoes, yoga pants, a long sleeve shirt and a huge sunhat with sunglasses. I made a comment about the risk of falling in. Her response was  - “ it’s ok I am staying close to shore.”

As I continued paddling I pondered her logic. To me it didn’t matter if you were close to shore or not, if you go overboard you are going to get fully submerges in 7-degree water for at least a few minutes while you drag yourself and your gear back to shore or pull yourself back up onto the board. Either way, you would then be soaking wet and would be who knows how far away from getting back to where you put in. That risk made absolutely no sense to me. I then turned my attention to the gear she had on that I did not – a huge sunhat protecting her face and neck from the sun. (I am guessing she probably had sunscreen on too!) That kind of protection never even crossed my mind.

It was clear our evaluation of risk and its probability and impact were very apart on the spectrum. It reminded me that the value of working with a team is the richness those varied perspectives bring.