Are you constantly building your skill set?

A couple of weeks ago, I started writing down things that I wanted to achieve in the next coming years. As part of my job at Walker Sands, I work pretty closely with our development team. They know HTML like it’s their first language, and it’s something I have always wanted to know how to do on my own. After some hunting down, I found a class for Basic HTML/CSS taught by Chicago Women Developers. The class is great and I am so glad I took it. I’m now looking into taking advanced classes.

In your career, professional growth and development is essential. The continuous quest to learn more and keep pushing yourself farther than you have in the past will help you to stand out from the crowd. Having the desire to strive to learn more and do better every day has taught me that I’m definitely in the right career for me.

It’s hard to tell what specifically each person needs to do to build their own skill set – you are on your own with that one, friends. But what I can do is tell you what I do to keep learning and growing daily in my professional career:

• Read what people who inspire you are writing. I am a firm believer in the fact that you learn best when surrounded by people who push you to do better. Jackie and I compiled a list earlier this year of sites we love that teach us and help us in our professional careers. It’s still a go to source for us. Check out the full list here.
• Take breaks when you need to. Just like Jackie and I did on here, sometimes you need to take breaks to refresh and learn what you really want. It’s okay not study/work on something related to your field every single day. Sometimes you learn more by building a skill outside of your industry. You’ll be surprised by what learning guitar can teach you about patience (this is very true for me right now).
• Try it yourself before you ask for help. The best way to learn something new is to try it on your own. With the HTML classes I am in, I have visited sites like w3schools and Online HTML Editor to find answers to my questions before asking someone who knows. You’ll learn it much faster if you are the one hunting for the answers.