Learning new skills is essential to growing your business. To stay competitive, you and your team need to be constantly learning new skills, strategies, and techniques to help your business grow and get ahead.
By having a team that is committed to continuous learning, you’re equipping your business with the ability to learn new things that will help expand your business into new areas and keep your business a cut above the competition.
“Those people who develop the ability to continuously acquire new and better forms of knowledge that they can apply to their work and to their lives will be the movers and shakers in our society for the indefinite future.”
― Brian Tracy
We strongly believe in continuous professional learning which is why we’ve made it an important part of our company culture.
Here is a list of some of the things we do to encourage continued professional learning across our team.
Share new knowledge with each other
We encourage team members to explore and educate themselves about topics not only related to their role in our company, but also topics they’re interested in outside of work.
This approach to continued learning comes from the top. Our CEO, AJ, is always reading and researching to stay on top of new ideas and strategies both in our industry and to stay on top of trends in small business. We know this because we often get forwarded emails to the entire company about interesting topics that he’s read about that he encourages us to read.
As an owner of a company, when you share knowledge you’ve learned about, it encourages your team to do so also and promotes a positive, pro-learning environment. It sends the message to everyone in your team that you’re committed to learning new things and they can too.
When anyone in the company reads something interesting, we don’t hesitate to share with with each other. The simple act of forwarding a blog post or emailing a report shows you care about learning and want your team to benefit.
Take online training courses
Udemy is a knowledge-thirsty person’s destination for online training courses. We pay a subscription for Udemy for the company so anyone can login and take as many online courses as they want. We can learn about things related to our role at Marketcircle, or other topics that we may be personally interested in as hobbies or just out of curiosity.
This gives our team the opportunity to learn about new topics and trends in marketing, branding, social media, web development, and much more. By giving our company access to this, we’re lowering the barrier to learning by making it accessible to anyone interested.
“Not every company allocates resources to foster growth in their employees’ development. I’m thrilled that Marketcircle sees the value in fostering a pro-learning culture. There is always something to be learned, and you should never stop learning. Having the company encourage you to continue your growth not only helps us as a team, but it also helps each individual. The more knowledge we gain, the greater ability to expand our potential both personally and professionally.”
–Ray, Customer Support Team
Lead a book club
A few months ago we started a book club called The Learning Curve dedicated to learning, self-development, productivity, and growth. Each month we read a new book and meet to discuss what we’ve learned. We share ideas for how we can implement our new-found knowledge into our work and everyday lives.
Here is a list of the books we’ve read so far:
The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande
So far the book club has been very well received by the team. We’ve gotten great feedback from team members that have joined, learned new techniques to help us be more productive, and have had some excellent ideas stem from our discussions. It’s even inspired a few blog posts.
Attend Conferences & Events
One great way to learn is by example. Hearing how other businesses owners have made mistakes and overcame hurdles is not only inspiring but also educational. We attend business conferences and events to stay up-to-date on industry trends and learn from others that have experienced similar pain points in growing a business.
Conferences and events also teach us about new strategies and are a great opportunity for networking.
Listen to Podcasts
Podcasts are a great way to learn about all sorts of different topics. Many of our team members have favourite podcasts that we regularly tune into. On top of learning things individually, we often share ideas, concepts, and techniques we’ve learned from podcasts with others in our team.
This has triggered new ways in how we’ve organized our team, changed internal workflows, and even sparked ideas for marketing campaigns.
Work with a Business Consultant
It’s easy to get tunnel vision as an entrepreneur or business owner and get caught in the weeds of the day-to-day things involved in running the business. To grow, you need to be focused on strategy and outlining plans for the future.
A business consultant can help bring a fresh perspective to your business. They can help highlight areas for opportunity and growth, while addressing problem areas and suggest ways to improve.
We work with a business consultant that has helped us implement The Rockefeller Habits and develop effective growth strategies. This allows us to look at the business from a high-level perspective so we can make better decisions that move us forward.
Encourage Exploration
We encourage our team to keep an open mind and ear to what’s out there. Team members are welcome to explore tools and services that can improve internal processes and make us more efficient.
We encourage team members to test out new apps that can help our team and have an open door policy to making suggestions for how we can improve. We rely on each other to explore, research, and share what we’ve learned.
These are a few of the ways we’ve fostered a culture that’s pro-learning. We hope you find this helpful in growing your business and would love to hear what ways you’ve promoted learning and growth in your business. Want to share your thoughts? Connect with us on Twitter and Facebook.
