Know What Kind of Learner You Are? It Matters…
If knowledge is power then understanding your learning style can be of great benefit for professional growth.
Do you dislike frequent meetings?
Do office politics make you feel dirty?
Do you like to use a highlighter when reviewing documents?
Are names hard for you to remember?
Are you a Google-search snob?
Do you shy away from video conference calls?
Do you like to sit at the front of the room during training sessions?
The answers to these questions will reveal your dominant learning style. And now for the asterisk: **There is no empirical evidence that shows we have specific, fixed learning styles. Before you stop reading, there are some important things that ARE proven scientifically, however:
What Science Knows About Learning
- Learners are different from one another
- These difference affect performance
- People vary in their capacity to learn certain content
- Life experience influences willingness to learn
- Companies/leaders (and you) will excel as they (you) take this into consideration
Let’s face it, everyone would like to make more money in their career, have a thriving and value driven business (if you are a business owner), be recognized verbally or financially for professional contributions and feel a sense of accomplishment when leaving work each day. Because we follow Christ, we perhaps long for meaning and impact in a spiritual way even more.
And yet their seems to be enough frustration in a work day to, at the very least, keep us on our positive-thinking toes or, at worst, instill a sense of daily career dread.
Knowing what kind of learner you are can make a significant difference for your overall attitude not to mention the way you interact with fellow employees, your staff or your management team. It can give you self-insight to develop strategies that navigate insecurity as well as promote humility.
Proverbs 18:15 The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge, for the ears of the wise seek it out.
How to Find Your Learning Style
So how can you find out what kind of learning best suits your style? There are a couple of useful websites here below. One is an actual assessment (Edutopia) and the other (Discovery.com) more of an informational quiz. Each takes only about five minutes to complete.
[Click on the logo to go to each assessment.]
Once you are done with the websites, here are a few self-coaching questions you can ask:
- What transformation can I make with this new knowledge in hand?
- What learning technique can I do more of to improve my knowledge retention?
- What learning style has not been working for me that I can now alter?
- How can this knowledge help me better interact with my colleagues during meetings, on the phone, when asking questions, when listening?
Why Know Your Learning Style?
As Christians let’s look at the workplace as one giant classroom where we can be the light that shines for Christ. With the classroom metaphor in mind, we can shine in the way we pay attention in class, interact with the other students, follow the rules, perform during tests and support our teachers.
We can actually have school spirit (egad!) We can make a difference in the lives of our fellow employees when we work as if working for the Lord. When we show genuine enthusiasm and a desire to learn we emulate the virtues of Christ and provide a new way for the world to experience Christianity.
Shawn Sommerkamp is a motivational speaker and Executive Coach with 20+ years of Fortune 100 leadership experience. He founded Motivationeer™ to coach Christian professionals how to bring the power of Christ’s word, as the foundation of career success, into corporate and small business America.
