Part 6: Prioritising your personal development

Wellbeing at work comprises so many aspects – your environment, enjoying a healthy life-work balance, recognising when to take a break and much more. But one of the most intrinsically effective areas to consider is your own personal development. Being curious, and staying curious, is incredibly good for us, at every stage of our lives.

Any form of personal development is positive – bolstering feelings of accomplishment, satisfaction and self-esteem. You can embark on a programme of growth through all kinds of routes: from short, standalone sessions; to longer term qualifications. However you choose to manage your own personal development, you will benefit from the improved knowledge, tools, understanding, insight - and more - that it will inevitably deliver. You have been warned, the dopamine hit we all get from successful learning can be quite addictive!

Whilst we’re not specifically referring to professional development and CPD here, personal development can affect our contribution at work. When we have a deeper understanding, depending on the subject matter, it can promote empathy, allow us to feel more in control, and give us the confidence to contribute more effectively and naturally.

Formal learning and training are great ways to approach personal development, especially as there are all kinds of courses of different durations, covering a multitude of topics. Some excellent places to look for soft subject, non-technical learning are:

The ICAEW is very good at providing courses for all kinds of topics (not just professional and technical content) and, for members, its extensive resources are worth investigating if there’s something you’d like to know more about.

The Open University’s Open Learn is multi-award-winning and has a whole host of free courses available covering everything from ‘Developing Career Resilience’ to ‘Outdoor Therapy’. And the courses aren’t just vocational, there is so much choice including Education and Development; Digital and Computing; and Society and Politics and Law - to name just a few.

Action for Happiness takes a completely different aspect of personal development by helping you to explore things about yourself. It prioritises happiness and kindness in all we do – at work, home and within our communities. Its patron is (rather impressively) the Dalai Lama.

FutureLearn isn’t free as the courses are more formal - but it does offer a year long, unlimited subscription model covering a huge base of courses. It offers short, online courses right the way through to MBA degrees.

Less formal options - such as webinars, professional journals and good quality networking groups - are also valuable.Shadowing a colleague in the workplace will allow you to see how someone else approaches their workday. This provides a fresh perspective which can be really interesting and often inspiring. A more casual sharing of news, information and experiences all contributes to a sense of growth.

Choose what is right for you, what might complement the kind of work you do and what you’d like to explore - and then create a plan of action. You might choose to have a structured schedule for the year ahead. Or you may prefer a less formal approach – trying things out, signing up for things when you see them or undertaking an immediate tutorial when you’re faced with a technical challenge for example. However you approach it, make sure you can see the value that you are likely to get from it. This will motivate you to do more. You might like to keep a log of your journey so you can recall all your training – either as a personal reminder or for your CV.

As we’ve said, personal development doesn’t have to directly benefit you in the workplace. You might want to learn First Aid, AI or advanced driving – nothing is off limits if it gives you a sense of achievement and feeling of growth.

On a last note, why not think about how you can share your skills? Could you set up something at work where you can knowledge-share with colleagues? Being generous with your expertise, either formally or informally, goes a long way in building good relationships and reinforces what you know.