Year-end reflections on learning
Close to the year’s end, I have been reflecting on how the past year has been from a learning standpoint.
Yes, Covid disrupted everything. We couldn’t go out, nor could we meet our families and teams as often as we wanted to. However, I cannot deny some of the positives that came out of the past year. Especially, when it comes to learning.
The past year has been strangely and unexpectedly productive as I managed to up my game on learning. Thanks to all the good tools and teachers who have shifted online during this year of remote work. As a result, I got the opportunity to learn from the best while sitting at my home in Sweden. The following courses stood out for me this year:
Aswath Damodaran, Professor of Finance at the Stern School of Business at New York University, has made his Corporate Finance and Valuation courses available online (link, and here’s a great primer to the upcoming classes). I don’t know how he managed to convince the school to do so, but I am so grateful that these resources are available online now. During the pandemic, Damodaran conducted his sessions over Zoom and these classes included live student interactions (which I believe are as important as the content itself). I just wrapped up the Corporate Finance lessons and will now kick off the valuation ones. I found these courses a good revision of the concepts I had learnt in business school many years back. Of course, when you are listening to these courses by yourself, you cannot become a part of a team to tackle a project together and that will remain a challenge unless you formally enrol in the course.
Over the weekends, I worked with Mira Swarup on improving my communication. No, not the oral or written communication, not accent training either. These sessions were focused on how to communicate consciously by becoming aware of our needs and feelings. This way of communicating was new to me and brought in a new awareness which I believe will enhance how I interact. Mira is based in India, and again, given the pandemic she started coaching online. That’s yet another benefit that I believe the pandemic has brought – you can get access to excellent coaches anywhere in the world. Though I joined her group coaching program, Mira has almost become my communication mentor and I take her advice when dealing with difficult challenges that require me to make a conscious effort to communicate better.
Above were some success stories. I can also add a few areas that didn’t work that well
For instance, I tried to do meditation by joining online classes. Usually, I do meditation courses twice or thrice a year and do them at retreats where I don’t have access to my devices and technologies. This year, I tried the online version with mixed success. On the positive side, I didn’t have to travel and that made these courses easier to enrol in and cheaper. However, I found it challenging to cut off from technology completely as, at the end of the day, you are accessing these courses via computer. The discipline to meditate was challenged as a result.
In addition, physical training is obviously nearly impossible to replicate via distant coaching. That was one area where I continued meeting my trainer face to face in Sweden. Though I could have accessed a nutritionist online, there is no replacement to a trainer who can help you improve your technique in a real-world setting.
I also tried to learn how to paint better by working with a painter-coach online. Over multiple weekends, over video, the coach tried to hone my drawing skills. However, it was a frustrating experience. Not because of the coach — who’s an excellent teacher — or because of the technology — there were multiple cameras that the coach used so that I can follow his work closely — but because it was nearly impossible to teach brush strokes over a video call.
My not-so-surprising conclusion was that skills that require softer skills and interpretation are easier to master online, while those involving physical techniques will continue to require human presence. We should therefore expect a hybrid learning model in the future based on what skills we would like to incorporate. In brief, physical trainers will remain bound to the gyms while soft skill trainers will find new audience from all over the globe.
How was your learning during the past year? Did you find some interesting courses that you would recommend?
