February 2018

Time Management

I have the feeling I have my time pretty well managed. I feel like I have enough free time, can work on my hobbies when I need and spend enough time with friends and family.

Nevertheless, I am always open for new ways to improve myself, which was the reason I signed up for the course time management when I saw it on the Vanderlande academy website. This 16 hour training, spread out over three days gave some valuable new insights, but I’m also pleased to learn that I was on the right track.

It was also a good refresher, as there was a lot of overlap with the training effective influencing.

The main point I took from this training was educating your environment on your behavior. If you repeat a certain behavior, this is what people will expect from you in the future. If you cancel another meeting because someone planned a meeting over it, that person might not respect your other meetings in the future. But if you make clear this is not possible, that person will probably look for a free moment next time he/she wants to plan a meeting.

This is behavior I was already implementing, but in cases like this it is also good to be more conscience about your behavior, and see what effect it has on your environment.

Design Patterns

The past 3 day’s I have had a course in design patterns. Even though I already have quite some experience with design patterns, I decided to formalize my knowledge and use the course as a refresher.

I have to say, I found it quite useful. The first day was not very interesting as it was very basic. But day 2 and 3 went more in depth and were very interesting. I really left with the feeling that I learned something, and that I will better be able to apply this to my everyday work.