I’m an advocate of remote work because it’s had a transformative impact on my life, especially since I became a father, especially since I’ve had my, had my kids, and my family has grown. It’s something that’s I’ve leaned on in in terms of helping to develop my career and helping to stay close to my family while I do that, but of course, you know it hasn’t always been a good experience for me. In this episode I share how I’ve developed my career as a remote professional.
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Hey, it's Alex from Remote Work Life Podcast. I hope this finds you well, wherever you may be in the world, and today, on today's tip of the day, I want to talk about embracing personal development as a way to improve your remote work, career and well-being. Now, I have chosen to create these bite-sized episodes because I just want to share, I guess, my own experience. When I talk about my own experience, I mean things that I've personally, uh, experienced myself, or things that, um, I have learned that my, my colleagues and my, my friends who work remotely have experienced themselves. Uh, and I think this experience, this learning, can if I I feel as though, if I pass it on, I can hopefully help you with your journey, along your journey to improve and to learn and develop whilst working remotely. I'm passionate, I'm an advocate of remote work because it's had a transformative impact on my life, especially since I became a father, especially since I've had my, had my kids, and my family has grown. It's something that's I've leaned on in in terms of, um, helping to develop my career and helping to stay also so close to my family while I do that, but of course, you know it hasn't always been, hasn't always been a good experience for me in the early days, when I first started working on a remote basis. I would just look at work as work and just leave it at that, and I wouldn't necessarily focus on things like embracing my personal development as a way of improving my remote career and well-being. In fact, my, my whole, I guess my whole goal was to just get work done and do things day by day, but I found that, um, as I did, that I became more isolated and I became um more and more unhappy in many ways. So, um, here I want to share some, some tips with you, not only tips that um I've used myself, but there are some tips that I've not used myself and have been passed to me by um friends, by colleagues who work on a remote basis.
Speaker 1:
2:20
So tip number one is you need to really focus on continuous learning. So dedicate time to continuous learning and skill development to stay relevant and competitive in your field. This can be achieved through online courses, webinars or reading industry related content. I will add to that that can also be achieved through following and listening to to podcasts or listening to your favorite um your favorite professionals, reading their blogs, understanding how they work. So it does require you to have a certain amount of um, curiosity to to want to learn and to want to understand and what to want to develop. So you want to understand and to want to develop. So you need to have that desire in the first place.
Speaker 1:
3:08
So continuous learning is number one. Number two you need to think about also goal setting. So setting clear professional and, in many cases, smart goals and personal goals to stay motivated and to stay focused, to keep on track with what you're doing and to have something to work toward. This can help you measure your progress and you can then celebrate your achievements, whether that be yourself. You can celebrate yourself, celebrate with your family, celebrate with your peers, your teammates, et cetera. So it's really important to have goals, to be a goal-focused person, and if you're not goal-focused, then develop that habit of setting goals.
Speaker 1:
4:04
So mentorship is another way in which you can embrace personal development as a way to improve your remote career and well-being. So mentorship, so seek out mentorship opportunities where you can learn from experienced professionals and gain valuable insights into your industry. I didn't necessarily have didn't seek out mentorship. What I did was, as I explained earlier, I would listen, understand, interview professionals who know more about remote work than I did at the time, and that's how I learned. But then those connections, those informational calls, became more regular interactions and they became in some cases friendships in which I would have more regular contact with those people. So again, I was able to learn from them and understand them a whole lot better as I grew closer and closer.
Speaker 1:
5:05
So number four on my list, which is again one which I talk about often, is focusing on wellness, so incorporating wellness into your routine. I often say this one, I often use this as part of my tips because it should be central. Your health, your wellness, is central to everything. If you're not well, if you're not healthy, then it makes things a lot more difficult. So you need to, where possible, try where you can to affect your own wellness through things such as exercise or engaging in hobbies that bring you joy and bring you relaxation. So that's number four on the list.
Speaker 1:
5:52
Number five on the list, um, is related to number three. So number five is social connection and if you remember number three, I was talking about mentorship. When I talk about social connection, though, for number five, um, that's going to require you to proactively stay connected with friends, stay connected with family, with colleagues to combat the feelings of isolation, and this can be done on a virtual basis, so virtual socializing on via video calls or in-person meetups. And, in my case, early on, as I was mentioning you, mentioning to you before about mentorship, for me personally that stemmed from my social connections and interactions with some of the people who I admired in the world of remote work and how they developed themselves and how they developed their teams. So, yeah, as much as remote workers, people who work from home, are often ridiculed in the press for lack of connection and lack of human interaction. It couldn't be further from the truth and, in fact, if you are working remotely, it's something that you probably need to do, more so than people who who work in a traditional way. So social connection is number five on my list.
Speaker 1:
7:14
And finally, I just say, by embracing personal development as a way to improve your remote career and well-being, remote workers can experience increased motivation. You certainly can. Your well-being. It can affect your well-being and enhance your overall productivity. I I firmly believe that, because that's something that I have experienced myself, so it's you really need to invest in that, invest in your personal development. When I say invest, it doesn't necessarily have to be a financial investment. It could be an investment of time, and an investment of time to make those connections that you need to make in order to develop yourself and continue on a path of learning.
Speaker 1:
7:58
Well, I hope that has been a useful segment for you today. If it has, please consider sharing this episode with your friends, with your colleagues, who may need to hear it. Please also, by all means, leave a review of the podcast and leave a rating. That would help me to disseminate this um further across the internet, in the hopes that it could help and reach people who who need it more. Um. So thank you for for doing that and, by all means, do reach out to me. My I've left my linkedin details in the show notes, as as usual. Please also reach out to me, say hello and if you have any feedback or suggestions. I am more than welcome feedback and suggestions for new episodes and new guests, but until next time, I wish you all the best.