How and when do you improve your skills?

Question

IT education

Hello.
I am interested in how you, dear colleagues, study new aspects of the profession, gain new knowledge and deepen the old ones.
I work from 9 am to 6 pm. I return home around 20:00. I wake up at 6:00. Sometime between 20:00 and 6:00, I want to eat, sleep, chat with my family. Weekends are also not a good option. At least one day is spent on various family matters. One remaining day is enough to read Habr and some articles of colleagues. Learning new technologies with such a schedule is not an option at all, they will become obsolete while I study them :)
At work, they already hinted to me that they are more interested in effectively using the knowledge and skills I have than in getting new ones. Like, for the existing tasks, these are enough (and this is so).
And I want a lot. There are online courses that I would like to take. There is a blog that I would like to write to (this helps to structure and organize knowledge). There are plans to develop some things (Open source) in order to increase skills and abilities. Etc. etc.
I considered the option of leaving for a remote location - this is almost a 100% decrease in income. you will have to compete with the guys from the regions who have lower demands. Plus, a job change is a tit in the hands and a crane in the sky. With existing loans, this is dangerous. I wouldn't want to let my family down.
Another option is freelancing. This is all of the above, plus instead of one boss - dozens of customers (essentially temporary bosses), who are not always sane.
And yes, I work for a non-core company. Perhaps the solution is to switch to the profile?

Answer 1

I personally have this:
1. I work in a web studio: I constantly study new technologies and immediately implement them, that is, every day I really learn something new, including I have even almost mastered the 10-finger method.
2. As many as 2 hours on the road every day free - there is a mobile phone, tablet or book. I don’t understand why I have to suffer every day in the car due to traffic jams, I don’t use the car at all on weekdays.
3. There is no difference in how much the working day begins - the main thing would be the desire: I have the usual five-day week and every day before work, without prejudice to freelance sleep, I calmly at least 1 hour, and usually 2-4 hours.
Let's say we went to bed at 22, woke up at 5-6 o'clock, at 10 I go to work, at 11 at work, until 20 I work at 21 at home. There are 5 to 4 hours in the morning and 2 on the road.
That is, stably every weekday from 4 to 6 (including the road) hours for training.
Plus a whole working day where you can work on your code quality, use new patterns and features.
The earlier you go to bed - the less time it takes to sleep, if you go to bed after 12 o'clock at night, then the body will not sleep well, experiment - compare how you feel all day if you slept for 6 hours lying down at 22 o'clock or at 01 o'clock - the difference is colossal.
You can also save time without having dinner at home - it’s terribly harmful to eat so late, because of this you have to sleep more and get less sleep, it’s better to take a hearty lunch to work and dine there so that you don’t want to eat at home in the evening. Lunch can be done at 15 o'clock, for example, and before that, gulls with livers 1 time to drink at work and breakfast in the morning.

Answer 2

It is not very clear what kind of answer you expect, because there are no miracles: there are 24 hours in a day and there are only two exits:
PS1 work from 9 to 18 is 9 hours. Do you have lunch for an hour or what? Eat lunch for 15-20 minutes, this is + 40-45 minutes per day. You can either leave work earlier, or read, write your project or watch a lecture right at work during these 40 minutes.
PS2, as I understand it, you spend about 4 hours a day on the road - this is a lot. I don’t remember now, but there is a local developer (on Habré) who spends a little less on the road and reads several technical books a month, doing this mainly in transport. If you are in your own car, then again the choice is yours: either hold the steering wheel in your hands 4 hours a day, or hold a book 4 hours a day.
PS3 and here remote work and freelancing did not understand in principle.

Answer 3

"I see a lot of professionals blogging professionally, working on open source projects, and even taking time out for a cultural break. And it makes me feel like I'm doing something wrong."
These specialists manage to do everything for one of the reasons:
1) they are so cool that they work at home for 4-5 hours a day without loss of income compared to the office and do not spend 4 hours on the road - in total, at least 7 hours are freed daily
2) either these are students who live with their parents or on a high scholarship and may not work at all, but only learn and practice new knowledge, write blogs, participate in open-source for the future, or just just for fun - not particularly worried in short
3) unlikely, but still: they sit on something (energy, coffee, LSD) - they sleep 4 hours a day and work hard work hard work hard ... while having time to "culturally relax" and plow in the office like everyone else for 9 hours
The author, we are all people, you don’t have to worry about doing something wrong, you just need to act based on your initial data (have a family? live with your parents? can you compete with freelancers and earn money regardless of your uncle in the office? are you ready to sacrifice sleep/health? ).
Usually, in a case like yours, people choose the first option. Or they change jobs for more interesting ones. Those. you are thinking in the right direction.
You can, of course, as they advise here to allocate time after work (forget about the family?), Do not spend "an hour on food, but eat quickly in 15 minutes" (oh my God ...) - but this option will burn you, destroy relationships with loved ones, while this progress will be slow. This option is for bachelors and workaholics

Answer 4

“I was considering the option of leaving remotely - this is almost a 100% decrease in income, because I will have to compete with guys from the regions who have lower demands. Plus, changing jobs is a tit in the hands and a pie in the sky. With existing loans, this is dangerous. I didn’t want to to set up a family. "
Don't piss, you can handle it, you feel bad now, you want to change something, but you don't change "I don't want to set up my family." Well, don’t whine, pull the strap further, since you are afraid to take risks and take responsibility.
You understand a simple thing - now you feel bad, and it cannot be much worse. Well, you will be left without a job and without money - why don’t you pick up $ 500 a month with random part-time jobs? Will you cut costs to a minimum? But there will be motivation to do something. And this is a bad alignment, but maybe "pie in the sky" will still happen.

Answer 5

Audio on the go (walking, driving, in the cabin, on the plane). English, courses, profile materials downloaded from the net.
Books on a smartphone, laptop.
I personally observed the picture when one of my mentors, an intelligent person and a chic specialist, was not given the opportunity for independent development (they were not given a vacation, for example, to pass certification), so that he would continue to do his job and not think about getting out of the provincial office, which grew up in also thanks to his knowledge.
In the end, the person left.
I myself went into freelance a few years ago mixed with remote work (for me it's the same thing).
There were +3 hours every day, morning preparations for work (shave there, iron, warm up the car) + hour, road to work + hour, road from work + hour. With an average 6-hour working day. There is enough time for a lot of things, for sports, for a woman, for a child, for a leisurely walk (it's funny to watch people walking to work in the morning), for a toaster and similar things :).
Loans are evil in the sense that they take away the freedom to choose work and move if you do not have a cash buffer, and whoever has a buffer does not take loans :)
But you are not a slave for loved ones, they will be happy if you do what you love.
You are not obligated to provide them with an absolutely problem-free life.
Of course, you need to choose a job for the technologies you want. Otherwise, he won't be at work.
The hackneyed truth - do what you like and what you are interested in. She's not beaten for nothing.

Answer 6

Agree with FoxInSox.
Do you have a full day at work right by the minute, do not even have an hour to read new materials? Then increase the estimated time for some project and this hour will appear;)
You always have to sacrifice something - evenings, weekends, family, sleep ...
I once worked the same way, left home at 6:45, came to At 18:00 I ate and rested, I rode a bike for an hour, at 20:00 I sat down at the computer and made my websites until 23:00. Now I am an individual entrepreneur and do not work in a company))

Answer 7

1) Change jobs. The journey to work should take no more than an hour one way. Otherwise, you won't be able to do anything.
2) Set aside 2 hours each evening. In fact, this is a lot.
3) Allocate 6 hours on weekends. Just rest half a day, study what is interesting for half a day.
If you are still young, then sit up until 2 am and code.

Answer 8

www.mann-ivanov-ferber.ru/books/bolshoe_v_malom
and using the links below,
just develop a habit - write a blog every day, send everything on Saturday - with delayed placement, etc.

Answer 9

As an audio book on the road, you can listen to www.youtube.com/user/atrainingru (section about IT education). Some of the other lectures can also be listened to on the road as an audio book.

Answer 10

I want a question from the category, but it pricks :)
Drop everything, take it and do it! (c) I
completely agree with Dmitry Avilov
Don't worry that you won't have enough money, you will always find where to make money if you have a head on your shoulders. Look not for money, but for yourself, where work is not a litigation, but a pleasure, then you will no longer have such questions.

Answer 11

90% of those who "blog, work on open source" etc. do it during work hours. So don't worry. Mind you, it's not your fault. If you work with a load, it is almost impossible to find the strength (time may be possible) for "development", a fact.

Answer 12

I learned a lot by reading in public transport.

Answer 13

the question is quite general - I also came to a large enterprise after insta a year ago. 90% probably went to search for solutions in the internet. and here is my growth - I switched from php to yii, now I'm looking at the project for yii 2. and so - you need to have a suspended tongue and impudence))) for my part, I tell my immediate supervisor what technology I want to use, I say that I don’t know it, but I also provide him with possible benefits (speed, maintainability). if I study the framework for 2-3 months, and then I rivet input forms in a day, then this is a significant progress. and about your situation - do you even imagine WHY you need to study? to the employer by x how many MBA diplomas you have, do you know mongoDB and so on. If you do YOUR job, you get paid. if you are preparing a springboard for leaving a cool company - what idiot will pay for this? judge from the point of view of economy. if there is a profit from training, the enterprise itself will pay for you. if you manage with the plan - no buns. And yes - then only self-education.

Answer 14

If the employer, as you say, is really interested in improving the skills of employees, then the right step on his part would be to allocate n hours a week to the employee for self-education.
Moreover, academic holidays and courses paid by the employer are practiced.
I used to work in the field of graduate education and I know what I'm talking about. At state-owned enterprises, for example, employees are required to take advanced training courses (see, for example, advanced training institutes for teachers and doctors), of course, not at their own expense.