The best things in life may be free, but that doesn’t mean they won’t take time, sweat, and perseverance to acquire. You must work hard to learn the most useful skills to master.
Education doesn’t stop with a degree- employers want to see solid aptitude training and up-to-date skills. If you want to stand out in a competitive workplace or boost your performance and salary at work, you’ll want to brush up on your skills or tackle a new one.
Here are lucrative skills that can set your resume apart from the pack, turbocharge your existing talents, or serve as a launch point for a whole new career. Best of all, you can lean every one of them from the comfort of your home, and many of them are completely free.
In an effort to ascertain which talents are worth the investment, we asked a community: What are the hardest and most useful skills to learn?
We’ve highlighted our favorite takeaways.
Useful skills to master … coding
For better or worse, digital devices drive our lives, and code drives every one of them. Whether learners want to start with basic HTML or move up to CSS, PHP or Java, online crash courses can prepare you for creating and managing digital content from the ground up.
Codecademy offers a wide range of interactive courses, serving 24 million users across the world.
Time management
Effective time management is one of the most highly valued skills by employers. While there is no one right way, it’s important to find a system that works for you and stick to it, Alina Grzegorzewska explains.
“The hardest thing to learn for me was how to plan,” she writes. “Not to execute what I have planned, but to make so epic a to-do list and to schedule it so thoroughly that I’m really capable of completing all the tasks on the scheduled date.”
Useful skills to master … data scraping
Once users have conquered coding, going behinds the scenes with data scraping is the next step. With a base knowledge of HTML and CSS, online learners can dig deeper into websites and PDFs to mine data that could be useful to others.
Currently, there are multiple apps available to help people mine data across the Internet. Increasing current knowledge could help make these apps better or allow users to develop new ones.
Mastering your sleep
There are so many prescribed sleep hacks out there it’s often hard to keep track. But regardless of what you choose, establishing a ritual can help ensure you have restful nights.
Numerous studies show that being consistent with your sleep schedule makes it easier to fall asleep and wake up, and it helps promote better sleep in general.
Useful skills to master … Speaking and translating other languages
In today’s globally-connected world, being able to fluently speak, write and understand the nuances of another language is an increasingly valuable skill.
The power to communicate or translate content into different languages helps companies forge worldwide business connections.
Duolingo is an online platform that offers free coaching for Spanish, French, German, Italian, German, Dutch, Swedish and Irish.
To get started, users simply select the language they want to learn and then can read discussions or try immersion by reading articles from the Internet in other languages. Learning an in-demand and lucrative online skill for free? That’s always a smart choice.
Consistency
Whether you’re trying a new exercise routine, studying for the LSATs, or working on an important project, Khaleel Syed writes that consistency is vital to maintaining any kind of success.
People often stop working hard when they reach the top, he explains, but to maintain that top position, they have to work harder and be more consistent in their work.
Useful skills to master … photography and photoshop
Looking for a flexible, creative, and self-directed vocation? Photography can be an excellent career choice for motivated and creative professionals, especially those with a flair for style and composition, and can touch of a variety of subjects from travel, sports, weddings, fashion, food, and beyond.
The lucrative skills of a Photoshop pro go hand in hand with photography, and can also stand alone as a valuable technical proficiency. Kelbyone offers access to some of the worldÕs leading photographers, as well as online courses in Photoshop and Lightroom, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Asking for help
“I once was told in a job interview, ‘You can’t have this job if you can’t ask for help when you need it,'”
“Naturally, I said I could. Later, I found out that the previous person with that job had screwed up big-time because he was in over his head but couldn’t admit it and didn’t ask for help.”
She explains that knowing when you need help and then asking for it is surprisingly difficult to learn and do because no one wants to be perceived as weak or incompetent.
But a recent study from the Harvard Business School suggests doing so makes you look more, not less, capable. According to the study authors, when you ask people for advice, you validate their intelligence or expertise, which makes you more likely to win them over.
Useful skills to master … listening
If you think listening isn’t an essential and lucrative skill, think again. Many people assume that their listening skills are up to par, or that listening is simply an inborn trait.
But communicating effectively is an art and one that’s essential to workplace success, including in lucrative business pursuits like management, leadership, conflict resolution, and negotiation.
Those in education and helping professions may be familiar with the basics of formal listening skills but will find that a little instruction goes a long way towards improving their day-to-day performance. BigThink has a variety of videos on the subject to help new team members to seasoned managers succeed.
Consistency
Learn impressive skills.
Whether you’re trying a new exercise routine, studying for the LSATs, or working on an important project, Khaleel Syed writes that consistency is vital to maintaining any kind of success.
People often stop working hard when they reach the top, he explains, but to maintain that top position, they have to work harder and be more consistent in their work.
Useful skills to master … writing
What white-collar profession doesn’t involve writing? There are few areas of business, government, healthcare, education, or nonprofits that don’t depend, in some part, on the written word.
Even those in technical fields like engineering can seriously improve their upward mobility by demonstrating impeccable written communication and documentation.
Truly skilled writers can make a living on their writing skills alone as bloggers, transcribers, copywriters, journalists, or novelists.
Purdue University offers online professional writing courseswhileGrammarly@eduoffers grammar tutorials and apps to help both K-12 and college students improve their writing.
Positive self-talk
“Ultimately it doesn’t matter what others think of you,” writes Shobhit Singhal, “but what you think of yourself certainly does, and it takes time to build that level of confidence and ability to believe in yourself when nobody else does.”
“It takes ages to learn and master this,” writes one businessman.
Sticking your nose into other people’s work isn’t helpful and wastes time and resources. You have no right to put forth your two or four cents, even if you are the last righteous person standing.
Useful skills to master … mastering your thoughts
To do what you want to do and accomplish what you want to accomplish, you need to consciously direct your thinking, writes another author.
“The challenge is that we are the product of our past experience and all of our thinking is the result of this,” he says. “However, the past does not equal the future.”
Empathy
“You can be the most disciplined, brilliant, and even wealthy individual in the world, but if you don’t care for or empathize with other people, then you are basically nothing but a sociopath,” writes Kamia Taylor.
Empathy, as business owner Jane Wurdwand explains, is a fundamental human ability that has too readily been forsworn by modern business.
“Empathy — the ability to feel what others feel — is what makes good sales and service people truly great. Empathy as in team spirit — esprit d’corps — motivates people to try harder.
Empathy drives employees to push beyond their own apathy, to go bigger, because they feel something bigger than just a paycheck,” she writes.
Useful skills to master … knowing when to shut up
“You can’t go around whining about every other thing that seems not-so-right to you in this world,” writes one author. “Sometimes you just need to shut up.”
There are many instances when keeping to yourself is the best course. “When we are angry, upset, agitated, or vexed,” writes another, “we blurt out anything and everything that comes to our mind.” And later, you tend to regret it.
Keeping your mouth shut when you’re agitated is one of the most valuable skills to learn, and of course, one of the most difficult.
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More reading on learning from Digital Spark Marketing’s Library:
Mike Schoultz is a digital marketing and customer service expert. With 48 years of business experience, he consults on and writes about topics to help improve the performance of small business. Find him on G+, Facebook, Twitter, Digital Spark Marketing, and LinkedIn.
