Use Twitter to learn? I was amazed when I encountered that suggestion 5 years ago. Till then, I assumed twitter was used by those who had nothing better to do than advertise what they were currently doing. I looked down on it and its proponents.
However the suggestion came from a very learned person, so I was game to try. After all what could I lose?
In the last 5 years I have understood that twitter is a tool. Its use depends on you. Just like a knife in the hands of a surgeon saves lives while in the hands of a murderer it takes lives.
To capitalize on Twitter’s power to aid on-going #learning:
Have separate personal and professional twitter accounts. This is critical. It will ensure that your time is utilized appropriately and you can follow the relevant people e.g. friends in your personal account and prominent persons in your discipline/ area of interest in your professional account.
Find the right people to follow. Scan the suggestions that twitter provides and follow them. You can always un-follow them .There are many people who are dedicated curators. Two of my personal recommendations are Nancy Rubin and HBR.
Twitter is micro-blogging. Tweets come in at amazing speed and relevant tweets keep going down the timeline. Dedicate some time to go over your Twitter feed at least once every day. That way you will not lose any interesting nugget of information.
Curate the articles that have long term value by marking them as favorites.
Re-tweet tweets that you feel will interest your followers.
Contributed by Lovely Kumar, Chief-projects, Larks Learning Pvt Ltd.
