Live data from Hacker News

$250 remaining of L&D budget – what to spend on?

news.ycombinator.com

1–10 of 23 posts

$250 remaining of L&D budget – what to spend on?

#1
Currently learning basic SQL (for free on Code Academy), already have a Coursera subscription for business courses. Interested in different forms of learning (MOOCs don't really engage me that well).

My background is in finance and I would like to learn more about product development and strategy. Also really keen on starting some new hobbies this year, so bite-sized learning of a variety of things would be great (to help me find something to deep-dive into!).

Books are fair game, as well as courses and productivity tools for this budget. Really anything that can be sold as professional or skill development, doesn't have to be associated with my role or the company.

Re: $250 remaining of L&D budget – what to spend on?

#2
Perhaps not what you're looking for, but...

Learn a language of a country that you might be doing business with in the future. Sure, everyone speaks English (do they though?) but even a little bit of their native language goes a long way establishing goodwill.

Even if not for profit, it grows your mind and that is never a bad thing.

Re: $250 remaining of L&D budget – what to spend on?

#5
AI Tool Testing

The market is currently flooded with AI tools so you could use all $250 on one month of various AI tools and try them out for next month. Then cancel whatever you don’t like and keep what you do; using the new years L&D budget on it each month.

Self Hosting (Hobby)

You could buy a Raspberry Pi and try self hosting some services.

Conferences

Find conferences next year that have tickets on sale now and buy in advance. For example my city has a monthly one for which you can by an annual subscription via one time payment

Re: $250 remaining of L&D budget – what to spend on?

#6
Python or JavaScript programming.

These are not the best languages, but they are very approachable for beginners and open up so much optionality without too much difficulty.

Python gets you backend development (to use with your SQL), AI/ML, stats/science, simple desktop utilities, command line tools, and pygame for simple video games. Lots of things to explore.

JavaScript gets you web frontend, web backend (to use with your SQL), and gets you the "full stack" experience for writing web applications. There are also some game/3D tools where you can write little video games.

Either language would be a fantastic starting point into the world of programming. Both languages are in high demand, with JavaScript having a bit of a lead.

After you have one of these under your belt for a year, pick up the other one. Then reach for something totally different, like Rust, Swift, or Go. Something statically typed would be great. Make sure to inquire about what each language excels at - you're ultimately wanting to use the language to solve problems you're interested in.

Python and JavaScript are easy to pick up and fun to learn. There are a lot of interactive courses, and either language will serve you in your career no matter where it goes.

There are abundant materials and interactive courses for these languages, and some of them are even free. With your L&D budget you can probably sample several different ones or perhaps learn different aspects of each language.

Re: $250 remaining of L&D budget – what to spend on?

#8
> I would like to learn more about product development and strategy.

Subscribe to Lenny's Newsletter:

https://www.lennysnewsletter.com?r=2vq60

That's my referral link, but you can strip it if you want. Lenny is an old friend, but more importantly, is considered the expert on product development and strategy. He headed up part of product at AirBnB for a long time, and he gets guests that have headed up product at equally well known places.

Post reply on HN