Learn to Type Fast

Keyboarding is an underutilized, under appreciated skill for career professionals.

With the speed of technological innovation, computers are being integrated into virtually every job out there, even in manual labor type jobs. For employers it saves time as it democratizes data in the organization. For employees, it can save us time and energy that can be spent elsewhere.

My father who is a pumper for a large natural gas corporation where he checks wells in rural Oklahoma now has a Blackberry and laptop for his workflow. The amount of data the home office gets from him and others in the field must be enormously useful for what they do.

Key Nugget: Learn to type fast, which means you need to take a keyboarding class.

I did in high school and it was one of the best skills I took (got up to 70 words a minute). I’ve used it in every job I’ve had to save time and energy. It also makes you faster in the eyes of your boss or employer.

I can’t imagine how much time I’ve saved by being a fast typer!

By the way, I’m not talking about chicken pecking. I’m talking about typing without looking at the keyboard, which means your fingers look for

Action Steps: Check out and enroll in an online keyboarding class (like Keyboarding Online) or a community college or career tech. I’d highly suggest taking something where you are accountable. It’s not fun to learn, but it pays dividends in your career.

Bonus Tip: You might also want to learn 10-key if you’re going to be dealing with numbers …. and find a great ergonomic keyboard like this one that the Dev Team at iThemes uses and swears by.

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This is part of the 5-minute Career Nugget series at Purposeful Paychecks. Share your best career advice here!