7 mostly free professional development ideas that PR and comms pros can start today

A PRSA survey last year suggested just 1 out of every 100 PR and comms professionals invest in their own professional development with any sort of cadence or frequency

Last year I spotted disturbing results of a survey included in a SmartBrief newsletter championed by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA). It was unsettling because respondents seemed to indicate very little interest in their own professional development.

The survey asked, “How often do you invest in your own professional development?” The responses tallied up as follows:

• .01% of respondents said, “once a month;”
• 0% of respondents said, “once a quarter”;
• 33% of respondents said, “a couple times of year”;
• 33% of respondents said, “once a year”;
• 33% of respondents said, “almost never.”

I find it stunning that just one out of every 100 PR and comms professionals invest in their own professional development with any sort of cadence or frequency.

I can’t imagine that’s true in other fields, say medicine, accounting, legal, support or cybersecurity. It’s true for trades too. Would you bring your car for maintenance to a mechanic who didn’t keep up with all the modern tech they are stuffing into vehicles?

Why is that true in PR and comms?

The survey did not provide a sample size. However, I think it’s safe to presume the quality was sound; likely derived from one of PRSA’s member or subscriber lists.

There’s just so much to know, and things are developing so fast these days, that I don’t think professional development is optional. There are also, generally speaking, traditional gaps in a communicator’s skill set, such as math, which hurts our credibility with executive leadership.

From where I sit, no one in PR or comms can afford not to be continuously learning. So, I thought I’d share some of the things that I do on a regular basis for professional development purposes.

1. Read voraciously (free)

Nearly every day I easily read at least ~10 articles (or similar) focused on my profession. Most of these are focused on marketing, communications, leadership and psychology. This does not include the reading I do to be sharp on client industries, which is equally, if not more voracious.

The key to finding good articles to read is to have an effective system for filtering. First, I used an RSS reader called Innoreader (replaced Feedly thanks to a tip from Tressa Robbins). This allows me to quickly scan headlines and focus on those that seem interesting.

Second, I use a dedicated Gmail account for newsletters – so it doesn’t muck up my work email. Similarly, I can scan through a lot of content to spend time only with those things that interest me. (Sidebar: most business executives do this too, which is why you should accept non-business emails for gated content and subscriptions).

I do carve out a little time to read books at night. Often, these are history or fiction. I find that fiction reading really improves my writing because, in the course of being entertained, I’m consuming examples of how published authors describe abstract concepts.

I’m currently reading “The Rise and Fall of the Galactic Empire,” where a real PhD historian dissects the fictional Star Wars saga. It’s fascinating because it reads like one of Jared Diamond’s books about civilizations or steel. Further, George Lucas, who created Star Wars, seemingly draws on real historical events in his storytelling.

Bonus: I take the best of what I’ve read about marketing and comms – and add it to a monthly newsletter. What I read is for me, but the way I think about it is that if the article was educational for me, it might also be for others. With just a little extra effort, I can make something valuable for others. Here are examples of prior newsletters and here’s where to subscribe.

2. Listen to podcasts (free)

Doug Downs, who hosts the Stories and Strategies podcast, recently told me that podcasts are like adding a 25th hour to every day. That’s been true for me because I listen during “in-between time,” such as when driving, working out, or while doing chores (I’ve done book reviews this way too).

I have a mix of news (from both sides of the aisle), economics and science-oriented podcasts. I used to listen to a lot more marketing and PR podcasts, and while I still have some in the queue, I’ve cut back in favor of other topics. Since I do a lot of reading here, I think of podcasts as a tool to broaden my knowledge.

More specifically, I’ve become enamored with physics, and especially astrophysics and quantum mechanics. I once heard Neal deGrasse Tyson say, there’s no biology without chemistry, and there’s no chemistry without physics. So, I see physics as a base way to strive to understand our place in all this stuff.

The discoveries coming out of the James Webb and Hubble space telescopes are amazing. Similarly, some of the quantum discoveries stemming from CERN and LIGO are equally incredible. I find it both satiates my curiosity and stimulates a hunger for more.

Since I work in technology, which is by definition the application of science for practical use, there is some direct professional development value. The more I can develop a broad understanding of physics, the better my foundation for understanding AI and quantum computing.

I also believe the cognitive gymnastics you have to do to understand physics is good mental exercise for the brain. That provides me with different tools to think about work problems and break them down in different ways to solve them; I think it stokes creativity.

Pocket Casts is my podcast app of choice. While there are free apps for this, I purchased this one because I like the way it allows me to customize podcast downloads. I don’t remember what I paid, but I think it was a one-time purchase for under $50.

3. Blinkist (~$120 a year) and Libby (free)

The Blinkist app summarizes the main points of thousands of books and distills them into ~20-minute summaries. You can read the summaries or listen to them – I tend to listen to them.

They say most books are built around one big idea – I find that to be true. Blinkist provides that one big idea. And I love being exposed to big ideas; who doesn’t?

Blinkist has allowed me to just plow through so many big ideas – hundreds of them. Some of them are new, but some are also books I’ve read in the past. This is a quick way to be reminded of the concepts. It is one of the best investments I have ever made in my own professional development.

I really mix up the topics here – philosophy, religion, history, politics, geopolitics, science and yes, business, marketing and communications too. It’s a great way to get exposed to a lot of different ideas and topics; I’ve found I have a lot of new interests this way.

Sometimes there are Blinkist summaries that cause me to want to delve (yes, delve, genAI stole it) into the whole book. This is where Libby comes in. Libby is a free app that connects to my local public library system (and probably yours too). I can “check out” audiobooks from my local library from the app on my phone. All you need to do is have a valid library card.

I used to buy audiobooks from Audible and did so for ~15 years. Then the company’s acquiring parent Amazon, decided that they didn’t want to sell audiobooks but rent them for a subscription fee. I didn’t like that approach or how it was forced on me. That’s what caused me to start looking for a better way to learn through audiobooks and how I discovered Blinkist and Libby.

4. Online courses (free)

There are so many free online courses today that there’s no need to pay for any. Google offers free courses on analytics and AI. HubSpot has them for marketing and social media. For me, these courses help color in details I might have missed, get a different take on a subject where I have strong views, or get more familiar with a specific platform like AdWords.

Most of the social media platforms have courses you can take on their advertising products. Even if you don’t manage Facebook ads, for example, taking the course will help you to be a better cross-functional collaborator with your peers in marketing.

From time to time, some of the SEO vendors open up courses for free. For example, during the pandemic, Moz made their courses free, and I jumped on that to sure up my understanding of technical SEO. I believe every marketing and PR person needs to take a course to understand on-page optimization.

These aren’t the only courses. For a time, I served as treasurer for my HOA, so I paid $100 for an 8-hour seminar that taught me how to be a good board member. That experience has professional application too. It gave me a new appreciation for budgets and spending decisions – especially when I’m making a case for marketing budgets.

My hometown offered some courses through the fire and police departments. While I learned about how these EMS services operate – and I made immediate fire prevention improvements to my home – the program was a community relations program too.

As such, it’s entirely relevant to my work in public relations. The same goes for the courses offered by businesses – those double as community-building programs too.

I strongly recommend new job seekers and college graduates start with Google Analytics and AdWords courses. Save the certificates and list the courses on your resume. It’s both a qualification and it demonstrates a learning mindset – which may separate you from your competition (especially given the survey numbers above).

Here are some of the courses I’ve taken over the last few years:

• Social Media Certification (HubSpot); May 2024
• LinkedIn Marketing Fundamentals Certification (LinkedIn); March 2024
• Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) Fundamentals (Google); December 2023
• Introduction to Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) (Google); December 2023
• Introduction to Large Language Models (Google); December 2023
• Introduction to Responsible Artificial Intelligence (AI) (Google); December 2023
• Responsible Artificial Intelligence (AI) with Google Cloud (Google); December 2023
• Google Analytics Certification (GA4) (Google); August 2023
• CAI Board Leader Certification (Community Association Institute); March 2023
• Citizens’ Public Safety Academy (City of Woodstock) November 2022
• Civilian Response to Active Shooter Training (City of Woodstock) November 2022
• On-page Optimization (Moz); April 2020
• Keyword Research (Moz); March 2020
• Technical Site Audit (Moz); March 2020
• Content Marketing Certified (HubSpot); February 2020
• Google Search Ad Certified (Google); February 2020
• Advanced Google Analytics (Google); November 2019

5. Khan Academy for Math (free)

If the list above makes you think I’ve been slacking off in the latter part of 2024, I haven’t been.

My interest in astrophysics, particularly the notion that Einstein discovered General Relativity with math, has fired within me a new interest in math. He was a “theoretical physicist” which means he did not make observations or conduct experiments. Everything he did was an equation; I want to understand his equations beyond my current layman’s understanding.

I’ve discovered Khan Academy, which is an amazing free math resource – and they have classes for every level. If you’re a parent with a child struggling with math, this is a great tool as well. If you are an adult like me, you can create customized learning paths too.

For example, I have an MBA, and I’m pretty good with business economics, financial statements and the time value of money. Similarly, in my MA program, I had formal training, and in my day-to-day work in as a marketing and PR professional, I got lots of practical experience with statistics and probability. However, outside of those two areas – I don’t know much. I haven’t touched Algebra since undergrad.

I want to learn Calculus (and beyond) in the hope that it gets me closer to understanding what Einstein revealed a century ago. These courses are probably going to take me months, and maybe years to work through, yet I benefit from what I learn immediately because so much of technology relies on math.

You don’t have to learn calculus in the pursuit of professional development (I’m a bit of an odd duck in that sense anyway). The point is, there are tons of free courses on the platform that can teach you finance, the language of business, or statistics, so you better understand surveys and even plain old arithmetic that can improve your ability to measure marketing and PR outcomes.

Khan Academy is a non-profit and I intend to donate to this worthy cause this year. I’m very grateful this amazing resource exists.

6. Weekly writing

If you are reading this, you know I produce a weekly blog post. Typically, I like to dive into marketing and PR trends and associated industry studies and reports. All this keeps my skills sharp and allows me to experiment with marketing ideas.

I started this blog in early 2009 after coming home from an overseas deployment. Here’s the back story, but the cliff notes are social media had changed the media landscape when I got home. I recognized this and started a blog to provide hands-on learning about content marketing and social media.

I started using BlogSpot which was completely free (and a relic of the web by today’s standards). Today, perhaps Medium or SubStack is a better option. The key takeaway here is: get writing.

I tell new grads and college students this all the time: start writing about something. It doesn’t have to be marketing or comms, but anything that interests you and keeps you writing. You hone your skills, have low-risk opportunities to experiment, and build a portfolio you can show to an employer; savvy employers recognize the extra effort you are putting in to learn.

There could be another benefit. For example, many years later, in 2016, I decided to hang a shingle for a consultancy. I decided to make this blog my “business site” rather than create a website for two key reasons.

First, I had developed a subscribed audience for years here, so it made sense to leverage that for a business.

Second, this blog epitomizes what I do for clients; I practice what I preach: this is why PR and content marketing need each other.

Here’s the kicker: all my interest in audio made me realize that I could reach a whole new segment of people by turning my blog posts into a podcast. And I have. You can get all these posts on audio one week after they publish on the B2B Marketing and PR podcast – and it’s on all the key platforms like Apple, Amazon and Spotify.

It’s a great way to repurpose content with just a little extra effort – and I’m advancing my podcasting skills to include audio editing. It’s worth noting, that this is my second podcast as during the pandemic I produced a 30-episode series, with the help of a professional sound engineer, about transitioning from the military to business careers.

7. Documentaries on YouTube

I’ve ditched a Netflix subscription for YouTube. I’ve discovered YouTube many long-form educational documentaries. Now, you have to be careful about what you consume, because anyone can post to YouTube and you want to find credible experts.

In terms of my affinities, I’ve found several scientists who produce exceptional documentaries on AstroPhysics.  And because I’m a weirdo and enjoy this stuff for fun, I’ll watch a documentary on Friday night instead of, you know, the mindless stuff on the subscription services (I do take breaks from time to time and watch mindless stuff too; I’m not a machine).

Two YouTube channels I currently love, by which I mean I’m slowly watching most of what they’ve produced, are Space Matters and The History of the Universe. It’s watching these and having them absolutely bend my mind that got me interested in going back and studying math on the side.

In addition, it might seem counterintuitive, but my interest in astrophysics has also rekindled my religious interests too. The way I’ve come to see it, there is an undeniable order in the universe. There are just too many things from the grandest of scales to the subatomic that are highly improbable and yet worked out perfectly for us to exist.

For example, as I understand it, the probability of a quantum fluctuation is 10^10^123.  As one physicist explained, of that exponent, if you took every atom in the whole universe and converted it to ink, you would not have enough ink to write out the zeros that go with that exponent. That’s a miracle.

But you don’t have to be into physics to do this, too; it just requires curiosity. Pick something else that interests you, maybe it’s about leadership or a hobby you have. Whatever it is, there’s a good chance there are credible experts on YouTube with educational content you can consume for free anywhere with an internet connection.

This is why kids today are going to be so much smarter than we are. Anytime they have a question, they don’t need to go to a library and look it up in the encyclopedia, many of them carry a device in their pocket that provides them with access to all the knowledge humankind has collected to date.

Learning isn’t a competition

There are still many things I’d like to learn. For example, one item that’s on my list for this year is video editing. I have an undergraduate degree in Film & TV broadcasting, so while I understand concepts, I learned to edit on an A/B roller, which is ancient history.

For a time in the early 2000’s, I got pretty good with Camtasia too, but I haven’t really touched it since. That was 25 years ago!

Sure, I play around with editing on social media platforms like Instagram, but what I’d really like to do is find a good app today and master it. Camtasia is an option still, or perhaps Canva, or something from Adobe – I’m open to recommendations – so if you have one please send it my way!

Indeed, video is getting more important. It was a theme among the contributions to my annual marketing and communications predictions post for 2025.

While I think we are a long way from Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), I know exactly what I’d do if it arrived tomorrow and put everyone out of work: I’d spend all my time learning. For me, learning is synonymous with leisure; I genuinely enjoy it. In the meantime, I’ve got to earn a living and so I squeeze all the learning into the daily time I have remaining.

I think that’s made me a better comms and marketing professional and I’m certain it will be for you too. To that end, this isn’t a competition, or if it is a competition, in the long run, then it’s only with yourself. The examples listed here are what works for me – and I’m merely suggesting that you find those that work for you.

When you do, or if you are already, you should take a measure of pride in knowing that, according to the survey above, just one out of every hundred comms professionals are doing the same.

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>> Looking for help with marketing and comms? Check out my services.

>>> Don’t need help but want more good ideas? Check out my weekly blog posts, weekly podcasts, or a monthly newsletter that rounds up interesting reading from the last 30 days or so (examples).

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Image credit: Wikicommons, File:Webb’s First Deep Field.jpg