Why I Keep Investing in Professional Development Courses

After more than two decades in front of the camera, in editorial rooms, and on stages around the world, you might expect the learning curve to flatten out. People sometimes assume that once you have anchored a breakfast sofa, written a few books, and built a community of hundreds of thousands of women, the hard intellectual work is done. That assumption could not be further from how I actually spend my time.

I still enrol on courses. I still block out weekends for reading. I still pay for coaching and workshops, and I still arrive at conferences in cities like Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane with the same nervous curiosity I had on my first day at a regional newsroom. Investing in professional development, even with decades of experience, is not a chore I have learned to tolerate. It is the habit that keeps the work, the business, and the leadership fresh, and it is one I would defend to anyone who thinks experience alone is enough.

The Comfort Trap of Experience

Experience is genuinely valuable, but it can quietly become a ceiling if you let it. The patterns you have seen a hundred times start to feel like the only patterns worth seeing. The phrases that once landed with audiences begin to feel comfortable, and comfortable phrases rarely travel well. The professional development courses I sign up for are partly an antidote to that comfort. They force me back into the position of a beginner, asking questions I have stopped asking, and paying attention to voices I might otherwise dismiss.

I noticed this most clearly while presenting a breakfast programme, when the format and the studio had become so familiar that I could almost predict every cue. A short course on new storytelling techniques, run by an independent trainer in Adelaide, broke that rhythm. Within weeks I had changed how I opened interviews, how I framed statistics, and how I listened to the silences between questions. The audience never saw the course, but the on-screen work shifted, and so did my confidence.

What I Look for in a Course

Not every course earns my time. I have a loose checklist, and it has saved me from spending weekends on material that feels recycled. The first test is specificity. A course on generic leadership theory rarely holds my attention, while a course on conflict management for live broadcast environments, or on negotiating publishing contracts, almost always does. The second is evidence. Who is teaching, what have they actually done in the field, and can they show measurable outcomes from past cohorts. The third is practicality. I want exercises, scripts, frameworks, and templates I can use the next morning, not just theory to admire over coffee.

The final test is harder to name. I ask whether the course will challenge something I currently believe. If the answer is yes, and the course is taught by someone with genuine credentials, I am usually willing to pay the fee and rearrange my diary. You can read more about my own background and the path that shaped these preferences on the official site.

Staying Relevant in a Changing Industry

Television, publishing, and live events have all been reshaped by streaming, short-form video, and the steady migration of audiences onto social platforms. The Australian market has felt this shift particularly sharply, with commissioning editors in Sydney and Melbourne now greenlighting digital-first formats alongside traditional linear shows. Standing still in that environment is the quickest route to irrelevance, and no amount of past ratings will protect you from a commissioning team that has moved on.

That is why I treat each new platform, each new analytics dashboard, and each new style of presenting as another skill to learn rather than another threat to defend. A recent workshop on short-form vertical video changed how I prepare material for my social channels. Another course on data-driven audience research helped me rethink the newsletter I send to readers of my books. Each investment is small compared with the cost of producing work that no longer connects. Even the way we present ourselves on professional networks has become a craft worth studying, which is why I booked a professional styling session before a major speaking tour and noticed the difference immediately on stage.

Learning Beyond the Studio

Professional development does not only happen in classrooms. Some of the Australians who teach me most generously do so over a flat white in Perth, on a long-haul flight, or through a quiet mentorship message at 3 a.m. when a deadline is looming. I have learned to value those conversations as much as any formal course, because they often carry the texture of real practice rather than the polish of a textbook.

A familiar risk for anyone with a public profile is the slow drift into an echo chamber, where everyone in the room agrees with you because they rely on you for access. Courses help me break out of that bubble, because the cohort is usually made up of people who have no reason to flatter me. They are junior producers from regional stations, first-time authors, founders in the early stages of growth, and seasoned executives who simply want a fresh perspective.

I also invest heavily in coaching. Working one-to-one with a leadership coach for senior executives is now standard practice among chief executives in Australia, and the same applies to senior broadcasters, authors, and founders. The sessions are uncomfortable in the way that good marriages are uncomfortable: they force you to name things you would rather leave unspoken. Pairing that kind of coaching with a structured course gives me both the language and the accountability, which is why I rarely choose one without the other.

A Simple Way to Choose Where to Invest

Over the years I have built a private shortlist of course formats, each with strengths that suit different goals. Before I book anything, I match the goal I want to move forward to the format most likely to deliver it. The shortlist below is not exhaustive, but it is honest, and it is the framework I use whenever a new opportunity lands in my inbox.

Most years I mix at least three of these formats, because each one gives me something the others cannot. If I had to pick only one, I would choose the mentorship circle, but only because the relationships compound over years.

The Returns I Actually See

People sometimes ask whether the courses pay for themselves, and the honest answer is that the return is rarely a single invoice. It shows up in a sharper live Q&A at a corporate event, a tighter chapter draft, a better conversation with a senior leader on a podcast, and a more grounded response when an interview takes an unexpected turn. It also shows up in the way my team experiences me as a leader, because the work I do on myself always leaks back into how I run a room.

If you run a business or lead a team in Australia and you are weighing whether to invest in your own development or in that of your senior people, reaching out to the corporate bookings team can help you shape a plan that aligns learning goals with the calendar of your organisation.

Habits That Make the Investment Stick

A course is a beginning, not an outcome. Without a few simple habits afterwards, the slides fade and the workbook gathers dust. Over time I have settled on a small set of practices that turn a one-off enrolment into lasting change, and these are the ones I would recommend to anyone starting out.

• Block the diary the week after the course to apply one specific technique from the material, rather than trying to absorb everything at once.
• Keep a single notebook or digital file dedicated to professional development, and review it monthly so the ideas surface regularly.
• Share one takeaway from each course with a colleague, your team, or your audience, because teaching cements learning faster than rereading.
• Pair every course with a person who will hold you accountable for what you said you would do with it.
• Revisit older notes every six months, because the same sentence often means something different once you have more experience to read it with.
• Pay for at least one course a year that feels slightly out of your comfort zone, even when the diary is already crowded.
• Treat the cost as part of your professional overhead, on the same line as travel and equipment, rather than as a luxury to justify each time.

I have followed versions of this list for years, and I have watched junior colleagues adopt it and quietly overtake people who never bothered to enrol in the first place. Experience opens the door, but only disciplined learning keeps the door open as the industry keeps changing around you.