Girls Night Outs – they have quite the reputation! Some are rambunctious nights of memorable (or too drunk to recall) fun. Others are trusting, bare-all emotional outpourings. There are ardent advocates of girl time and others who’ve never justified the time for one.
But at the core of them are Girlfriends – the ones that make you laugh louder, smile wider and live just a wee bit better.
A true friend understands you, accepts you, but still motivates or even nudges you to grow. When you find it difficult to integrate learning into a busy life schedule, why not take the help of a trusted source to help you with this.
A Girls Night Out Learning is also a fantastic way to stay accountable and on track.
Hmm! So How do you Make a GNOL Work ?
Set a schedule
Collaborate with a friend (or many) and make GNOL a recurring happening, where you learn something together. Share resources like books, or watch something online.
Your best friend lives across the world. No problem – catch a webinar together. I did just that when I attended a webcast on social media trends, along with my sister sitting halfway across the world. It was a first time experience of studying something together knowing that we both need this knowledge in our respective careers. More so because my sister had never tuned into one before.
Make it a Team’s Work
Remember study groups from college? You can always earmark portions for each of you to prep to teach the other(s) later on. Make notes, research or simply share summaries – anything that makes learning more efficient in everyone’s time-crunched lives.
If you have a learning minded friend with another skill set in mind, you can always study in parallel while pausing for that occasional ‘ got to tell you something moment.’
Don’t we all get ahead with a little help from friends.
Take the Lead. Motivate
Just like you laugh with some and you cry with some, not all girlfriends are made for learning with you. But all women are made for learning, and if you are the good friend, that’s what you could initiate.
May be you can virtually teach iMovie to your best friend via Skype. That could be an intensely satisfying hour of conversation knowing that besides being an emotional sound bag, you also ended up contributing to her career skills. Or ask another friend to provide the learning.
If finding a rhythm seems a challenge, start with a one-off. How about an impromptu night of sharing style tips or a cooking demo. Social media tips, cool tricks to master Powerpoint in an hour. The possibilities are endless, as are the benefits.
FREE MEMBER PRIVILEGES!
New Times & new ways to collaborate.
A Helping Hand
Has it ever occurred to you to initiate a night because you see your friend struggling with her career decisions. Over cups of hot coffee, a warm fireplace and a cozy blanket, I recently taught a friend how to resize and watermark her images. Simple for me, as I’m a designer, but a big challenge in her everyday work needs.
Friendship or Partnership?
If you are looking to partner with a friend for starting a business, initiating a couple of GNOL’s will give you an insight into her work ethic or aptitude and help decide whether it’s good to blend work and friendship or leave well alone.
Build Something Together? Or Take idea bartering it up a level?
You might be handling your business alone, but why not get together with an entrepreneurial/career bestie to brainstorm ideas off each other.
Seems like a challenge? It’s all in the collective spirit – once you embrace the concept of learning together, a whole new world of possibilities is going to spark for you. Trust yourself and all that you can do together.
Girls night out learning. That’s a crazy idea.
What time?
You can’t use up creativity. The more you create, the more you have.
A Designer and Entrepreneur, Aditi graduated from a top design school and subsequently started her own design and merchandising business. Co-founder at Maroon Oak, she has over 17 years of business experience with Two Dotts, her design consulting company and an Etsy store which serves as an outlet for her gifts and patented product designs.
A mother to a teen and a tween, she enjoys running, dancing and raising her newest baby, a Bichon named Miltie.
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What a super idea! I am going to suggest this to my friends. 🙂
I love this and your quote at the end is so true there is no way we ever use up our creativity!!! Recently we started a virtual mixer for entrepreneurs since we travel full time and it has been such a hit! I enjoyed reading this because it was a reminder that our mixers are very much needed for other like minded individuals
I love it. I enjoy my girlfriends and we have had some really great nights out together.
Ive recently moved to a new state and have not made any new friends. I look forward to meeting people I could enjoy a girls night out with.
I love girls nights out. I’ve never thought about using it to take up learning but will now. Sounds like something fun and a great way to spend time bonding with BFF’s.
Girls night out are the so funny, using them for something creative is great!
It’s always nice to be able to catch up with the girls! Our schedules don’t always work together. I could really use this guide!
It’s been a long time since I last went on a GNO! I would sure love to gather the squad and plan something. Thanks for all the tips!
Love this idea and the way you presented it was encouraging and made it easy to understand how to follow through. I’m game for a WNOL!
These are wonderful ideas! I think a GNOL is wonderful! Strong women supporting strong women!
Lots of great ideas in here. Sounds like you’ve got lots of good plans ahead for you and your friends!
I love this! I used to go out once a month with a local writer’s group, and I made some great connections there! Single motherhood sortof put a stop to that just for now, but I’m looking forward to getting back into it for sure!
Interesting girls night out spin off! And who better to learn from?
Completely agree Ayana!
Really interesting post about how women could use get-togethers as a way to further our educational and life goals. I realized my crew has done this recently via email, one friend was renovating her bathroom so in the design phase we all chimed in with tips and then at the end she shared pictures and told us what they had learned in the process. There was definitely some stuff I learned that I’ll bring to my next DIY.
Thats fantastic Kristen. The possibilities to collaborate and learn are unlimited!
Thanks for giving it a name. Some of us have been doing this forever.
Awesome post! I love the idea of virtual learning together !
Thanks Avery! Yes, Today technology has made so much possible.
Love it! I guess a Book club counts as one too!
Totally Sandy!