Top 5 Memorization Techniques For Professionals

Memorize anything: presentations, lists, handbooks, names; with these simple memorization techniques.

You might think that your days of late-night cramming, using cue cards and chugging energy drinks are behind you. I have news for you friend…memory skills are essential to a thriving career and it will also give you mad charisma in the boardroom!

It’s true, you haven’t had to memorize anything since college, but what if you get blessed with the opportunity to deliver a presentation? Or what if you’re going to a work party and have to memorize everyone’s names and faces before going in? Cue cards worked when you were 21, but there are better, more effective ways to remember important information these days. Here are 5 simple memorization techniques that will help you memorize things quickly and no energy drinks required!

Here’s What We’ll Cover:

Group your text into chunks

Find the meaning behind the words

Create a memory palace AKA The Loci Technique

Repetition, Repetition, Repetition

Create an acronym

Key Takeaways

Group your text into chunks

Ok, we’re borrowing from the cue card method here, but organizing a text out into small chunks is hugely helpful when it comes to memorizing. Try giving each new idea or concept its own paragraph while making sure each section is well spaced out from the other. The great thing about this technique is that it gives you a series of “starting points”. So, if you get lost, you can zip back to the beginning of a “chunk” and then continue on from there.

Find the meaning behind the words

This learning technique is called “The Building Technique”. It’s based on the idea that a concept is more easily remembered when it’s well understood. Remember when you were studying for exams back in college? Wasn’t it true that the most interesting facts tended to stick in your mind more easily? It’s because you actually cared to remember them! So when you’re reading through your presentation, try to understand and express the “meaning” behind the words you are saying. Pretend you are Robert DeNiro auditioning for “boardroom presenter” and you’ll never forget your lines again.

Create a memory palace AKA The Loci Technique

The memory palace or “mind palace” memory technique is helpful in remembering lists of words. Whether it is within a presentation or in a handbook, this little trick will definitely help keep those items top of mind. You can practice the memory palace technique by imagining what each word would look like, and then create a journey through a house or outdoor environment that features these mental images in the right order. Let’s say you need to memorize a list of animals in a particular order: sharks, elephants, kangaroos, snakes, owls and iguanas. To memorize this list you might picture sharks swimming in the moat around your palace, then when you reach the door, you see an elephant ushering you in, then a kangaroo taking your coat, a snake leading you down the hallway, an owl turning on the lights and an iguana tipping its hat to you. I never said it had to be logical. So now, when you have to remember the list, the words will come that much easier. You’ll see, they’ll sort of “fly” out of your mouth!

Repetition, Repetition, Repetition

Experts revere repetition as the 2nd most effective memorization method of all time! Read your presentation or document at least ten times before starting to memorize the nitty-gritty of it. The more you read it, the more it will stick in your mind. It would be even better if you can space these repetitions out over a long period of time.

Create an acronym

This is one of the oldest memory tricks in the book! If you are trying to remember a series of words, try creating your own acronym by arranging the first letter of each of the names into a memorable word. If the names are: “Caitlyn, Kishawn, Eric and Amanda. The acronym would obviously be “CAKE”. Who could ever forget that?

Key Takeaways

So to recap, the top 5 memorization techniques most used by professionals are:

• Group the text into chunks
• Find the meaning behind the words
• Use the Memory Palace Technique AKA The Loci Technique
• Repetition, Repetition, Repetition
• Create an acronym

There are countless memory techniques out there. The trick is to find one that suits the unique way your brain processes information while also being fast and effective.

Find out more about learning techniques like this one on our resource hub.

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