Investigate new tech trends
Learn the key words that describe new tech trends and the current lingo in your field. During time away from your technical field, there have been innovations and development. You need to know about new tech trends in order to update your resume, sound job-ready to a technical interviewer, and to get your skills up to date.
Job descriptions
Look at job descriptions (on online job sites as listed in Job search tools ) to find key skills and experience required, for the jobs you will apply for. Update your technical skills, then list them on your resume using the lingo of those key words and phrases.
Online tech news
Regularly read online news in your field. For instance, http://slashdot.org/, Wired.com, and The Verge for computer techies and Technology Review for multiple tech fields.
LinkedIn groups
Join LinkedIn groups in your field. You will find out about new tech trends and lingo by reading the postings.
Online educational material
There may be significant sources of free as well as for-pay educational material covering the latest trends for your field. Check websites of professional societies, conferences in your field, and leaders in your field (both human and corporate) to find educational material mentioning new tech trends and lingo. For instance, educational resources are available at Cisco (networking) and SANS (information security). Some sites with aggregated links to online technical training Tech Tutorials on the Web, TechTutorials, and Train Yourself: A Guide to Online Tech Tutorials. Use Wikipedia and Google to research the current state of your field.
Workshops
Workshops can be helpful to learn new lingo and modernize skills (and also make useful job networking contacts).
Cisco's educational offerings include online videos, web seminars and workshops, much for free.
SANS (information security) offers both free and for-pay online webinars, and also offers workshops.
Many professional societies offer workshops, varying in cost from free to expensive.
Educational conferences
Check out the EmTech (Emerging Technology) conference website - it shows what is new in tech today and what will be hot tomorrow. Educational conferences are often a couple days long and significantly more expensive than workshops. For instance, SANS and BlackHat offer hiqh-quality educational conferences in the information security field. To find out new tech trends and lingo, you can attend the conferences or just check out the websites (then Google the concepts).
Classes
A class should update you on tech trends in the subject area. See Update technical skills section for discussion of how to strategically choose a class.
Professional Societies
You can also learn about tech trends and lingo through joining professional societies such as IEEE, AITP, Society of Women Engineers, and the Society of Black Engineers. Aggregated links to many technical professional societies here. Many professional societies have in-person meetings as well as online discussion groups and educational resources, so they offer many types of learning opportunities.
