Most companies allow employees to allocate time for self-development. In some cases, you can use up to 20% of your time (1 day per week) for that. You won’t probably get much guidance on the development path, and I don’t see your boss complaining if you forfeit that time and decide to finish a couple of tasks and answer a bunch of emails (they should complain – if you stop developing, it is bad for them too).
For this reason, you need to be ruthless with self-development. Make it a regular appointment on your calendar (mine is on Friday morning), and defend it. Decide what you want to learn, register to an online course, or collect some material, and then take that time, just do it. At the end of the day, you will feel much more accomplished: you will feel better with yourself, your work, your company and everything else.
