Entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship / Inc.com / Leadership / Models / Perception

“Resilience: What The New York Times, New Yorker and Most of Academia Got Wrong” (My Inc. story)

My latest Inc.com story "Resilience: What The New York Times, New Yorker and Most of Academia Got Wrong" begins Resilience: What The New York Times, New Yorker, and Most of Academia Got Wrong If you want to be resilient, not just know about resilience, research and the media won't help you. [the story starts with a picture of an athlete covered in mud, struggling to make it] You're covered in mud, exhausted, bruised, and have a long way to go. Disaster or glory? Any leader or entrepreneur knows it's how you look at it. The active among us find ways to motivate ourselves and our teams. Resilience is a hot topic. It's valuable to know to handle challenges and recover from adversity. Those who can…

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April 1, 2016

Choosing/Decision-Making / Education / Entrepreneurship / Leadership

My courses will lead students to leave traditional, lecture-based universities — to greater success and reward

I loved university. Studying physics, universities are about the only places to learn it. I value university for many things. They do a lot of valuable things better than any other institution or alternatives---the hard sciences, for example. It's not right for everyone and it does some things terribly. Places other than universities do some non-academic activities so much better than school. Experiential learning---how I teach leadership, entrepreneurship, sales, and hustling---is so much more effective at teaching leadership, entrepreneurship, sales, and hustling, than traditional, lecture-based education, that you could consider the latter counterproductive. Moreover, experiential courses where students create major projects can sometimes lead them to their life's great passion. I spoke with such a guy the other day. The first experiential class he took…

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March 30, 2016

Choosing/Decision-Making / Education / Entrepreneurship / Fitness / Models / Perception / Relationships

I’ve been catching up my whole life

School Doing a gratitude exercise recently, writing my undergraduate advisor who helped me figure out how to major in physics starting my second semester junior year. Physics is intense so most of my classmates were younger, having known their major since high school. So academically, I was catching up with classmates from when I chose my major. I just finished the major in my last semester and got into Penn for graduate school, so I felt caught up. Graduate school brought a new level of classmates. Many of them came from abroad, where their educational systems had them take only math and science classes from fifteen or sixteen years old. Some of them had taken forty math and science classes. Columbia is a liberal arts…

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March 29, 2016

Art / Awareness / Creativity / Entrepreneurship / Inc.com

Why Entrepreneurs Are Today’s Artists (My Inc. article today)

Read my article on Inc. today: "Why Entrepreneurs Are Today's Artists" It begins Why Entrepreneurs Are Today's Artists What is today's greatest source of creativity, expression, social change, progress, innovation, introspection, performance, determination, struggle, challenge, and even truth and beauty? Artists change how we see and think about the world. Visiting Paris's Musee D'Orsayfor the first time in twenty years made me wonder if artists today are changing how we see the world like a century ago. Manet, Monet, Degas, Cezanne, their peers, mentors, and legacies--to pick one of countless lineages--provoked discussion and debate in their time and affected society and culture forever. The biggest debates on art in my time surrounded a photograph of a crucifix in urine and a portrait of the virgin Mary with feces. Maybe I'm shortsighted, but today's…

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March 25, 2016

Education / Entrepreneurship / Exercises / Tips

Overview of my experiential course in entrepreneurial thinking and behavior

How does a course get student reviews like these? "This is one of the greatest classes I have ever taken. It was engaging, thought provoking, challenging, and fun. Josh is an incredible teacher, mentor, and friend to everyone in the class who is passionate about the subject matter. If I could take this class all over again, I would" — "10/10 would take again! I loved every second of this class, but what's cooler, is that I think I may have loved the homework even more." — "As a senior, this was the first course that challenged me, asking me to think outside my comfort zones. Yet, it is also where I developed a strong network of supporters through group projects." — "I cannot even…

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March 24, 2016

Entrepreneurship / Inc.com / Stories

Product review: Webinarninja embarrassed me in front of customers. One of the worst products I’ve used.

EDIT: I've started using Webinarjam, which has worked flawlessly so far. I recommend it instead. I haven't compared it with others beside Webinarninja, which failed me miserably and whose customer support wasted my time, so I can say it works. It's possible there are better alternatives, but I'm happy with it. To see my use of Webinarjam in action, check out my recurring webinar describing my leadership course, which as of January 2016 runs weekly on Thursdays. Click here to register and see it (you can unsubscribe after watching it). I am pleased to promote products and services that deliver or overdeliver, such as a remarkably helpful flight attendant, my thirty-year-old-and-still-going-strong rice cooker / vegetable steamer / miracle appliance, and the pressure cooker that has…

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March 21, 2016

Entrepreneurship / Models / Nonjudgment / Tips

Don’t “Become an entrepreneur.” Solve people’s problems so well they pay you for it.

Teaching entrepreneurship, I often hear people say they want "to become an entrepreneur," "to be their own boss," and "to run their own company." I have to distinguish between thinking and behaving entrepreneurially and "becoming an entrepreneur." Thinking and behaving entrepreneurially means identifying problems that people would pay you to solve, figuring out how to solve them, creating sustainable models to implement the solutions, attracting teammates, marketing and selling the solutions, and so on. Note that everything here emerges from the problem and the people feeling it. They come first, not you. You serve them. The solution and everything after, depends on the problem and the people feeling it. "Becoming an entrepreneur" means you want to start a company or be your own boss, so…

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March 19, 2016

Awareness / Entrepreneurship / Leadership / Perception

Know the problem to solve it

Entrepreneurs solve problems. So do leaders. If you don't understand the problem, you won't know how to solve it. If you want help from others, if you don't understand the problem, you'll lead people to give you useless advice. People feel like solutions make them heroes, so they focus on what they consider solutions, but if you don't understand the problem from the perspective of people feeling it---that is, your potential customers---you can only solve it accidentally. Understanding the problem enables you to solve it. Einstein said if you gave him an hour to solve a problem he'd spend fifty-five minutes understanding the problem and five minutes working on the solution. He solved a few hard problems so might be someone worth emulating in that…

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March 16, 2016

Awareness / Entrepreneurship / Leadership / Nonjudgment

Why people fear failure. It’s not what you think.

I hear people talk about how much people fear failure, but also that you have to learn to handle failure. They talk about it like it's abstract---just not achieving a goal you want to. Like if you want to start a business and you end up not making money. Or you want to achieve some other goal and don't. We don't like not achieving goals, but we don't fear such abstraction. Humans have no inborn fear of not making money that we wanted to. We fear how not achieving our goals makes us feel. We've been made fun of, laughed at, scorned, questioned, judged, and so on for what we call failure. These outcomes led us to feel ashamed, humiliated, insecure, anxious, depressed, and so…

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March 13, 2016

Art / Choosing/Decision-Making / Entrepreneurship / Inc.com / Models / Perception

My Inc. piece today: How Beatles Producer George Martin Succeeded Where Every Label Failed

My post at Inc. today, "How Beatles Producer George Martin Succeeded Where Every Label Failed," begins: How Beatles Producer George Martin Succeeded Where Every Label Failed George Martin signed the Beatles in 1962 after every British label rejected them. How the experts missed the opportunity happens more than you think. I played Abbey Road until the stylus on my child's cheap record player destroyed each groove from Come Together to Her Majesty. I've never stopped loving The Beatles' music and still consider them my favorite musicians. George Martin, the band's producer, died yesterday at 90. It's hard to imagine that every British record label rejected them before him. It's hard to imagine music today without "The most popular and influential rock act of all time,…

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March 9, 2016

Awareness / Entrepreneurship / Exercises / Leadership / Relationships / Stories / Tips

Video: How to Make Meaningful Connections

Here is the video from Sunday's webinar on How to Make Meaningful Connections, which, as I describe in it and you'll find if you practice the exercise in it, is about how to develop compassion. The exercise in this webinar teaches some of the most valuable skills you can learn about relationships. Every leader I've ever heard talk about compassion describes it as critical, up there with empathy and self-awareness. Scratch that. Every successful person, not just leaders. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9h3gNZ3rl4 If you want your questions answered, attend the webinars or contact me. By the way, I'm still getting to the questions people responded to in my poll on what your most important question about leadership is. If you haven't responded to it, please do, at this…

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March 8, 2016

Choosing/Decision-Making / Entrepreneurship

Committing makes things happen that waiting prevents

I spent years juggling three passions---my company, making art, and teaching leadership---waiting for something external to show which I should devote myself to. I was doing above average in each, but wanted to excel. The sign never came. Having said "You have to say no to a lot of good things to have a great life" many times, I decided to live by it. I chose to focus on leadership and let go of the company and the art. Suddenly the signs I had hoped to happen happened. I started getting leadership job offers, connections, clients, revenue, and so on. Why did it happen after I chose? Couldn't the signs have come before, and made deciding easier? I've used the following quote a lot recently…

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March 6, 2016

Creativity / Entrepreneurship / Inc.com / Models

Inc.com Today: This Insidious (and Subtle) Innovation Myth is Killing Your Creativity

My post today on Inc.com, "This Insidious (and Subtle) Innovation Myth is Killing Your Creativity," begins: This Insidious (and Subtle) Innovation Myth is Killing Your Creativity This specious myth is so commonly held enough that few challenge it. Yet overcoming it is easy and rewarding. Thomas Edison was an outlier. For someone to invent so many products and succeed with so many, even accounting for his failures, just doesn't happen, before or after him. Elon Musk, with several innovations, is still an outlier. It's rare that someone could come up with multiple ideas, let alone to succeed with even one of them. Jeff Bezos, while more financially successful than most, is more typical in terms of innovation. Most of us would be lucky to come…

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March 4, 2016

Choosing/Decision-Making / Education / Entrepreneurship / Exercises

How can you find passion if you don’t try, even if you don’t know where to try?

Everyone wants to find a passion---something that engages them so much they love doing it and working on it doesn't feel like work. Most of us hold back from trying because we aren't sure what we might feel passion for. We know we don't feel passion for anything now. Maybe this, maybe that. Unsure which, and afraid of picking something we'll later learn we don't feel passion for, we don't try. Teaching people to behave entrepreneurially, I see people hold back a lot. They don't realize they're holding back, protecting their vulnerabilities. They just feel like they don't know what they want. One of the students in my online entrepreneurship course, after doing all but the last exercise, realized he wanted to take a different…

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February 27, 2016

Education / Entrepreneurship

Almost nothing inspires more than helping others so much that they pay you for it

I'm getting good at leading students to inspiration. I can't wait to release my online entrepreneurship course (contact me if you're interested in taking it), which is where I'm seeing all the inspiration. I'm not talking about short-term feelings of inspiration. If you want to build muscle, quotes from Arnold Schwarzenegger from his Pumping Iron days may make you feel inspired, but you'll still have to keep motivating yourself to go to the gym. Teaching entrepreneurship has shown me that when someone identifies a problem, the people feeling it, and a way to solve it, and they engage themselves in implementing the solution, they get more than temporary feelings of inspiration. They get enduring passion, like they can make a meaningful difference in others' lives…

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February 25, 2016

Entrepreneurship / Leadership / SIDCHAs

My bold next stages

Emails to great, long-time friends you don't see that often give you the chance to reflect on longer stages than normal and to put together thoughts more complex than you think daily. I wrote the following to one such friend, capturing the change my change in focus and direction following my increased confidence in my courses as I've seen hundreds of people succeed in them. Some of it feels over the top, but I believe having bold goals helps you achieve them. The email: At long last, I'm switching from developing my material to promoting and selling it. I held back because I felt promoting and selling would distract me from developing more, though I didn't know if that development had an ending point. Now…

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February 24, 2016

Entrepreneurship / Inc.com / Stories

Why Disaster Was the Best Thing to Happen to Me as an Entrepreneur

My post today on Inc.com, "Why Disaster Was the Best Thing to Happen to Me as an Entrepreneur," begins: Why Disaster Was the Best Thing to Happen to Me as an Entrepreneur You want experience in people you hire and yourself too. Only the more useful the experience, the more painful it is to gain. Do you know how to tell how good at something someone is? I've learned: Clueless people brag about how great they are. Masters tell you the disasters they overcame on the way to mastery. The masters' stories are more fun and educational. I hope you enjoy and learn from mine. You Value Experience, But Not Any Experience When you hire, you look for experience, but not any experience. Anyone the same age has the same…

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February 23, 2016

Entrepreneurship / Exercises / Fitness / Habits / Leadership / SIDCHAs

Webinar: Self-Imposed Daily Challenging Activities, Saturday 1pm EST

After teaching, coaching, studying, and practicing leadership for twenty years, I announced my online leadership course, "Introducing the most effective leadership course available anywhere." I'm hosting a series of free webinars on the most actionable, useful, effective, and exciting parts of the course. My webinars will always deliver exclusive, valuable lessons you can use that day and how to build for the long term. Attend my third webinar, free, this Saturday, February 27, 1pm Eastern Standard Time! All you need is an internet connection. SIDCHAs: Self-Imposed Daily Challenging Healthy Activities If you read my blog you know about SIDCHAs. Learn more about them in detail and how you can make them work for you. Read more about them here to learn how critically useful they…

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February 22, 2016

Education / Entrepreneurship / Exercises / Leadership

Another problem with traditional education: Employers are disappointed by traditionally educated students

I've written "Why I avoid lecturing when I lead and teach", asked "Does lecturing turn schools into prisons?", and discussed "How lecturing is the opposite of how we learn". As if those reasons weren't enough, the most-credentialed students that traditional education produces disappoint employers in areas where jobs. This video of the director and producer of a documentary on project-based learning shows what they learned from people who hire at top Silicon Valley companies don't value credentials of traditional education. https://joshuaspodek.com/mlts_interview Compare these outcomes with the student voices from my last course, "This is one of the greatest classes I have ever taken. It was engaging, thought provoking, challenging, and fun." Do they sound like they're waiting for someone to tell them what to do?…

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February 11, 2016

Education / Entrepreneurship / Events / Exercises / Leadership

Three Leadership Secrets You’ll Never Learn Reading A Book

I've taught, coached, studied, and practiced leadership for twenty years. After announcing my online leadership course on my blog, "Introducing the most effective leadership course available anywhere," I'm hosting a series of webinars on the most actionable, useful, effective, and exciting parts of the course. My webinars will always deliver exclusive, valuable lessons you can use that day and how to build for the long term. Attend my first webinar, free, this Saturday, February 6, 1pm Eastern Standard Time! All you need is an internet connection. Three Leadership Secrets You'll Never Learn Reading A Book Click to register! From the registration page: What You'll Learn in The Webinar The value of behavior and experience beyond reading, no matter how valuable what you read What researchers…

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February 3, 2016

Audio / Awareness / Choosing/Decision-Making / Creativity / Education / Entrepreneurship / Exercises / Leadership / Models / Nonjudgment / Relationships / Tips

Introducing the most effective leadership course available anywhere

If you read this blog, you know I care about leadership and how to improve yours---in business, personal, family, and every other part of your life. I presume you do too. As much as you've learned from the blog, you can learn more from doing. If you want to improve because you're moving up the corporate ladder, just finished school, starting your own projects, or any other reason that you have to lead people and teams, developing leadership skills from practice will improve you most effectively. Anyone can improve their ability to lead, and the most effective improvement comes from experience, not books, lectures, or case studies. Or even my blog. I created what I believe the most effective course in leadership you can find…

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February 2, 2016

Choosing/Decision-Making / Entrepreneurship / Inc.com / Relationships

Have I wrung this opportunity dry — absolutely, completely dry?

If persistence pays off, how far do you persist? How often do you persist (politely) until you've wrong an opportunity dry---absolutely, completely dry? As I wrote on Inc.com yesterday in "How to Build the Best Relationships With Both Leaders and Superiors," people appreciate helping others---if you behave like you deserve it, but not like you're entitled. A student of mine was applying to graduate school. She told me how she applied and had visited a few of the schools she was applying to. She had researched some professors she wanted to work with but hadn't contacted them---even in her number one choice school. While I recognized she had other priorities, like her current studies, I could tell she hadn't yet learned the value of persisting…

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January 30, 2016

Awareness / Entrepreneurship / Inc.com / Leadership / Perception / Relationships / Stories

Inc.com Today: Why You Should Never Let Anyone Call You ‘Smart’ in Business

My post today on Inc.com, "Why You Should Never Let Anyone Call You 'Smart' in Business" begins: Intelligence is good so entrepreneurs should like being called smart, right? Wrong. People call you smart when you have nothing they care about more. Look at who doesn't care if you're smart in business: Customers value products and services that solve their problems. Employees want to pay their rent and enjoy their jobs. Suppliers want to get paid. But the big concern is investors. Read the rest at the site: Why You Should Never Let Anyone Call You 'Smart' in Business

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January 27, 2016

Education / Entrepreneurship / Inc.com / SIDCHAs

How Inc. Magazine improved overnight

Inc. Magazine, in its own words: For 35 years, we've been the premier publication dedicated to entrepreneurs---the most innovative, most courageous, and most essential business leaders in America. In that time, Inc. has won widespread recognition for maintaining the highest editorial standards as we've documented that world. How did it improve overnight? They hired me as their latest columnist! Today marks my first piece, "How I Wish Business School Had Taught Me Leadership." First time here? My editor tells me I may see more readers than usual, with Inc.'s 1.57 million Twitter followers. If you're new here, the links below give you an idea of what to find here. If you like it, subscribe to my newsletter with the purple button at the top right.…

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January 25, 2016

Education / Entrepreneurship / Leadership

Two types of students?

I teach, but not how nearly all my teachers taught me. I teach experientially. I try to avoid lecturing. I try to include in the classroom the challenges life will challenge students with, not abstractions. Nearly all my students come from years of lecturing and abstract learning. I find two broad types of students. I don't think they're different types of people. I think they come from different types of backgrounds. The first type wants to learn about leadership or entrepreneurship. The second type wants to learn to do them. I spent most of my life and education in the first type. Obviously, I've moved into the second type and prefer it. Which type are you of the following, if either? The first type often…

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January 21, 2016