What happens after arts school?

DailyLit’s Question: Sweet or Salty?

DailyLit’s question this week is simple: sweet or salty? Which do you prefer? You can enter your preference here.

Thanks to Gretchen Rubin (of The Happiness Project) for the idea behind this…

DailyLit Launches More Khan Academy Video Courses

DailyLit has just launched the following additional Khan Academy Video Courses:
-Chemistry
-Current Economics
-Finance
-Organic Chemistry
-Paulson Bailout
-Pre-calculus
-…

DailyLit News: Rhyme and Reason

In case you miss it in your inbox, here’s the latest newsletter from DailyLit:

What’s in here:
Note from the Founder
New: Poetry Collections
Earth Day, Every Day
Creative Challenge: Shaking…

The entire curve doesn’t buy Starbucks or iPhones and both companies succeed as a result. Many orgs make the mistake of thinking they need to bridge the chasm in order to grow.

"The difference between a freelancer & an entrepreneur:
An entrepreneur asks - is there someone better that could do this job?"

Sometimes it is scary to thrash.

I think I underestimated the term. 

I mean, really, when I think about the word “thrash,” I think about a shark biting a chunk of bait (let’s say “bait”, not like “leg”) and fighting with it until he gets to eat the whole thing.

Gross.

And as I am in the process of thrashing through the details of a project right now, I am feeling that fight. I sit at my desk and sometimes wish that no one else would ask me a question or that someone else would run the meeting because hello. I’m kinda scared here.

But what separates us, those thrashing, from them, those who don’t thrash, is what we do with those moments.

We don’t hide because we don’t want someone else to have the answer. We don’t sit back in meetings because we are confident that even if our answer is wrong, it is going to lead us to the right one.

It is okay to fear the thrashing, to cower a bit in the presence of it. But the win comes when we keep thrashing, keep fighting, until that project is shipped. 

And what separates us from them?

We thrash because we have to ship.

And then we ship.

Booyah.

Thrash early to ship projects on time

Most important projects fail because Very Important People in your organization decide to make a last minute change.  The closer you get to ship time, the more changes from the top you will get.  Their ideas are usually great, but you would have liked them on Day 5 of the project, not midnight before the proposal is due.  Get your organization to thrash early by having everyone to agree to no changes after Day 5 (or 10, whatever makes sense).  While the new ideas may be good, they will remain only good ideas because the cost of incorporating them at the last minute is losing your bid and opportunity to get an exciting project out the door so you can move on to the next.

The whole Nano MBA Class 

Ship It

If the week long experience could be summarized into two words.