Master Class Monday: Seth Godin on being a linchpin

in

Here is the first (of many, I’m sure!) Master Class Monday’s featuring Seth Godin.

This is a talk that he gave at Catalyst 2010 that he recently featured on Akimbo. It is crazy how relevant all of it still is a full decade later!

Seth crams an awful lot of content into 51 minutes here.

One of my favorite parts is when he talks about competence no longer being a scarce commodity in the age of Google. That is only more true 10 years later.

Seth talks about creating a movement and that people will hate your movement.

He also talks about being a linchpin, about making yourself indispensable. The age of Google has done nothing to diminish the importance of being a linchpin and nothing ever will.

Master Class Monday: Dorrie Clark on how to overcome writer's block (or literally anything else!)

in

“It needs to be good and it needs to be done. And those are different things than being perfect.”

—Dori Clark

For the latest Master Class Monday, this video addresses overcoming writer’s block in less than two minutes. You can substitute literally anything for writer’s block.

Don’t hide behind the fake excuse of being a “perfectionist.” I’ve done it many times myself. It is a lie you are telling yourself because you are scared you aren’t good enough.

You might not be. So you’d better get your next attempt out of your system and into the world as soon as possible. Because the only way to get to the fourth iteration of your website is to share the first three with the world.

Great advice from Dorie Clark!

Master Class Monday: Annie Duke on decision making

in

Introducing Monday Master Class!

I am constantly searching for videos, podcast episodes, blog posts, really any content to keep me learning. I am now going to share one thing such thing each week on Mondays.

When I stop learning I get complacent. But like you, I am busy enough that it can be pretty easy for me to stop carving out the time needed to learn. That’s why I value people online who can curate things for me. When I am presented with great content, all I have to do is consume it. There’s no time tracking it down.

That’s what I’m going to attempt to do with this feature feature moving forward.

First up is former professional poker player Annie Duke. She wrote a book that comes highly recommended (I haven’t read it yet!) titled Thinking in Bets. (You can read Derek Sivers’ notes on the book here.)

One thing she says in this interview is that people frequently associate a good outcome with a good decision and she pushes back on that in a thoughtful way. Sometimes we can make a bad decision and because of luck it can turn out well.

Similarly, we can make a good decision (based on all available information at the time) and due to bad luck, the results can be bad. But that does not make it a bad decision.

She goes into detail and it really got me thinking about how I frame my decisions.

Also valuable in this video is her laying out how to ask people for advice, and specifically, how not to do so.

I found this video worth my time and hopefully you will too!

Last thing, I would love to get some suggestions for videos (can be longer YouTube clips like this or a 90-second IGTV clip from Instagram that you found especially thought-provoking. Ideally, I’d love for their to be a variety of long clips and short clips.

But if you have anything to share, please just shoot me an email to andrew@tem.fm and I might include it in a future Master Class Monday with a shout-out. Thanks!

Poker champion and author Annie Duke speaks with Prof. Adi Wyner on the "Thinking in Bets" panel at the 2019 Wharton Sports Business Summit. Learn more about...

The Perfect Thing

in

I stumbled onto this article from a marketer I wasn’t familiar with, Michel Fortin. I found this post because he quoted Dori Clark, whose work I love.

An excerpt from the article:

Screenshot_20200820-213714.png

The perfect thing doesn’t exist so stop hiding behind the excuse of waiting for it. Do your best. Not your best overall. Your best right now. Then share it with the world. Then do it again just a little better.

That’s all any of the people we look up to in the business have ever done.

Article: An Impossible Choice: Music Majors, COVID-19, and an Uncertain Future

in

We are living through remarkable times. I was explaining to my six-year-old the other day that literally no one alive has ever lived through something like this. That applies to people and to institutions.

Higher ed has been under some immense pressure of late for a number of reasons. And this pandemic has really accelerated a lot of those pressures, which is putting it lightly.

This article by Zach Finkelstein and Dana Lynne Varga dives into the choices that current and former college music majors are currently faced with. There are no good choices.

“With fewer or no opportunities to perform live at school, can music degrees live up to their mandate to prepare students for a career? In other words, what is the value of a socially distanced degree in music performance? And if the value is significantly reduced, and given the extraordinary financial stress on young music students and their families, what is the best course of action?”

Particularly interesting is the end of the article where the authors map out how a student who is either deferring or taking a year off could continue their education on their own for a fraction of the cost of attending college this upcoming year.

It will be fascinating to see how all of this plays out, both this year and moving forward.

Did I mention we are living through remarkable times?

Click here to read the article.

Do what matters, now

in

“The life you have left is a gift. Cherish it. Enjoy it now, to the fullest. Do what matters, now.”

―Leo Babauta

If you aren't in love, really and truly IN LOVE, with some aspect of your life or career, make a change. What are you waiting for?

Far too often I see people (myself included!) continuing to do something they don't love because they lack the courage to make a change. But rest assured, any time I am not making a change because I'm afraid of the uncertainty on the other side of it, I tell myself a great story that involves all sorts of reasons other than fear to justify it in my head. And I always believe that story, too!

I can't tell you how many TEM Coaching clients I've had over the years who wrestled with a decision that to me as an outsider was an obvious one and when they finally made it they were ecstatic they did.

And I would be remiss to not point out that even though I'm someone who gets paid to help people make these kinds of decisions that I still struggle with making them myself occasionally!

Derek Sivers has a great formula for living life. He says if it's not a &@#$ yes, it's a no. If you are presented with an opportunity (or considering staying in a current one), a no is obviously a no. A maybe is also a no. Derek says that even a yes is a no. The only things he recommends you say yes to are ones that are a &@#$ yes!

Circling back to the above quote, doing anything that I'm not fully and 100% into feels like wasting the gift that is the life we have left. We have to do what matters today because we aren't guaranteed even one more day. There is no time like the present.

This is of course an oversimplification. There are lots of reasons to not simply cut loose an aspect of your portfolio career or your life in general, especially during a pandemic.

Health insurance. Shelter. Food on the table. Stability for yourself or your family. None of these are optional.

But even while checking these vital boxes, we all have more control over how we choose to spend our precious time than we sometimes realize. This is a point that I’ve seen made over and over again in the books that have had the biggest impact on me. It's also a point I've seen the people I look up to model repeatedly through their actions.

In my professional career I’ve quit four college teaching jobs and two professional brass quintets and every single time it was a good decision for me and for them. Anyone reading this is busy just like me. Any time we say yes to anything, we are by definition saying no to other things.

Saying yes to something you like but don’t love or to something that doesn’t have much impact on the world is saying no to doing more important work with the limited amount of time you have left on this earth.

It’s a cliche but this isn’t a dress rehearsal! We only get one crack at this. That’s why I am constantly trying to evaluate my priorities and always trying to have the courage to make difficult decisions. Those decisions will never end in my career and in life so all I can do is face them. Because putting off a difficult decision becomes a decision in and of itself.

Do what matters, now.