Author: Garth Beyer

There’s a professor at a school of business that was let go recently because the university was 18 million in the red. This professor wasn’t an ordinary professor. His entire curriculum was built around real experiences.

He, himself, started a handful of businesses and now runs a consulting company, so he’s consistently armed with timely real-world experiences.

The readings he assigned were not classic text books. They were business memoirs; books business owners have written about their personal experiences. All from the last 5 years, too.

The lectures he gave. Well, he wasn’t the one who really gave them. He brought in current business owners and community leaders to speak on the topics people needed to learn to be successful.

I was blessed to have been invited to his class once to speak on marketing.

The students in there were remarkably adept. They were curious. I could tell they have learned a ton, that they cared about the class, that they recognized the value in learning from real experiences.

It may cost less to bring a teacher with no previous business experience in that knows the pre-set textbook curriculum, but boy does it cost each person, the university and our culture so much more.

If you’re considering going back for your MBA. You’re better off skipping it and taking out a loan to start a business and get real experience.

Alas, if that’s too scary. At least consider the AltMBA. It’s the bridge you’re looking for. And, quite frankly, it’s the bridge anyone considering enrolling in the professor’s now disembodied and defunct curriculum needs.

Stay Positive & Follow The Leaders More Than The Readers

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p.s. If you’re a professor, teacher, coach like the one that was let go. Thank you for all you do. You’re valued more than you will ever know by generations of people you may never meet.

A customer that’s a customer forever isn’t that great.

Like any loyalty loop or innovation adoption curve, it’s a beautiful thing when the peak is reached.

Unlike a loyalty loop or innovation adoption curve, when a customer turns into a friend then there’s no longer that significant of a risk of drop off.

They’re in this with you as much as you are.

So, sure, get the customers you need to help you create the change you seek to make. But go ahead and work toward them becoming friends, too.

You’ll be thankful you did.

Stay Positive & Grow Together

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Hassle is weight on our shoulders.

It’s usually a time-suck, too.

Inconvenience takes us away from focusing on creating the change we wish to make.

But so does the time we spend sulking on sunk costs of paying to have the hassle removed.

Paying, bartering or ridding ourselves of hassle is actually an investment.

When there’s only 24 hours in a day, it’s worth ensuring you can get the most of them.

Too much time is wasted DIY’ing things we don’t want to DIY or feeling regret for investing in someone else to do them for us.

Now that’s a real hassle.

Stay Positive & Only You Can Take The Weight Off Your Shoulders

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You don’t need to become a master, though that opportunity is as much yours as anyone else’s.

Getting better doesn’t even need to take a lot of work. You don’t need to exhaust yourself or completely reinvent your life.

It simply comes down to consistency of attempt with a mind that’s curious enough to either learn from a failure or to leverage the momentum of success.

Stay Positive & It Starts With Starting

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Milestones aren’t just memorable moments.

They are the points in time that people change the most. It’s the time that worldviews are easiest to change. Behaviors, too.

It’s why so many businesses are launched on holidays, goals are set on new year’s, fresh habits are attempted after one’s birthday.

It’s why we’re advertised to more when we get married or have a kid or buy a house. Those are the moments we are most susceptible to switching brands (which is really code for most likely to switch world views).

If it’s easiest to make a change for the better during a milestone, it makes sense to make our own milestones.

They don’t need to be big, but they need to exist. They give us a platform to leap from. It might mean we force a move or we designate our own holiday. It might even mean that we celebrate a self-designated day of starting.

Starting the work we’ve been procrastinating. Starting to change the behaviors we’ve been frustrated with upholding.

Simply starting.

Stay Positive & BYOM (Build Your Own Milestone)

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Downtime isn’t as effective as it sounds.

It enables competition to move forward beyond you. It leaves customers wondering what’s next or if you’ll even be back.

Far different than uptime. The investment we put in leveling up, proactively communicating and connecting on a new level.

Stay Positive & What Time Is It?

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There are a number of things in life that everyone needs. There’s literally a hierarchy to it, but that aside, there’s also a social and emotional space we all need, too – a reprieve.

A reprieve from the craziness of the world and the pressure we feel and the burdens we’re carrying.

Now more than ever people are searching for a specific reprieve. One that gives a sense of normalcy and care.

It might be a place or a person or a thing, but whatever it is, it’s something you might be able to offer and grow from.

Whether you’re leading a team, a personal brand, a small business or some other entity. What you served may not be the reprieve people need now.

A good place to (re)start is to (re)listen.

Stay Positive & Then Pivot And Build

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