Study Skills My Ass

Posted inSchool / Education2 Comments on Study Skills My Ass

That’s the latest from my advisor at school. Do the reading better = get better grades. Makes sense. But it’s not why I have a C in the class. “I’m sure you’re really busy with your business thing and your other interests but…” It’s impossible for me to try to explain the amount of emotional and intellectual energy that goes to other things, and many times it seems like I can’t control it when my mind wanders. I’m just so god damn fidgety when reading page after page of 400-page textbook after 400-page textbook that I’d rather sit back and watch Cornel West engage in rhetorical wizardry and ponder the implications of moving away from an examined, Socratic society and into a materialistic, anti-intellectual one.

I felt pretty abandoned after that advisor meeting. I wish they would stop taking the same cookie cutter model and trying to mold me around that…I want to be different. I think different. I am different. My philosophies may not always be right, but they’re different.

Comment

National Center for Women and Info Tech

Posted inPhilanthropyLeave a comment on National Center for Women and Info Tech

On Monday night I went to a reception in Palo Alto hosted by the National Center for Women and Information Technology. My friend Brad Feld is chairman of this non-profit which seeks to ensure that women are fully represented in the creation and application of information technology. This is something that I’ve always wondered as I go around meeting folks and 99% of the time it is men.

I saw some old friends (most from the extended Mobius family) and met a couple interesting people. The point I hammered home to folks was that outreach to women in IT needs to start at the grammar and high school level. For example, in my electronic music class at school 1 out of 24 of the students is a woman, and in the Computer Science AP class I hear there is just one or two. If technology is a “guy’s thing” all throughout school, we can’t be surprised that so few women choose to focus on things other than technology in college and in life.

This is just one of the non-profits I’m monitoring. Check them out. I’ll be posting later on my thoughts on integrating blogs and philanthropy…as the holiday season approaches.

Comment

Friends of Ben: Michael Simmons

Posted inFriends of BenLeave a comment on Friends of Ben: Michael Simmons

Network: Ben Casnocha > It’s, like, Ben’s Blog > Michael Simmons

Google: Michael Simmons + Entrepreneur

So far I’ve profiled two friends – an accomplished software company CEO and a VC from Cupertino. Today, I am profiling someone much younger. In fact, Michael Simmons (blog) is just finishing up NYU. But he is a name you don’t want to forget.

I first met Michael this past summer when I was in New York City. He found out about me through my blog. Michael had just finished giving a speech to some youth on entrepreneurship when he came outside and we met and chatted in a park near NYU. Within the first 5 minutes I realized I really liked Michael and what he was doing – he was kind, determined, and not the least bit self-centered despite all the speaking and writing he has done. (He published a book, available on Amazon, called The Student Success Manifesto.)

Michael has started Extreme Entrepreneurship: An Education Corporation as the follow up to his book. They’re all about empowering young people to start companies, come up with ideas, obtain support and mentoring from older people, and the like. His focus is about nuturing the entrepreneurial lifestyle. That’s really cool and something I’ll blog about later. Their three guiding principles are:

“Be the change you want to see…” – Gandhi Empowerment is a young adult’s ability to make the best decisions to available in each moment regardless of background, environment, or other external factors.

“All education is self-education.” – Isaac Asimov
Parents, mentors, friends, administrators are all crucial to development, but most important and core is each young adult’s ability to empower him or herself.

We are all naturally visionary and productive. For us to not to be, something must have gone wrong. The best way for young adults to rediscover their innate curiosity and passion is by empowering themselves to LEAP.

If you peruse Michael’s blog you’ll find it rich in deep insights that touch on not just entrepreneurship but the total life picture with stuff on philosophy, religion, spirituality, fear, and the like. His post 3 Life Transforming Vuja Daze Strategies is good, and I also reccomend Our Deepest Fear.

Michael is a leader of today and will be a leader of tomorrow because he so well versed in various disciplines of social thought. I believe that succesful entrepreneurs and people are those who are interesting. And you’re only interesting if you know at least a little about a lot of different things. Michael is a good example of someone anchored in entrepreneurship but a deep thinker in other areas.

Comment

Basketball Season: Real-World Application of Business-Sports Analogies

Posted inSports1 Comment on Basketball Season: Real-World Application of Business-Sports Analogies

I always love talking to adults who played high school sports and listen to them reminince about Friday night games, the big crowds, the close games that went the other way, the ref who blew the call in the 4th quarter. I love it because I know am I living those experiences right now and to hear people talk about their memories it helps me think about what kind of memories do I want to create right now.

Last year, I was the only sophomore on the varsity basketball team who started and got big minutes. I also was chosen to the 2nd Team All League group. These two things prompted the coach to name me co-captain of the team along with another senior this year. This is a very unusual move as juniors are rarely captains if there are other seniors on the team. But, I know I earned it, and I know that I will be able to be a strong leader on the team.

It is great to get back into the daily basketball world after being immersed in the business world since March. In the business world, people say “Let’s punt on this point and bring it up in the next presentation” or “We need a score here or else this deal will go into overtime.” It seems like every business situation could be compared to a game of ‘hoops or football or soccer. I like when people use a sports analogy – hey, people understand things better when you talk in a lingo that they appreciate…a basic tenet of oral anthropology.

My co-captain position on this year’s team will also allow me to apply some of the leadership lessons I’ve accumulated over the years. Beacuse of the nature of my company and my current role in it, it is not always easy for me to read a great leadership article and then apply it the very next day. Over the next four months, I will be able to do that.

Like in any business environment, there are substantial interpersonal issues which need to be flushed out. Egos getting in the way. People pissed about playing time. One person is pissed that I was named captain and is trying to systematically undermine my credibility. Over the past week I’ve been meeting with the coaches and my co-captain to finalize the rosters. Today, with the team set, we will be doing a goal-setting exercise.

I do need to be cautious not to be toooo business like in my approach this year for the team. Occassionally friends from school will say “Jeeze Ben, stop taking such a business-like attitude.” My automatic reaction to anything is to make sure everyone is really organized, everyone is communicating, milestones, goals, progress, etc etc. This approach is not always congruent to how people in school approach projects which is usually: First, procrastinate. Second, procrastinate. Third, and most important, procrastinate.

Over the next four months I may share some of my experiences as I work to create a close-knit team and a team that achieves excellence on the court.

Comment

The Recovering Secularist

Posted inReligion / Spirituality2 Comments on The Recovering Secularist

I came across a good March 2003 article in the Atlantic by David Brooks on the "Recovering Secularist" – a six step program. This really got at how I’m feeling now a days, out here in the San Francisco bubble (or as some of my San Franciscans call it, the United States of Canada with the rest of the US "Jesusland"). The first step:

There are six steps in the recovery process. First you have to accept the fact that you are not the norm. Western foundations and universities send out squads of researchers to study and explain religious movements. But as the sociologist Peter Berger has pointed out, the phenomenon that really needs explaining is the habits of the American professoriat: religious groups should be sending out researchers to try to understand why there are pockets of people in the world who do not feel the constant presence of God in their lives, who do not fill their days with rituals and prayers and garments that bring them into contact with the divine, and who do not believe that God’s will should shape their public lives.

Comment