April This month is rich with excellent opportunities to get more out of life! Celebrate the month by taking a chance on something, taking a walk to your favorite spot, encouraging a writer and youth in their studies, protecting the earth, and volunteering to help rebuild for families around the country! Don't pressure yourself to dive deep into all of these causes, but do scope them out to find out which aligns with your interests and passions. You may just get involved with a great organization where you can volunteer your time or even find your dream career! Check out what April has to … [Read more...]
Why a Sense of Humor Matters
From Chapter 7, "Tolerating Risk: Being a Doer, Not a Dreamer" in Ingredients of Outliers Sense of Humor/ Humility Another essential quality the successful entrepreneur must have is a sense of humor. Things will go wrong, often at the most unexpected and inopportune times. The customer who came to my hot dog stand and announced to all within earshot that I was the doctor who’d treated him in the emergency department a week earlier is a case in point. An embarrassing moment? You bet it was! But I still laugh every time I think about it. A sense of humor is what keeps an entrepreneur … [Read more...]
Learning from Failure
From Chapter 2 "Fail Fast: The Gift of Failure" in Ingredients of Outliers Going into Business[es] With my newly discovered burst of self-confidence, I decided to launch my business career. But where to start? I’d once entertained thoughts of owning a restaurant. I knew nothing about restaurant operations, so I thought it would be less risky to start out with hot dog stands. I bought five of them, and in the winter in Phoenix, Arizona, they did really well—in the summer, however, not so much. The hot dog stands were a huge failure—but that didn’t stop me. Since then I’ve started, or … [Read more...]
Trumping Failure
We are sure many of you are familiar with the name Donald Trump: star of hit TV show "The Apprentice", chairman and president of the Trump Organization, founder of Trump Entertainment Resorts, investor, author and billionaire. With countless achievements under his belt, one might think this all comes easy to Trump, but in fact, success was not handed to him. Trump had to overcome obstacles and took ample risk. Trump started his off his working life at his father’s real estate company and eventually built his own personal real estate empire. Unfortunately, interest payments became to much and … [Read more...]
Taking a Risk to Make History
Vivian Jones enrolled at the University of Alabama in 1963. She was one of the first two black students to be enrolled at an all-white school. Jones took a risk every day just by attending her classes. She encountered countless death threats and endless ridicule throughout her time at the school. Even Alabama Governor George C. Wallace attempted to block Jones and the other black student from entering the all-white school by standing in front of the entrance of the auditorium. Jones pressed on and became the first African-American student to graduate from a university, receiving a B.A. in … [Read more...]